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Lawrence Winters (Larry Winters) -- Making and Un-making of a Marine

2011-02-09T07:59:00.000-05:00

Lawrence Winters (Larry Winters) -- Making and Un-making of a Marine: "- Sent using Google Toolbar"

Long Time Gone

2008-11-14T16:33:00.002-05:00

It's been a while sense I have have blogged there have been many things pulling my attention. Most of them veterans related. I have been speaking to vet group and doing workshop of my own as well as educating my self at others. It has become more clear to me lately that what is missing in the healing equation for vets when the come home with PTSD or some other war related wound is that society has no idea how to deal with them. There is no issue in the all of mankind that is bigger than war. It boils right down to the fact that war is about life death and lots of pain and we are to small to be able to encompass such a huge frightening thing as war so we stick out small ostrich head with our ipod earplugs into the softest pile of sand we can find and hope when we pull it back up the vets will have gone away. Problem is that they don't, they are still there and infact the have begun to infect all of us with their pain. The missing peice is a way to see the war issue from a larger perspective then we have. In order to generate any hope in the conditions of war and the afteraffects of war we need to have a vantage point of the soul, higher self, or God view or we remain stuck in the trenches looking at each other with hate and rage and hoplessness. The chaplin has become a pivital role in the miliatary and their job is to get men stabalized so they can return to battle. What a job this has to be for consious men and woman to ask their fellow human beings to offer up their lives for causes that have become so complicated that no one seems to understand them.

Just a few thougth that have been stirring would love to have some feed back.

Larry

There are a number of new UTube's on my website

2008-02-13T11:37:00.002-05:00

My Webmaster has really put a lot of hard work into getting some very interesting UTube shows on the website makingandunmaking.com. I'd love for you to check them out and to give comment. There are many valuable links and a good deal of important information on the site look at it carefully.

Be well

Larry

So You Support the Troops and Not the War

2008-01-06T18:25:00.000-05:00

OK, let's think about this for a few minutes. You say you support the troops but not the war. Have I got that right? Great! I thought that's what you said. So let me just make sure I understand what that means; support the troops, that is.

I was once a troop during the Vietnam War, and I would have seen support as you showing up for me. You would have honored me when I was sent to war to risk my life to keep you safe. You would have followed the war as it progressed to see where I was and how I was doing. You would have written me letters and prayed for my safety. You would have welcomed me home when I got back. And you would have thanked me from the bottom of your heart for standing between you and the enemy.

You then would have asked me what I needed, and how was my health. You would have wanted to know what you could do to repay me for the effort that I put in to keep our country safe. Your primary interest would have been for my welfare. You would have wanted to comfort me from my battlefield fears; you would have asked if you could pay for my medical bills; you would have helped my family when I was gone; and, you would have told me that you honored me for my sacrifice. You would have asked me for forgiveness for not going yourself and you would have offered forgiveness for the killing I did in your name. That must be what you mean when you say you support the troops?

Hey where are you going we just started this conversation? Come on back I want to hear about why you don't support the war.

Larry Winters

These two poems are a must read

2007-12-30T20:22:00.000-05:00

If You Are Lucky in This Life

If you are lucky in this life
A window will appear on a battlefield between two armies.

And when the soldiers look into the window
They don't see their enemies
They see themselves as children.

And they stop fighting
And go home and go to sleep.
When they wake up, the land is well again.

By Cameron Penny,
who was a 4th grader in a Michigan school when he wrote this poem.
The poem was originally published in 2001.

______________________________

________________________________________________

Hopi Elders Speak

by The Elders, Hopi Nation, Oraibi, Arizona

We have been telling the people that this is the Eleventh Hour
Now we must go back and tell the people this is The Hour

And there are things to be considered:

Where are you living?
What are you doing?
Are you in right relation?
Where is your water?
Know your garden.

It is time to speak your truth.

Create your community.
Be good to each other.

And do not look outside yourself for the leader.
This could be a good time!

There is a river flowing now very fast
It is so great and swift that there are those who will be afraid.
They will try to hold on to the shore.
They will feel they are being torn apart and they will suffer greatly.

Know the river has its destination.

The Elders say we must let go of the shore, and push off and into the river, keep our eyes open, and our head above the water.

See who is in there with you and Celebrate.

At this time in history, we are to take nothing personally.
Least of all, ourselves.

For the moment that we do, our spiritual growth and journey comes to a halt.

The time of the lone wolf is over.

Gather yourselves!

Banish the word "struggle" from your attitude and your vocabulary.

All that you do now must be done in a sacred manner
And in celebration.
"We are the ones we have been waiting for...."

Doumentary Body of War

2007-12-30T19:31:00.000-05:00

Everyone needs to understand what War does to an individual soldier watch this new Documentary by Phil Donahue and Ellen Spiro “Body of War” when it comes to you. http://www.bodyofwar.com

http://www.woodstockfilmfestival.com. I’d love your feed back on my

blog site makingandunmaking.blogspot.com

Larry

Penumbra

2007-12-16T17:32:00.000-05:00

Penumbra

by
Larry Winters

A tangle of branches poked at the gunmetal sky. The cold a blade held against the exposed flesh of Simon's forehead. The thirty below temperature made the windblown trees rattle at octaves he'd never heard before. When Simon started walking, the snow squealed under his boots like he was crushing small rodents. The hair in his nostrils froze and ice was caked on the outside of the scarf he'd tied over his face. Simon had seen no one on Mountain Rest Road for miles. The two houses he'd passed had lights on but no one was outside; there were no kids playing in the new snow; the cars in the driveways still had snow on them. Standing alone under the night sky, the darkness was his.

