John J. Whelan
  • Home
  • About John
  • Blog
  • Books
    • Going Crazy In the Green Machine >
      • Sample Chapter from Going Crazy
    • Ghost In the Ranks >
      • Sample Chapter from Ghost In the Ranks
    • Narcissus Called My Name
  • Bookstore
  • Contact

Blog

Hero to Zero - Losing Specialness

11/29/2015

3 Comments

 
Picture
From meeting training objectives, being told that we have unique or exceptional skills, or being selected for specific deployments or duties; many military people learn that they are special. Even wearing the flag on one’s shoulder signifies that military people are set apart from everyday citizens. When we discuss operational stress, we generally focus on the particulars of bad events. We wonder why people won’t admit or talk about their problems in spite of the many well-intentioned efforts aimed at this issue. So, what gets in the way?

Pride! From day one, we are required to continually prove ourselves along with everyone else if we are to belong. We learn the costs and the value of pride. However, when we talk about mental issues, we often miss the impact of losing our special status. The constant pressure to be perfect and excel comes with a cost that most people do not understand until the wear and tear begins to show. Work harder, try harder, shut out any signs of vulnerability because it is too painful to face honestly – like falling into a bottomless pit. If everything was invested in the role; if family life was sacrificed for the job, the slide into self-judgement or giving up can be irresistible as an only outlet for those things that cannot ever be said out loud.
 
What do you do when you believe that the best you ever were is behind you - ‘when we shone as brightly as the sun with limitless possibilities?’ Each of us knows that everybody is replaceable – everybody that is but us. That is the blind spot in the service of pride. Losing special status can be a crushing blow to ego and self-image but most people are embarrassed to even talk about this loss. Most theories about mental distress miss it entirely. To go from being a key person to invisibility is often the real struggle for many people in uniform. “Where am I supposed to go now?” Veterans struggle with repairing the identity and self-image they developed in uniform; there is no going back to the people we were before joining. Many people struggle with attempts to go back to school, retraining, or taking on a civilian career after leaving the military. We often think it is due to their mental diagnoses but it is often the loss of confidence that drives their anxiety and the constant second-guessing: “I can’t do it, I won’t enjoy it….” Many people fear that the new thing will not measure up because they are looking to regain their former status.
 
Being special meant being content with ourselves. There is much talk these days about transition from the military to civilian life but these conversations leave out the importance of coming to terms with this changed identity. From my view, it is something to be dealt with head-on before people leave the military. It takes years to hone one’s military identity and I think we should spend at least some time and training to learn to take the uniform off with pride and dignity left intact.            


3 Comments
Roger Pothier
11/29/2015 09:31:15 pm

very true; however the loss of special status and its impact have been, for me, acutely affected by not necessarily the embarrassment of discussing it, but was more due to our (my) struggle with attempting to do that very thing -discuss it. when the leadership specifically orders you not to discuss or share your thoughts it becomes increasingly problematic.

so now, not only is there embarrassment in sharing your experiences there is also shame and disgust affiliated with those struggles.

what is worse than being judged by folks outside the wire is being judged by those inside the wire....the overwhelming response is to shut down and internalize every single thing in your life.

thanks for this commentary John.

Reply
John
11/30/2015 06:26:07 pm

Roger- Thanks for your comment. The way that the CoC responds is crucial.. . What they say and how senior leaders act has a profound impact on people. Am tackling this in the second book. We can't simply keep farming it all out to mental health folks to try to solve.

Reply
Roger Pothier
12/8/2015 09:12:51 pm

John, I look forward to the second book...though I am still struggling through the first :-)

perhaps there can be appropriate training and guidelines provided to those senior leaders along with 'lessons learned' that can possibly improve the interactions between leader and subordinate/subordinate and leader....

I have always been taught that in order to be an effective leader you must first become an effective follower....com

cheers, roger

Reply

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Picture

    John J. Whelan

    John J. Whelan, Ph.D., is the author of Going Crazy in the Green Machine, available now on FriesenPress.

    Follow John on social media...


    Archives

    September 2018
    May 2018
    November 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    April 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015

    Categories

    All
    The Book

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.
  • Home
  • About John
  • Blog
  • Books
    • Going Crazy In the Green Machine >
      • Sample Chapter from Going Crazy
    • Ghost In the Ranks >
      • Sample Chapter from Ghost In the Ranks
    • Narcissus Called My Name
  • Bookstore
  • Contact