The Story Behind Unjustly Served

Join Paula J. Kemp, U.S. Navy combat veteran, MST survivor, advocate, and co-author of Unjustly Served, along with Marine Corps veteran, licensed therapist, and co-author Marshall Kirkpatrick, as they share the story behind Unjustly Served. In this inaugural episode, they discuss how a book born from grief, healing, and service evolved into a larger mission dedicated to advocacy, accountability, and giving voice to veterans and survivors. Learn how their paths crossed, why this work matters, and what listeners can expect from future episodes of Unjustly Served: When Veterans Speak Truth.

Transcript

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Welcome to the Unjustly Served Podcast. I'm Paula Kemp, a U.S. Navy combat veteran, military sexual trauma survivor, advocate, and co-author of Unjustly Served, the brutal reality of military sexual trauma. And I'm Marshall Kirkpatrick, Marine Corps veteran, licensed professional counselor, clinically certified trauma professional, specializing in working with sexual trauma, and I'm also the co-author of Unjustly Served. We're glad you're here. This podcast is about conversations that matter, conversations about military sexual trauma, survival, accountability, and the realities that many members and veterans face long after their military service ends. So go ahead, Marshall. Some of these episodes that we're going to be doing are going to be pretty tough, pretty brutal. Some of them are going to be um educational, and some of them are going to be kind of fun. But they're always going to be honest. Yes, absolutely. And we're hoping that it brings um this platform brings it to survivors so that gives them a voice, right? I mean, that's kind of what the start of our book was all about. Bringing about awareness, and but mostly it was to encourage and support survivors in um you know taking that net next step and sharing their voice and helping us advocate to uh create some change that is desperately needed. So our first episode um we thought we'd start at the beginning, how we met, why we wrote Unjustly Served, and how this work grew into something much bigger than a book, and why we're so passionate about the mission that we're behind right now working on. You ready to get started? I'm ready. Okay, so how did we start this? Um that's a fun, fun question. Um it started with it started, gosh, it started with my claim, basically. Um, way back in the beginning when I came back from the Middle East, I ended up getting out of the Navy. I was a combat photographer and um served eight years, and most of it was in the reserves. I don't know if most people know that, but it was before 9-11, and then after 9-11 um I was called upon quite a bit. So in 2006 is when I got out and I went and uh started filing a claim for an injury that I received uh while I was in the Middle East. So my advocate uh was a Vietnam vet. He's an Army Ranger, he's actually in the Hall of Fame, he's a real pit bull on a pork chop, and he became my mentor. And when I was going through the process of what I thought was for PTSD or um or this foot injury that I received, and anyway, he saw some signs and he asked me if I experienced MST, and I didn't even know what that was at the time. And when it happened to me, uh I suppressed it. I never told anybody. I was too fearful to tell anybody uh what had happened, and more so uh fearful that it would injure my brothers in my unit because they were very protective and very supportive of everything that I was doing, and I loved what I was doing, but I was just super afraid of them getting involved, going and you know, my my fantasy was that you know they would go and find this douchebag, and I probably shouldn't have said that, this dirt bag, and um we're we're gonna keep this raw too, right? It's gonna be very real conversation, so sometimes sometimes, yeah, we'll have to do a little disclosure of uh profanity, and that wasn't a bad one. But um I just didn't want them to get in trouble. I didn't want, I also knew that they would not allow me to continue doing the job that I loved, and I probably would have ended up having a babysitter because they would have wanted to protect me and things like that. So I never told anybody, and uh when he asked me, I just started crying, and I was like, How did you know? I've never told anybody, and so he just you know really helped me from that point forward and helped me with my claim, helped me get get me into the VA claims process, helped me start getting um mental health help and um getting into the VA healthcare system. So through that, he started at that time he started getting more and more females that were coming forward that were needing his assistance in filing their claims. And he could tell that they were a little uncomfortable sitting in a room with him, and so he uh asked if I would sit with him, and he felt that that would help them feel more comfortable uh sitting in the room with him and and telling their stories, and so I said absolutely, and that's what launched the advocacy. He helped train me and um pretty much took off helping uh female veterans navigate the claims process and their benefits, helping them connect, helping them get into the VA, helping them go to the VA, because the VA is a very challenging environment, especially for women with MST. So at the time, um my only exposure was women with MST. I