When Brian Rikstad, 58, of Rochester, came home from Iraq in 2005, all he wanted to do was turn around and head back.
“We knew what we were doing,” Rikstad told The Chronicle this week.
He returned home from his mission-driven work to a wife and new daughter, who he said had become independent without him. With a new job, house and young family, the worries of his day felt trivial. People around him seemed to feel entitled and unfocused, he said.
“All the people in Iraq were (happy) to have just a Coke or a piece of candy or a pencil. Holy smokes, it was just a beautiful place in a lot of respects,” Rikstad said.
He yearned for the community of soldiers who understood the mission and each other. That’s where his problems started, he said. As Rikstad put it, he got drunk and stayed drunk for seven years.
If, in 2005, Rikstad had been involved in Veterans Journey Forward, a new program from the Veterans Memorial Museum in Chehalis, he said he’d be in an entirely different place. Fortunately for those in similar positions today, the program has very low barriers to enter and virtually none to get involved.
Veterans Journey Forward Director Jesse Lloyd, 30, and Chip Duncan, 51, executive director of the museum, have teamed up to make Chehalis’ most prominent roadside museum into a veterans’ resource center. And the work is well underway.
Thanks in part to recent county funding, peer counseling workshops have been established. The museum also now offers some no-cost dental care and has helped veterans connect with other services. Eventually, the museum hopes to add medical services, housing resources and anything else they see as a need from the veteran community, Duncan said.
“We're trying to meet veterans where they are. Trying to work with what they're going through and having somebody sitting across from them that has similar life experience. (So) they really feel heard, understood,” Lloyd said. “And we're trying to make them feel like they matter — like they did in the military. Because they do.”
With trainings, various kinds of therapy and simple activities such as cookie exchanges meant to bring veterans and their families together, the museum is looking to fill a service void in Lewis County. Here, about 10% of the 80,000 residents are veterans — yet the nearest resource center of this kind is in neighboring Thurston County.
“I feel like on a state and federal level, they look at us and (say) ‘It’s only 8,000.’ And it just gets washed over,” Duncan said. “So we’re doing all we can do.”
In the concept stage over a year ago, Duncan found Lloyd, a young veteran from Chehalis with a degree in psychology seeking a master’s in counseling. Duncan said he couldn’t ask for someone more qualified. Just this week, Lloyd brought in a trained hostage negotiator to teach a group about deescalation, a training invaluable for helping veterans back off the ledge, he said.
Besides teaching veterans to help their peers, the counseling center will teach spouses and other veteran family members to help their loved ones and cope with the trauma they’ve received vicariously, Lloyd said.
Rikstad recalls the research and effort his wife put into learning about post-traumatic stress after he returned from Iraq and said of the counseling program, “I wish I had this 15 years ago.”
Recalling various barriers and a lack of local support, Lloyd said he was spurred to pursue mental health training after a friend died by suicide. He was also aware that for many veterans suffering from mental illness, seeking counseling from a civilian therapist can be challenging and many patients feel misunderstood. With peer counseling, veterans can be in camaraderie with people who get it.
Veterans Journey Forward also has promise for preventing homelessness and recidivism along with mental illness, suicide and substance abuse disorders, Lloyd said. Comparing the costs in state and local funds to respond to these issues — acquired through health care services, crisis or law enforcement responses, incarceration and more — he said peer counseling can mean huge savings for a community.
And when it comes to saving lives, Rikstad said, “You can’t put a value on that.”
The biggest obstacle the program faces now is funding. The museum will continue seeking more county funds along with various federal and state grant programs, Duncan said.
Learn more about getting involved or donate to the budding resource center at https://www.veteransjourneyforward.org/. Lloyd and Duncan encouraged anyone interested, veteran or otherwise, to join in on trainings and events.
