A
INVISIBLE CASUALTIES
DURHAM, N.C.
A STORY MIKE MCMICHAEL’S grandma told him when he was young
probably saved his life. But that was years after he had grown up to be
a National Guard infantry officer, been knocked unconscious by an IED
blast in Iraq and come home after a long combat tour with brain injuries
the Army never diagnosed.
It was after worsening tremors and memory lapses forced him to quit
the military, and after blackouts and violent rages cost him his civilian
job and nearly drove away his wife, Jackie, and their four young children.
It was when he felt he’d failed as a warrior and failed as a dependable
wage earner and failed as a husband and dad. When suicide began to look
like the only option left, it was then that he remembered the story his
grandma had told him. She’d been a nurse, and the story went like this.
Many years before, a man in his
prime unaccountably had fallen
on such hard times that he came
to believe suicide was the only
way to end his pain. He put a
shotgun under his chin and pulled
the trigger. The blast blew off his
face and part of his brain, but it
left him alive and breathing.
For the rest of his life he sat in a
chair, unable to speak, alone with
his thoughts. Inside, the young Mike
imagined, he was silently screaming.
“How did things get so bad in
his life that he thought that was
the answer?” Mike wondered.
In Mike’s own darkest moments,
when thoughts of suicide were
banging up against his zest for life
and love for his family, the story
weighed on him. He hesitated,
perfecting the suicide plan but
putting off the decision. “I didn’t
want to be that guy,” he explained.
“That’s what drug it out.”
So far, at least, Mike, now 39,
has triumphed over his demons.
But it’s been close. He is a stocky,
well-muscled man whose commanding presence, friendly, backwoods demeanor and liquid Carolina diction camouflage a world of
hurt and struggle.
For too long, Mike got no help.
For too long, professional help
was out of reach. For too long, he
resisted what help there was.
In that, he is like too many others, military men and women who
remain at risk of suicide.
Invisible casualties, they are
HUFFINGTON
09.01-08.13