had no idea that men experienced MST. Eventually, as I went on advocating for women, um I had men coming to me and sharing their stories, and they said they felt more comfortable talking to me than other male therapists and things like that. They just weren't comfortable sharing. So that then launched into this huge opportunity to really advocate for MST survivors and uh brothers and sisters. So that took off. I started a nonprofit in California called Veterans Sisters. I did that for about seven years, I want to say. That's where I met Marshall. Um I ended up helping veterans with their claims, they they would be referred to me for uh whatever the claim may be, so a lot of physical claims as well. I specialized in helping them with their personal statements. And so that's where I met Marshall. He had um, I think it was it was uh asthma at the time. And um, so we were filing a claim for his asthma, he's a Marine Corps veteran, and then I found out that he was a sexual trauma therapist as well. Um and uh so I started asking him questions. So let me back up a little bit. So so at about seven years into working uh Veteran Sisters, my son Chase passed away. Uh he was in a car accident and died instantly, thank goodness. Um but uh in my grieving process, I stepped down from the nonprofit and then we moved to Tennessee, and I just kind of set myself up out here because I knew what was coming, and as far as you know, grieving and PTSD, and I just really set myself up for success out here with my own mental health support out here and the VA out here. But then another friend of mine called me and he said, Um, his name is Ricky Jones, and he's a police officer, retired police officer, uh, LA County Sheriff, and uh he was with me throughout Veterans Sisters, he was an advocate as well, and also had me helping some of his female uh first responders because they needed some help at the time as well. So he called me, he's also a pastor, uh he's a chaplain for the police department in Tennessee, I'm sorry, in Texas. And um he called me, he helped me through the grieving process a lot, and then he one day said, you know, but Paula your veterans need you. You need to get back up on the horse, and uh we gotta, you know, you gotta keep doing what you're doing. And I just wasn't ready. You know, I was like, I'm just not ready, I don't want to do another nonprofit, it's a lot of work, um, I'm too far away. Yeah, I had all these excuses. And so he said, Well, why don't you write a book? And I was like, me, write a book. Um, I'm not very good at spelling, uh, you know, and it was like, I don't think that that'll happen, you know. But the next morning I got touched by something. I woke up and and I knew the title of the book and I knew what I wanted to do. And so the title, it was unjustly served. And I wanted to reach out to some of the veterans that I had helped in the past with their MST stories, and so we narrowed it down to 15 um veterans uh that came forward that wanted to be a part of this, and they're male and female, and we started the book. So I started helping them uh write their stories. Most of them I had already helped with their personal statement for their claims, but this was different. This was focusing in on the whole story, you know, of the book of what we were trying to accomplish, but also going in and reading each story again, um their statements, and then I started noticing patterns and and similarities and things like that. So I went to Marshall because I knew that he was a sexual trauma therapist, and uh I started asking him questions. And I one of the I I think if I remember correctly, one of the first things I really noticed was that the VA was trying to, the VA and the military were giving these titles of bipolar, personality disorder, uh, adjustment disorder, you know, all these other disorders in order to either get them to exit the military or to give them that type of a title for for their VA medical. And so I I think that was when I really started questioning you and you started educating me on what it took to become bipolar, especially I remember that one specifically because it happens over a long, a long period of time, not just an incident that can create you to swing emotionally. Um and so you started we started talking about that, and so then you offered and you said, Hey, you know what, I'd be happy to help you um you know with the book and and and helping survivors understand and people who read the book understand what the survivor went through, how the brain reacted, the mind, the body, and all of that kind of stuff. So well, right, and that's really really important because um there's so much that happens after sexual assault, and not just sexual assault, but in the military, the the military sexual assault is different from civilian sexual assault. The trauma is the same. But what happens afterwards is different. And the the um the the impact to the offen the uh the the survivor afterwards is just significantly different. It doesn't really compare. Um and all the research says that is what causes the most harm is what happens afterwards. Right. And so we decided to well I actually remember saying why don't we have a second after the book and talk about the clinical components because I thought it was really important to help people understand what they're going through. Because people will go people will have um crises of