The new suicide prevention awareness

Courtesy Photo | Infantry Soldiers from Heavy Troop 3rd Squadron, 3rd Cavalry Regiment, carry a fellow Soldier to the next station out of five Nov. 6, 2014. (U.S. Army photo by 1st Lt. Anthony Pham, 1/3d CR PAO))  

NANGARHAR PROVINCE, AFGHANISTAN

11.19.2014

Courtesy Story

3d Cavalry Regiment Public Affairs Office

NANGARHAR PROVINCE, Afghanistan – Chaplain Charles Walker, the 1st Squadron, 3rd Cavalry Regiment “Tiger” Squadron Chaplain, Capt. Brenan, Capt. Patterson and Spc. Welsh, members from the 528th Combat Stress Team, began a series of suicide prevention awareness classes.

Normally, this class would have consisted of a large room filled with Soldiers trying to listen to a PowerPoint presentation. This year however, this team came together to come up with a different concept for suicide prevention awareness training. All participants engaged in a fun and interactive training event, truly bringing home valuable lessons that may one day save another soldier’s life. All 3rd Cavalry Regiment soldiers at Operational Base Fenty participated in the training, to include Task Force Tiger, the 43rd Engineers, Heavy Troop, and Grim Troop.

The interactive training circuit consisted of five stations that spread out on OB Fenty. At each station, groups of soldiers were challenged to a different form of physical training. Once these exercises were complete, Chaplain Walker of TF Tiger, Capt. Brennan, Capt. Patterson and Spec. Welsh of the 528th Combat Stress Team incorporated lessons and examples about suicide prevention awareness from the specific exercise that soldiers had to perform.

For example, after the first station, soldiers had to carry a mock “fallen” soldier on a litter 300 meters to the second station. At the second station, Capt. Brennan, articulated the importance of helping other soldiers when they were mentally injured just as if we would carry them off the battlefield if they were physically harmed.

For three days, both civilians and soldiers saw men and women in their physical training uniforms getting “smoked.” Through all this physical activity, one could not see a soldier fighting to stay awake or a soldier playing on his or her phone. In fact, every Soldier that went through this training was engaged and enjoyed doing all the exercises. One could not help but get a sense that soldiers were truly grasping these lessons in a much richer and memorably deeper way.

This time physical exercises were utilized and interpreted to understand the mental and physical symptoms of suicide. The main lesson about suicide prevention awareness is to know the signs, listen and truly care for our brothers and sisters in arms.

• Date Taken: 11.19.2014
• Date Posted: 11.19.2014 04:54
• Story ID: 148221
• Location: NANGARHAR PROVINCE, AF
• Hometown: FORT CAVAZOS, TX, US
• Hometown: KILLEEN, TX, US