FEMALE VETERANS
AT THEIR SERVICE
WithYou’ s groundbreaking Rebuild Project is providing much-needed dedicated support for female veterans struggling with trauma and substance use. DDN reports
‘ W omen have served within the armed forces for over 100 years,’ says the 2021 We also served: the health and wellbeing of female veterans in the UK report. But while their contribution has been‘ extraordinary’, it states, the prevailing military culture had left its‘ mark on the health and wellbeing of many’.
Women veterans remain‘ very much a hidden population’, states the No man’ s land report from veterans’ charity Forward Assist. The authors spoke to 100 women veterans, with the findings giving‘ real cause for concern’. Fifty-eight per cent reported having mental health issues, with‘ little support’ provided to help prepare them for the transition to civilian life, and adding that the civilian community often had difficulty even recognising women as veterans – something that could lead to women becoming‘ depressed, isolated, disconnected from services, and angry that their personal service goes unrecognised’.
UNIQUE NEEDS Late last year, however, WithYou launched a new pilot substance use support service tailored to the unique needs of this group, and recognising the‘ intersections of military culture, gender-based experiences, and the stigma that surrounds both trauma and substance use within veteran communities’. With funding from the Armed Forces Covenant Trust, WithYou’ s Rebuild Project offers specialist trauma-focused psychological therapy and forms part of its wider Armed Forces Community Programme – the charity was already the first drug and alcohol service provider to receive a gold award in the Ministry of Defence’ s employer recognition scheme( DDN, November 2025, page 14).
The free services on offer during the Rebuild Project’ s 16-week course of specialist one-to-one therapy include CBT and EMDR( eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing), and the project is the‘ first of its kind in terms of having that in-house recovery worker engagement, plus the evidencebased support’ says the service’ s high intensity CBT and EMDR therapist, Simran Jassal.
POSITIVE OUTCOMES A 2021 study published in the journal Addiction found that almost half of women veterans in the UK were drinking at hazardous levels, and the available literature tends to suggest that among
Female soldiers of 7th Battalion, The Rifles at the Lord Mayor’ s Show parade 2024 in the City of London. Avpics / Alamy
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