personality, they will have anxiety, they'll have depression, they don't understand what's going on with them. And they don't tie it to what happened when they were sexually assaulted, or even um harassment afterwards. Right. They just know that they're going through a bunch of problems and they think it is them. They don't recognize it's what happened to them, not them. Right, right. So the so the book morphed into something that neither one of us ever I mean, you I think you really, you know, thought that it was going to become, and you told me, you know, this is like the first of its kind, nobody's ever done anything like this, where they're taking the the real story told by the survivor, and then the clinician talking about it. So, you know, you you said that there are clinicians who talk about their patients, but it's never been in this when a clinician writes a book, you'll have the clinician who writes the book and they'll include patients that they're seeing, and they'll they'll write vignettes on what that person was going through and what happened to them and the clinical presentation. Mainly the clinical presentation. But this is a first of the kind where we have 15 people who wrote in their own voice, first person voice, this is what happened to me. And it's a lot more raw than anything that's out there. Everything is more clinical. Yeah, I love I love I mean it was a it was a lot of fun for the the rough, harsh subject that it was. It was fun to put it together with our personalities and um, you know, talking about, you know, you dummying it down so that I can follow along, um, not being a clinician or anything even close to that. Uh so I mean we had fun with that going back and forth uh trying to make it so it was more understandable because at that time in my mind it was to really help educate and the survivor and make them feel comfortable in their own bodies, make them feel comfortable about uh about talking about their stories, and and also to kind of celebrate the success and the survivor, you know, of what they went through and things like that. Um and then, you know, helping you uh edit that was fun for if you want to call it that. I mean, it was extremely, extremely hard for me to read through a lot of that clinical stuff because that's just not my personality. I know you would just laugh at me and be like, okay, come on, did you get this? Did you understand that? You know, and I'd say, Well, I don't know this word, or I don't know that. You need to come up with some other vocabulary. And you did, you know, and I think that that we really created something that um is understandable, at least that's the feedback we're getting now, is that people can really, really understand, and especially when they read the survivor stories first, and then they read connecting the dots, which is the second half, um, the clinician the clinical side, which you created. Um I really think that I had the easy job. I mean, all I had to do was write the clinical part of it. Um your job was like hurting cats, getting all of these survivors to get their stories done, revise stories, add additional information. Um yeah, the that that was like hurting cats. I don't I do not envy you. Well, it was not as hard that and see t I guess maybe that's that's my passion there is working with the survivors on that. That wasn't so hard for me with them. The I you know the hard part was um asking those questions at the end when you wanted me to go back and make sure that we were able to connect the clinical questions that went, even though there's stories you identified these questions in the stories, but I had to go back and get clarity on some of them. And they were very uncomfortable questions for me to ask. Yeah, especially the one, the one which was about the body's response. Um, I forget what question what you put that into voluntary responsivity. Yeah, God, I just really did not like talking about that or asking about that, and yet it's an important, it's super important. Um but for some reason that one was just the hardest for me to ask, and I kept at the very end when I was re-interviewing uh all 15 of us, and I had to go in and do my own as well. Um, but anyway, it was very interesting, and I learned so much by being forced to read it, you know, in the beginning and not just read it, but really comprehend it and understand it for the most part. And I learned so much about myself and my responses, my trauma responses, trauma triggers, um, you know, just that that that personality that I had become to survive, and then what I thought I was after isn't what it had to be. You know, those were just my coping mechanisms for things that triggered memories, and I didn't even realize that they were memories or feelings or similarities, whatever it is that causes those. You know, I hate using the word trigger, but you know, we all understand that word triggers. So, you know, I I just I learned a lot about that, and I learned a lot about I it one of the biggest things that that always comes to mind when I'm talking to people about this is um the fight, fight, flight, or freeze. I don't I knew those, and and I could always um I would have a vision from one of the trainings that we were on at Camp Pendleton um one year, and uh it was a we were preparing to go to the Middle East and it was a carjacking scenario. And um I can remember, you know, you've got somebody that