{"id":5,"date":"2008-09-30T15:59:36","date_gmt":"2008-09-30T15:59:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ericnewhouse.com\/blog\/?p=5"},"modified":"2008-10-07T21:17:59","modified_gmt":"2008-10-07T21:17:59","slug":"making-a-difference","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ericnewhouse.com\/blog\/making-a-difference\/","title":{"rendered":"Making a difference"},"content":{"rendered":"

Knowing that I\u2019ve made a difference in someone\u2019s life is one of the best feelings I know. That\u2019s why I was in tears last weekend at the second annual Great Falls Stand-Down ceremony.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Stand-Down is a military ceremony to let soldiers know that their mission has been accomplished, but it has taken on a new meaning in Montana. With so many former combat vets essentially hiding out in this vast and vastly under-populated state, it has become a way to connect emotionally wounded warriors and provide them with help, things like survival gear, cold-weather sleeping bags and warm clothing.<\/span><\/p>\n

I was covering the event for the Great Falls Tribune when I ran into Dave Belcher, a former combat vet whom I had interviewed for my book, Faces of Combat.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>A former platoon sergeant during Operation Desert Storm and Desert Shield, Dave came back with an enormous load of anger that he couldn\u2019t control, much of it directed at his wife Daneil.<\/span><\/p>\n

When I sat down to talk with the couple, Daneil was still terrified at saying something that might set off her husband so agreed to visit with her along. There she told me that it was so frustrating to watch her husband getting better while she was stuck with her own anger at the way he had treated her. I began to see that Dave\u2019s post-traumatic stress disorder was becoming shared by his partially traumatized wife.<\/span><\/p>\n

I urged her to see a counselor, even recommending a particular woman who I knew could help her and making an introductory phone call on her behalf. I saw her a couple of times over the next couple of months, but each time she told me that she hadn\u2019t mustered the nerve to set up an appointment \u2014 she was worried about how her husband might react.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I was surprised when Dave stopped to tell me, \u201cDaneil is going to see a counselor now, and I couldn\u2019t be happier.\u201d I told him I was really glad, that she needed help in getting past her own anger and learning again to forgive and trust.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s making a tremendous difference to us,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s really opened things up. I cvan\u2019t tell you how much of a difference you have made in our lives.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

So that\u2019s how I came to be stumbling out of the vets\u2019 Stand-Down in tears last weekend.\u00a0 <\/span>Mercifully, vets are quite accustomed to tears, so no one even gave me a second look.<\/span><\/p>\n

For the full story on Dave and Daneil, see <\/span><\/a>chapter 5 of Faces of Combat<\/span>, which should be in bookstores across America by the middle of October. I guess it\u2019s remarkable that the book is making that kind of an impact before it\u2019s even released. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Knowing that I\u2019ve made a difference in someone\u2019s life is one of the best feelings I know. That\u2019s why I was in tears last weekend at the second annual Great Falls Stand-Down ceremony. The Stand-Down is a military ceremony to let soldiers know that their mission has been accomplished, but it has taken on a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ericnewhouse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ericnewhouse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ericnewhouse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ericnewhouse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ericnewhouse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ericnewhouse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ericnewhouse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ericnewhouse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ericnewhouse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}