Capt. Casey Ross from the Montana Air National Guard – 120th Airlift Wing shares her story of overcoming mental health challenges. She credits her Wing DPH and Commanders with helping her find the tools she needed. This powerful story has much more to it, check back soon for the full story of how the Air National Guard saved her life and her career.
Transcript
Growing up there was four kids in my family and my parents were married and to the outside world, we looked liked a normal family. But, behind closed doors it was a different story, it was a nightmare. I was molested at six. 15, I was raped. My Dad was super-intense. He’d do things like buy us cats and dogs and then torture them to death in front of us. Growing up like that I always thought, “I am gonna be more than this. I am gonna be better than this.” So I graduated high school and I thought, “I’m gonna go make something of myself and I’m never lookin’ back.” So I joined the military. I got through, I rocked flight school, followed on to SERE school, came home, and when I got home I noticed that something along the way in my training had been an incredible trigger for me. So my husband said maybe I should go, you know, talk to a counselor a little bit. Which in my mind was super taboo. I did not wanna affect my military career. So amongst all this I started doing treatment, an intensive outpatient treatment. Basically my job was to go to counseling all day. I actually started getting a little bit worse and I didn’t wanna tell anybody that it wasn’t working, so rather than tell anybody, I got to my breaking point. I couldn’t go home. I couldn’t go to work. I didn’t wanna be around my family. I couldn’t work out. I was absolutely ashamed of the things that had happened in the past. I couldn’t go to sleep ’cause I had nightmares constantly. Every day was just torment, it was physical torment ’cause the side effects of the PTSD, it was awful. After counseling one day I just got to a place where I didn’t have any hope. I was just done. I went home that night with the intent of suicide. I was done. I feel like being military we’re doers, that we wanna do something about it. So my something was to just turn it off. I just wanted everything to stop. There was nothing, nothing was worth what I was going through every day. So God intervened and I’m still here but I still struggled with it day-to-day. I struggled with the idea of maybe I could find some peace if I just turned this off. So I finally realized that I should probably tell someone that I was thinking that. So I told the Colonel DeLin. Said “I’ve been really thinking about the easy way out.” And he said, “We’re gonna get you the help you need. We’re gonna figure it out. I’m gonna bring in some of our friends and tell them what’s going on and that you need some support.” And the more I realized that I wasn’t broken for good, the more I realized that I could be helped, the easier it got to tell my story, and the easier it got to get up each day. From my perspective, the Commanders were so instrumental in my success. If they had pushed me away, I don’t know how I would have dealt with it. I don’t think I would have been able to deal with it. They were my support and my lifeline through this. They fought to keep me on a fly status. They fought to get me back in the airplane. They fought to get me back to my full potential so I could do my job. I honestly owe my life to my Commanders and to the DPH. They carried me through this. I really want people to know that struggling with mental health, having a mental illness, whether it’s PTSD, whatever it is, it doesn’t have to be the end of your career. The Air National Guard’s the reason I had the resources to get through all this. They are what got me connected with the right counselors and what helped me to realign when I was struggling. They were my family through everything. I can honestly testify that treatment works and the more you stick with it and have support through it, it really can get you through. Whatever you’re dealing with, whatever that is to you, that’s your struggle and how that effects you, it’s not gonna be the same as anyone else. So say something. Go get help before it becomes too big. If you’re going through a divorce, if you’re going through financial hardships, there’s resources out there to support you through that. So reach out, that’s why they’re there.