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IRAQ — Army Strong doesn’t just mean physical, but also emotional and mental. However, many soldiers do not know the resources that the Army provides to gain emotional or mental strength. Sometimes they aren’t even told the full extent about what the resources that are provided can actually provide.
“I’ll do some hip-pocket training about chaplain confidentiality, and 99% of the time people get it wrong,” said Army Chaplain (Capt.) Adam Marchese. “They’ll say you can’t tell anyone unless [it’s about suicide] and as soon as the word comes out [suicide], well, now you’re wrong and you had it, and then you didn’t have it because there are zero exceptions to that [confidentiality].” The Chaplain Corps not only serves the ones who are of their faith, but also any soldier who needs help, spiritual guidance, or just to talk to someone and give them tools to help them.
“I might try to apply tools from my tradition that another person would receive that I obviously think are beneficial,” Marchese continued. "But I’m not an expert in Buddhist tools, yet I’m going to try to find the point of connection between my tradition and their tradition that they would receive well.”
While chaplains were not designed to be ‘long-term counseling’, as Marchese put it, they can refer you to behavioral health, which can offer counseling. Outside of counseling, the main effort behavioral health officers use in treating suicide is the acronym "ACE", which stands for Ask, Care, Escort, and was implemented to help fellow soldiers recognize risk factors in their battle buddies.
Risk factors are put into a helpful acronym, “IS PATH WARM,” which stands for I-Ideation, S-Substance Abuse, P-Purposeless, A-Anxiety, T-Trapped, H-Hopelessness, W-Withdrawal, A-Anger, R-Recklessness, and M-Mood Swings. These are the suicide risk factors that behavioral health officers teach soldiers to recognize to get the people who need help to counseling to help them.
An army is not just one person, and it needs all its soldiers to support each other, whether that be by physical conditioning exercises or mental fortitude, in order to function as one cohesive unit.
| Date Taken: | 09.09.2025 |
| Date Posted: | 11.22.2025 03:30 |
| Story ID: | 548126 |
| Location: | IQ |
| Web Views: | 5 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, The Lesser Known Resources Available for Suicide Prevention, by SGT Anthony Till, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
