By Michelle Ruschman
Resilience. Community. Forgiveness. These are three words that would describe what three-time Purple Heart recipient, Chris Lambert, wants for fellow veterans. His Purple Hearts were received during the Vietnam War when he began serving at 18 years old during the Tet Offensive in 1968. His experiences have given him compassion for those going through PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder), even as he continues to move through his healing, and he’s also helped veterans who have gone through MST (Military Sexual Trauma).
People join the military for different reasons. Among them, for the love of their country, to have a chance to serve alongside friends, some are looking to find direction in a season where there is none, or they want to follow in the footsteps of a family member who served in the military. For Chris, it was his father who was the greatest influence to volunteer.
“My dad was playing football for Oklahoma University when the war broke out in 1941 and he went and joined up like everyone else did. He came home with really bad PTSD but back then it was called battle fatigue. He ended up being an alcoholic and I joined because I just wanted to know he was proud of me.”
Just as Chris’ dad managed his PTSD from World War II with alcohol, so would Chris as he came back home from Vietnam and suffered the abuse of a veteran whose efforts were overlooked by the country he fought for. He would battle alcoholism till December 1980, when he joined Alcoholics Anonymous. As Chris lives sober today, he wants people to know an important fact about his fellow veterans and the way coping in post-war may present itself in each person.
“Veterans who have been through combat aren’t broken. We’re just not trained. We’re not trained to have the life skills that are needed after seeing the horrors of battle.”
Even as the VA, churches, and community organizations do their best to support the military after coming home from deployment, there isn’t enough being done to prepare them for the realities of combat: Injuries and death, the sounds and smells, the guilt over killing and surviving, and having to integrate back into their family home with their injuries and fractured mental health. How do you settle back into domestic life when you can’t unsee the experiences of deployment? According to Chris, you do it by getting in front of other veterans, finding a way to express what you want to hide the most, and you learn to forgive.
“I think something that’s missing from many current modalities of treatment is the ability for military members to be angry, cry, and express all the fear, sadness, and guilt that we carry around. We think there’s a way we’re ‘supposed’ to respond to war and the reality is, every response is valid. For example, when you come close to getting killed, you will pee in your pants. It’s things like that that we need to talk about together so you figure out that what you think is private shame is normal in abnormal circumstances.”
One place where Chris has experienced profound healing is at JoJo’s Coffee and Goodness in Niceville. It’s there that owner, Angela “JoJo ‘’ Stevenson, who comes from a military family herself, hosts a monthly meeting called Come to the Table. At this event, veterans gather to enjoy a meal, pray together, share experiences with those who speak the same language, and together, find their way home.
If you know a vet who is looking for support, or you are one, reach out to Chris at 209-985-7075 or email Chris4vetsnolb@aol.com. (NOLB – No one left behind.). For meeting times for Come to the Table, call JoJo’s Coffee and Goodness at 850-737-6193.
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