WHITE RIVER JUNCTION — About 20 veterans die by suicide each day in the U.S. and 70% of them do so using a gun, according to statistics from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.
In an effort to reduce this risk, VA health care providers — including those at the White River Junction VA Medical Center — talk to veterans about how they might keep themselves safe, said Thea Schlieben, suicide prevention case manager at the White River Junction VA. Part of that discussion includes ways veterans can protect themselves from guns when they are feeling low.
The clinician’s own beliefs about firearms don’t have a place in that conversation, Schlieben said during a community mental health summit focused on treatment for pain and addiction at the White River Junction VA last Friday.
“This is not about sides,” Schlieben said. “This is about lives.”
These conversations come up as Schlieben and other providers across the VA system work with veterans to create safety plans to turn to in a time of crisis. In addition to discussing how to secure their guns or other lethal means such as opioids, safety planning also asks that veterans write down triggers and warning signs that they are in crisis and coping strategies to distract themselves from negative thoughts, including people they can call for help or places they can go.
Justus Keith, Sergeant First Class in the Vermont National Guard, has been trained in suicide intervention and his name is on the list of people to call for friends and military members.
When he gets those calls, he keeps the person on the phone, tries to listen to his or her worries and “get them to understand that things aren’t so bad,” said Keith, a Newport resident who also is a member of the Combat Veterans Motorcycle Association of the Upper Valley.
“Sometimes just listening gives them validation,” he said in a Wednesday phone interview.
Keith said that the people who call him may be having thoughts of suicide but usually do not have a plan. His conversations with them generally do not focus on means.
But, when gun safety is an issue, Keith said it’s “easy enough to call a friend (and have them) hold them for you.”
Though conversations about guns easily can become political, Schlieben, a gun owner herself, said that clinicians’ roles in helping veterans create safety plans is to listen and offer help. Any other approach might cause the veteran to distrust the provider and be dishonest about whether he or she has guns or access to them.
Wesley Wolter, a licensed mental health and alcohol and drug counselor who founded Milldale Farm Center for Wellness in Fairlee, said that the most important thing in safety planning is developing a trusting relationship with the veteran.
“Secrets are what make us all sick,” Wolter said, during Friday’s event. Earlier in the day, Wolter led a yoga class for the event’s attendees, and he later gave a presentation on how yoga can be employed to address mental health issues and addiction.
Schlieben, in a Wednesday phone interview, said that she uses a direct approach when discussing mental health and guns with veterans.
“When we’re trying to find out if somebody is having thoughts of suicide (it’s) not helpful to beat around the bush,” she said.
The best way to get the most accurate information is to ask somebody in a nonjudgmental way if they’re having thoughts about suicide, she said.
“If we try to kind of hide the question … (it) helps push forward the idea that it’s something to be ashamed of,” she said.
Similarly, approaching the topic of guns in a direct way helps underline the fact that owning a firearm is not something to be ashamed of.
Instead, she said, it’s a “cultural reality of where we live.”
On Friday, Schlieben offered those in the audience, which included providers at the VA and in community settings, a list of options for ways to help veterans secure their guns including: having a friend or relative take them to their house; locking them in a storage unit and giving the key to a friend; or having a police department hold the guns on a temporary basis. Other off-site options include pawn shops, gun stores or gun clubs.
For veterans who do not want their guns to leave their property, Schlieben might suggest that they store their guns in a safe and have a friend change the combination. She suggests that veterans store their ammunition separately, “because we know that that saves lives.”
She also said some veterans take the firing pins out of their guns and freeze them into a block of ice, which would require that the veteran defrost the pins and then reassemble the gun before using it.
“How much time is that going to take you?” she said. “Everything we can do to build more time in is saving lives.”
To help veterans put their plans into action, Schlieben will sometimes work with them to make a call to a relative or friend who will come and pick up their guns that day.
“I hear on a relatively steady basis from veterans — unsolicited — this is something that has saved their lives in the past,” she said.
Nora Doyle-Burr can be reached at ndoyleburr@vnews.com or 603-727-3213.
