All Things Soldier: Healing With Honor

Athens Now spends a fair amount of time in this column discussing the prospects and possibilities for true wholeness after traumatic events, as a service to our troops and first responders. Doing so is another way of our saying “Thank you” for all the risks you take to keep us safe both here and abroad. It is so important for everyone to know, especially soldiers, that there is documented proof of complete, drug-free recovery from the fallout of war, and I am always glad when I learn about new resources that can be of lasting help.

One of the things at which vets chafe is having to “talk, talk, talk” in a standard therapeutic setting about their problems or the scenarios which caused them, especially to someone who has no clue (outside the realm of the theoretical) what soldiers go through long after a war is over. That is why when vets who have faced down and triumphed over their own demons band together to help other vets, there is just more impact, and it is often much quicker. Their triumph serves to extend an invitation to police officers, firefighters, EMTs, Emergency Dispatchers, and others to come and “heal with honor,” and that is why I am so pleased to talk about Warriors Heart.

Warriors Heart is a movement, a facility, and a community. It is located at a gorgeous ranch near San Antonio, TX, and the site itself is one of the powerful components to jump start healing. The sheer beauty of the place, designed to be like a well-appointed hunting lodge, has its own therapeutic power. It is co-founded by Josh Lannon, a successful entrepreneur who himself has beat alcohol addiction and has started other treatment facilities, and Tom Spooner, a vet with PTSD who knew that vets and first responders needed their own exclusive place to deal with their very specific issues.

Warriors Heart also understands the need for good nutrition, body work and massage, exercise, healing spiritually, massage, and EMDR, which stands for Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprogramming. Briefly, our brains are so amazing that if we are re-presented with the memories that cause PTSD incidents simultaneously with visual stimuli such as the rapid eye movement needed to gaze at sunlight dancing through leaves on a breezy day, the brain essentially creates a modified memory that no longer has the power to traumatize. I have a dear friend, a ‘Nam vet who wrote the introduction for my book, who went through EMDR about five years ago, and it changed his life. I was with him about 25 years ago when he had a PTSD episode, and it brings my heart great joy to know that healing is at last his.

Warriors Heart is run by professionals and is certified by the State of Texas. Treatment is covered by most insurance programs, including Tri-Care. They also have a specific program for older vets who “fell through the cracks” due to the fact that very little was understood about the assault on the brain and heart when they were fresh home from the battlefield decades ago. For more information, go to warriorsheart.com, or call 844-448-2567 24/7. Warriors of all kinds, healing for your heart and the rest of you is waiting.
By: Ali Elizabeth Turner