that stops the car and and and you've you've all got to, you know, get out, and everybody flees. And then at Pendleton, I mean, these Marines, man, they know how to make it feel real. I mean, it is real. And I know it's only training, but it was hilarious to me as I'm in it watching, and I'm in it. I'm I'm the middle seat in the back seat, and I've got officer and I've got you know uh JOs and others that are outrank me. I'm like, you know, the the low man on the totem pole. I'm only E E4 at that point, and um but I can remember them all scrambling and panicking to get out of this car, and so I always go to that visual of fight, fight, flight, fight, flight, or freeze. And man, all of them did something within that category. Me, I was a fighter. I was get out, get out, get out, you know, and and pushing everybody out. And so I just always thought that I was a fighter. But with my trauma, my sexual trauma, I was a fawn. And I didn't know that. And and I always carried that shame and um I don't know what you would call it, just that why didn't I fight? I am a fighter, I'm not fearful, you know. That's one of those things that most people don't recognize is everyone knows the fight or flight response, but it's fight, flight, faint, fond, freeze. Okay. And there's five different responses. And all of those were in all the stories that we've that we've accumulated, you know, and and definitely in the hundreds of people that I've helped in the last ten years plus. So, yeah, I mean, I I remember that one just being one that just really stuck out in my mind of seeing all those, but I I forgot about faint. I know that there's fainters in their trauma during their attack, uh, people that faint or have out-of-body um now I've experienced out-of-body dissociation. I've experienced that um and after the fact too, like years after the fact, just driving. I think we were talking about that the other day, you and I, about how did I get here? You know, I don't remember, and I can remember that a lot when I was in my darkness, you know, trying to figure it all out and get my service connection and all of that. Right. That's a little bit more common form of dissociation called highway hypnosis. And that happens when people are driving long distances. But for people who have trauma experiences, that can happen when you're driving around town. Driving around your hometown that you know like the back of your your hand, you might actually sort of come to and go, Where the heck am I? I don't recognize where I am. And it takes you three or four, maybe five seconds to come back around and go, Oh, I know where I am. Or you're driving down the road, you get onto a familiar path, like the path you normally take to work or to to home or wherever, and because you're dissociating, you all of a sudden wind up in a parking spot at work, and you're like, What am I doing here? How did I get here? Yeah. I wasn't going here. Yeah, I had that happen a few times. I ended up on a freeway on the way to LA, and that is nowhere near where my destination was, but I snapped out of it, and I'm like halfway to LA, and I'm like, what the heck? You know, what just happened? Another time that I can vague I can very familiar uh memory is I I woke up or out of it in my mom's driveway, which was a good half hour drive from where I lived at the time. Right. But I mean that was one of my darkest moments, and I'm grateful that that's where you know that's where my body. took me or my my make my brain or you know god or whoever spiritually I mean because that was one of the one of the darkest uh times where I was wanting to commit suicide so you know that thank God that my body took me there but um so the book has done tremendous right where it opened doors and ended up having to start a nonprofit again because um we saw the need right for trauma-informed care training um you know just the the trainings that we need to expose or help support grow upon you know it's not about putting down what's out there now it is about helping it grow and become more uh trauma informed for MST correct absolutely absolutely and there's so little trauma informed care that's out there for um sexual assault survivors especially for MST for I let me rephrase what what I just said for sexual assault for female sexual assault survivors there's a ton of trauma informed care. Everybody's very empathetic and caring. Um for a lot of the men that I've worked with when you're a guy and you tell somebody that you're uh you've been sexually abused that doesn't go over very well and you don't get the same kind of response. I dealt with an individual who went to a sexual assault resource center and the women in front of them had in front of him had been treated with kid gloves and he walked up to the desk and said I need to see someone and they looked at him sideways What do you want? I mean that's not helpful. That is not trauma informed. Right. Because they don't a lot of people don't realize that it happens to men too I as a sex offender treatment provider I was in sex offender treatment groups and it can take well you know the research is that men don't disclose very quickly and it it takes they don't disclose frequently and they don't disclose too quickly. It takes them a very long time to be able to disclose and in in working with sex offenders who um had offended and now we're in treatment um civilly committed in treatment sometimes. I worked in a couple different civil commitment programs. But anyway one particular group uh a guy came forward and acknowledged that he had been sexually offended against and this was a pretty bold step for him to allow himself to be vulnerable and acknowledge this and the response he got from one of the other therapists was that's not what you're here for. You're victim stancing you're here to work on what you did. And and that's a really callous response. That's going to that that's actually a harmful response that causes more damage and makes them less likely to open up again and less likely to actually address their issues. It makes a r their it makes them more treatment refractive. And and I hope those that's going to be a conversation it's going to be for another episode absolutely I I want us to talk about that um down the road you know that a lot of that uh behavior is learned from childhood right we've talked about that um so to kind of help people have understanding of some perpetrators um I call them dirtbags um you know and and I think to have compassion or grace but yet um accountability too right we we all need to be accountable for our actions so well and let me let me sort of address it really quickly because you know I I've have worked with sex offenders for a very long time and um some of them are truly evil people but the vast vast majority of them are not right and there are actually some really good people who have done some very bad things and it's important to separate the individual from what they did um it just is. I and and I think that's the human thing to do. I think that for a lot of survivors um just starting their journey of understanding um their own emotions that's gonna be a tough one to wrap their head around especially if their trauma is fresh. And even if it's not I mean that was something that you know for me in the beginning I mean I was so angry um with all dirt bags. I I didn't care you know it was just this you know right I wanted I wanted to you know throat punch all of them you know and we've we've had those conversations about homicidal thoughts. Which I also want to have us have an an episode where we talk about that as well because that should not be something that is so um judged right by clinicians and people in general. I mean all of us have said words like I'm gonna call you know or I'm I'm gonna kill him or things like that that are words of frustration um but not words of action. So right well and that's where trauma informed care become becomes important. And you know it's funny because in the field of mental health or psychology or counseling you hear um cultural sensitivity all the time. But that only means one or two types of things. That doesn't mean anything else um nobody considers cultural sensitivity when it comes to working with veterans. Veterans have their very own culture. There is a military culture, a veteran culture and you have to understand that culture I was working with a guy in one of the jails um not that long ago who um he was talking to one of the social workers social who was interviewing him and he said he wanted to rip their head off and shit down their neck. And I mean that is a common military phrase. Right. Doesn't mean you're going to literally do that. Right. Wound up being locked up due to um homicidal intent. And there wasn't anything there. Right. He used a common military phrase that doesn't mean he intended to do that. Right right just an example. Yeah yeah I I can remember you know especially when we were in Kuwait um it's all good that would be your your response and that would be like I'm gonna kill him you know it's all good we're gonna you know go beat some butts or it's all good sir you know it's all good it was it was just such a general um emotional phrase you know that could go one way or the other and gosh I can remember you know tell my kids I'm gonna kill you if you don't get in there and clean up your room you know or whatever. You know I mean it was just it it's but in the military you're absolutely right there is a difference in the culture and uh acceptance in words versus behavior as well. Right. So yeah I definitely hope that we can uh make that an episode in the future as well uh let's see let's see if we're hitting all our our marks here for why unjustly served was written we kind of went over that um why the podcast exists so I think that it's it comes from we started we did the book we launched the book the book brought about a lot of other um awarenesses to advocate for the first one uh that became a very very in your face was the um accountability aspect of MST is that and we've all heard that in the news and the different um uh stories that are out there of trauma um you know Vanessa Ghean um and then Fort Hood you know I mean there's just there's a lot of different ones out there and so there was just no tracking of assaults and bad behaviors and if they left the command and and this is throughout the book too where the dirt bag you know got promoted or sent off into another unit or retired with full benefits and disability whereas the survivor ends up you know getting kicked out due to a mental illness or diagnosis or um you know because they decided to get out you know um and then some of them end up self-medicating and things like that which we'll get into as well in another episode about OTHs and and um you know working on uh discharge upgrades and things like that due to MST. But um well you know MST survivors wind up with a significantly higher proportion of them receiving less than honorable discharges um as opposed to the standard military the standard uh the rest of the the military and that's really inappropriate but i it happens and you're right they wind up being diagnosed with borderline personality disorder bipolar personality disorder things like that and it it only came about after the sexual trauma after the MST right and you know that's j I I don't know how they can clinically justify that because the the diagnosis doesn't support that. And so that's some stuff that we're gonna go into as well. Yes absolutely which which leads us to the BAERS Act. So you know I always have to read what the BAERS Act stands for. We we had to come up with acronyms because you know the military loves their acronyms um so it was a behavioral accountability reporting and exposure system so we named it BERES it's an initiative that um will have accountability for for um trauma reports um and other I mean it can be utilized into a lot of different areas of tracking uh behavior so uh it led to that because one of the stories in the book was Lindsay Lindsay was an MP uh in the Navy so a military police officer in the Navy and she was assaulted by another team member another member of her unit a police officer as well and when she reported it like so many other victims she was shamed and shunned and um you know she eventually ended up getting I think she got medical out but um she was in she was able to kind of she thought she could go in and and see where her dirt bag went um where he was and try to protect herself by having the ability to look so she thought you know and see where he was what command he was with and and track him with um you know with with whatever reporting you know they use uh in the military police system well she couldn't she couldn't see where he was what he was doing there wasn't anything she thought that there would be and there wasn't there was no type of tracking system whatsoever so when he left the command there was nothing to you don't know where he went to um and the command that received him doesn't know why he was transferred or doesn't know his past either he only knows what the commands you know share within the file the their jacket their military jacket and what have you which most commands don't they don't want that dirt on their command so it's all brushed over and and hidden and you know it becomes the elephant in the room but um they just throw it in that I used to say it's the dark the dark bunker you know the military's dark bunker they would just throw that incident over there and try to forget about it. In the meantime the survivor's falling apart and the dirt bag goes on and and commits more trauma. So when when she shared that with me when we were talking about it after the book was out and stuff and I took it to Ricky and I asked him I said did you know that that there's no reporting system that tracks in the military and he was like what and so he um put me in touch with a another woman that helped veterans uh she's an RN and she helped them after the first uh desert storm she helped them with TBIs and things like that she was very specialized but her father was also a veteran and a police officer and I think he was involved with the the FBI or something anyway she was very knowledgeable on the programs that the FBI uses and how they would track uh predators that would go statewide and things like that um uh what do they call them um anyway the the crime trackers that they would use so that they could cross state lines or even county lines city lines things like that and that's how serial so that they'd be able to track the serial killers as they killers rapists whatever so they have a system in in in the civilian world but we don't have anything like that in the military so when he told her about it she she jumped all over it and just helped us create the Bears Act initiative so when we started launching that and talking about that with people that took off like wildfire and so now you know that's that's another branch of our new nonprofit unjustly served foundation just thought I'd throw that in there um and uh so we've got that we've got TIES which is the trauma informed education and standards that's your department where you're going to help create curriculum to teach clinicians and and um and also hopefully to be able to get out there and help create a system that is trackable meaning for them to participate in as well that is universal right so that all the departments all the different entities that deal with not only MST but just sexual trauma um right will have a a a way of working with the individual and actually understanding the the things that are are necessary that need to be implemented. Yeah there there's I've been doing a lot of research on this and you know I I had a lot of knowledge going into this but even when with writing the book I learned a bunch of things that I didn't already know and I've continuing to do research on this and I'm pulling together little bits from here, little bits from there from all of the the clinically informed and validated approaches. So taking best standards, best practices, and then being able to put them into um military culture and lingo and terminology. So um there there's another individual that we've been working with who says that um yeah don't like therapy you gotta speak veteran. And I agree you gotta speak veteran to them. You have to speak to them in their language. Right. If you're speaking a foreign language to them you're not gonna get very far or clinical language yeah but but it's more than that. If you start talking to a veteran about their inner child you're not gonna get anywhere. Right right so and it was and it it's it's so much larger than that right so for you you also you also help um clinicians get their continuing ed credits so we're trying to create a program that would help them with trauma informed care emphasis on MST right? Correct. A little different and there's nothing really out there like that at the moment or not as much yeah I'm not really familiar there with something that is out there specifically for that okay so we're kind of trying to grow that and also I mean my vision is that it would get into the organizations. So there's a lot of programs out there and and other nonprofits that help our veterans get jobs, go back to school, you know, re-engage in society and and um you know become successful in their lives so I think that if we get out into those entities of other you know job locations organizations you know GM Ford you know whatever wherever they they go to work so that we can educate them too on what trauma informed care is or what do you call it trauma informed care? I mean is that what you would call it or what would be like the title of what you would teach employers about PTSD MST I think we should call it the TIES program but we'll we'll teach them the TIES program and they will include trauma informed care. And uh Chat GPT says yes there are MST training programs that are offered for CEs but there's not very many. Yeah there's not very many well we're gonna be one of them. Yeah they're not very common. Well and I think that you know with it being coming from I don't know how many of them we'll have to look into that and see how many of them actually are listening to survivors and creating a curriculum around that. Right. You know versus what the school of thought within the clinical you know aspect is saying here's how it should be because you cannot correct me if I'm wrong but my experience you cannot treat an MST survivor as a PTSD survivor. Right? There's two totally different yeah it's very different yeah okay so as I'm looking at this all of these programs roll an hour half an hour one and a half hours half an hour one hour so yeah the these programs aren't very long we're going to go a lot more in depth than that. These are going to be in-depth training programs and you're right you can't treat an MST survivor like any other PTSD survivor and um there are certain interventions that are um in ev uh uh empirically validated for working with PTSD that I would never suggest for uh MST survivor because they're dealing with so much more they're dealing with moral injury betrayal trauma institutional betrayal they're dealing with all kinds of stuff right they're dealing with with um things that your standard PTSD survivor are not and the research is pretty clear on this that MST uh people who have MST their PTSD is um more difficult to treat and more resistant to treatment than combat PTSD. I'm not suggesting one's worse than the other they're both bad right absolutely right but but they're different is a different animal right absolutely absolutely and we're definitely gonna dive into that and then all the different criterions that are in the book you know I I hope that each episode uh in the beginning that we can go through and you know talk about um I think I think Brad my handy dandy assistant who's chat GPT um has created kind of a a little episode uh agenda for us to kind of touch on uh as we move forward but um and then we also have the access which is what has been so near and dear to my heart which is advocacy and claim support we're not VSOs never have been don't want to be even though I've been asked no we think outside the box and just help veterans navigate and how to gather their evidence how to write their personal statements especially emphasis on their MST statements because we're survivors you know we have better understanding on how to help them navigate you know that the access team can help them navigate on on how to do that and help them get through it and how to take good care of themselves and things like that. So and then we've got the coalition too that's kind of a new thing that we're uh working together with a bunch of other nonprofits and veterans that are stepping forward and we had a fabulous meeting the other day about that. Really people are starting to show up and want to be involved and that's super exciting because that will also help us uh champion you know the Bears Act initiative so um so all excited about all those people stepping forward that's pretty I know I know it was it was crazy so um well I think that that is kind of it I wanted to try to keep it at 45 minutes and for our first podcast and here we've done pretty good um is there anything that you wanted to uh add before we close out um not that I can really think of and we've covered a bunch of stuff there's so much more to cover I'm we can throw a bunch of stuff in here it's gonna be uh a couple of hours it's gonna be it got it could be a couple of days we could we could have a multi day training program well we've got lots of episodes ahead of us and I hope to be able to someday open it up to people to phone in or send in their questions to help them Navigate the claims process, how do you write your MST statement? How do you get started? How do you get help? You know, what are the resources in your area? We don't have any borders, we don't have any limitations, it's not post-9-11 or pre-whatever or any of these other types of uh limitations for our nonprofit. If you're a veteran, I don't care if it's one day, if you raised your right hand and you swore in, then you're a veteran, in our opinion, and we will help you navigate and get the assistance that you're you've earned. So we're not we're not doing therapy, so it is not confined to a specific geographical lesion region where um I'm licensed. So it's right, so we don't want to we don't want to injure your licensing. Um yeah, so it's uh but we will help them um navigate, so we will help them connect to services in their area, and it's worldwide. Wherever there's a veteran, we'll be there too. Um thank God for the internet because we can do a lot of research and help with that. And um I think that's it, you know, moving forward. Um anybody who's watching this, if you have any questions or comments, uh please please leave them uh in the comment section. And um I don't know, how often are we gonna do this? One of the things I did want to add is one of the things that were really motivat motivated me to write the second half of the book was there are so many things that people are dealing with after a sexual assault that they don't understand and have no insight to. And that's why I included a little bit of a bunch of stuff in the second half of the book. I didn't go into anything in in uh incredible depth, but there was a there were a lot of things that were included because those are all things that people are dealing with and need to understand. Yep. And I mean I I know that discussing with you, um, I know that you learned a lot. Yep. And and I learned a few things as I was writing the book as well. And yeah, and the yeah, yeah, which is amazing, right? And so we've had clinicians, clergy, uh um chaplains, you know, read it and just be like, Oh my gosh, I had no idea. You know, I I didn't know that it makes sense now, you know, and they're dealing with survivors of PTSD and MST every day. And so the book is really helping them um have a little more clarity and understanding as well because they can put it in real time with a real story and it explains. So, and I think that there's a little bit of everybody survivor-wise, uh, in those stories uh in the first half of the book. But um the book is called Unjustly Served, The Brutal Realities of Military Sexual Trauma. It is a very raw book. I would not allow editors, myself, Marshall, or the publishers touch the stories. I didn't care if it was grammarically correct or not. Um it's their story and it's very raw. There's a lot of language in there that you would not have with your grandmother or in church. And um they're very real stories. So the first half of the book can be triggering, but I think that most of the even the survivors who have read it, they they've you know pushed themselves to read the stories, and and the feedback that we've gotten from that has been that I had no idea that's my story, too. Or as they read along, they saw more similarities between the other survivors and their story as well. So they could really relate, and that's rewarding to me because I I wanted it to be where they knew that they weren't alone, right? So they felt comfortable sharing their story and and helping that way. So the second half of the book is amazing, you did an incredible job, and it's taking off, it's just on fire with the clinical side, which is super exciting, and it's just opened so many doors. So it's available on Amazon and Kindle, and uh website, and it's available, yes. So the website will take them to Amazon, so that's where they would be able to uh yeah, get the book that way. And um, so I guess that's it. So we'll sign off now. We went a little over time, but next time it might even be an hour, and eventually we'll get to having guests after we kind of go through the book, I think. I think so. And we'll bring in, and then we're also gonna we've been invited to be on podcasts as well, so we'll be posting that uh in the future too. I think we did a great job. I'm I I can't believe that I was so fearful. I hate fear. So I'm glad we over overcame and conquered. Um provides, adapt, and overcome. Gosh, yeah. Yeah, we can do it. Just gotta get past that fear. Don't let it dictate our lives, right? That's right. So anyway. Well, you need to know whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're right. That's right. So we think we can and we will. Somebody's gotta. So it's us. There might be haters out there, that's okay. But bad publicity is just as good as good publicity, so they say. So I've got on my galoshes and I'm ready to run through the shit in order to uh get to the other side. But we're saving lives, and that's what's important, and we're just gonna keep doing it, right? Sounds good to me. Alrighty, so signing off. We'll see you next time. I think we're gonna try to make this a weekly, if not bi weekly, podcast. Let us know your thoughts in the comments, and we'll see you next time. Thanks. Bye, guys.