Simon had things to think about. He'd been struggling all last night and the whole day with what happened during yesterday's afternoon nap. He felt desperate to sort out the vision that had come before him. If his mother was still alive, she might have been able to explain what it all meant; but she'd died on Christmas day two years ago. She would have had some idea what the specter standing before him was, and why it smelled like someone had peeled an apple in the room when it left.

Simon had rubbed his eyes with the backs of his hands, but it was still there, a soldier in battle gear. A bolt action rifle hung over one shoulder, mud on his knees, a bandoleer of rounds draped across his chest. Simon had blurted out, "What the Hell are you doing here?"

The soldier stared at him and said, in a cockney accent, "They sent me to look for a tree, a Christmas tree."

"Who sent you?"

"The sergeant did! We got three men who've been gassed. They won't see Christmas tomorrow?

"Come on man. I know it's Christmas tomorrow, but you're talking like there's a war in my backyard."

"I need a tree now!"

Running his hand through his hair, Simon asked, "Do you know where you are?"

"Verdun!"

"No, man, for God's sake, you're in New Paltz NY. It's 2007 and it's the coldest day in 100 years."

"Listen, I don't have time for your jokes, there's a war going on. Have you seen anything green, I've got to bring something back for these men?"

"Wait here a minute." Simon got up from his chair tugged his coat on and went to the garage. Taking the handsaw off the hook, he ambled through the frigid air into the back yard to the edge of the forest. With a few powerful stokes he cut down a scrawny white pine about three feet tall. Shaking the snow from its limbs he carried it back to the house.

When he walked into the living room there was no one there. Where the soldier had stood there was a pool of water and some clumps of mud. He looked at the tiny tree in his hands and walked to the back door and tossed it into the snow bank, writing the whole thing off to a dream. Sitting back down in his comfortable chair, he pulled the blanket up to his shoulders. As he was dozing off a sharp knock on the back door startled him. He heard the door open and, "Thank ye, good man, may God bless ye, he sure as hell has forgotten the likes of us this Christmas."

Throwing off the blanket, Simon leaped up and ran to the back door, the tree was gone; there were his footprints and another set leading towards the mountains.

This must have been the tenth time he had let this remembrance run through his mind. He was now in a section of road where there were no houses and he cast his eyes to the heavens searching. Before his mom died she'd pointed up at the night sky and told him, "I'll be looking down on you, so don't get yourself in trouble. When you look at the stars on a clear night one of them will be me." He didn't think much about this because she'd always been weird, but he let his eyes hunt the winking stars.

Suddenly he smelt apples again. He then remembered his mother telling him how his grandfather couldn't eat apples, because it reminded him of the smell of gas in World War I. Looking towards the mountain he saw a penumbra surrounding the Mohonk Tower. There were flashes coming from the far side of the mountain like heat lighting in the clouds or heavy artillery blasts. He lifted the ear flap of his hat and thought he heard distant rumbling.

He thought being in the cold would clear his confusion, but it was growing worse. Something inside him knew that his mom was watching. He remembered one cold winter when she told him, "When it gets really bitter cold strange things can happen with how we experience time." Looking straight into his eyes, she said, "You've heard how the sounds of whales travel a single layer of molecules in the ocean water and can be heard hundreds of miles away. Something like that can happen when it gets really cold. Eskimos know about this, when it gets down to a certain temperature they can tell when something important is happening to a family member miles away." He remembered making a joke and saying, "Yeah they make a cell phone call."

She smirked and said, "That's not what I'm talking about. Why don't you open to what's right in front of you? There is so much more for you to know only if you would allow it. Stop trying to fix everything and just be. Another thing you should know is that time can become so condensed from the cold that the past and present can become frozen together. History and present day get pressed so close they blend into one another."

"Right Ma, you mean after you die if it's really cold, I might get a chance to see you again?" He was trying to make another joke, but suddenly felt bad that he'd mentioned her dying."

"Maybe," She'd whispered.

Simon wondered if that was what was happening now. Was the apple smell from deadly gas lingering on the soldier clothes? Was history and present forced together by the chilling temperatures? Should he be paying more attention to the fact that his country was fighting in two wars right now, and that men and women were going to spend tomorrow's Christmas day like the soldier who'd stood in his living room?

Looking back at his footprints he knew it was time to turn back towards home. Warm in his jacket, he now understood all that his mother had wanted him to.

Push On

2007-12-09T12:52:00.000-05:00

Peter Seeger once sang.

It was back in nineteen forty-two,
I was a member of a good platoon.
We were on maneuvers in-a Loozianna,
One night by the light of the moon.
The captain told us to ford a river,
That's how it all begun.
We were -- knee deep in the Big Muddy,
But the big fool said to push on.

The Sergeant said, "Sir, are you sure,
This is the best way back to the base?"
"Sergeant, go on! I forded this river
'Bout a mile above this place.
It'll be a little soggy but just keep slogging.
We'll soon be on dry ground."
We were -- waist deep in the Big Muddy
And the big fool said to push on.

The Sergeant said, "Sir, with all this equipment
No man will be able to swim."
"Sergeant, don't be a Nervous Nellie,"
The Captain said to him.
"All we need is a little determination;
Men, follow me, I'll lead on."
We were -- neck deep in the Big Muddy
And the big fool said to push on.

All at once, the moon clouded over,
We heard a gurgling cry.
A few seconds later, the captain's helmet
Was all that floated by.
The Sergeant said, "Turn around men!
I'm in charge from now on."
And we just made it out of the Big Muddy
With the captain dead and gone.

We stripped and dived and found his body
Stuck in the old quicksand.
I guess he didn't know that the water was deeper
Than the place he'd once before been.
Another stream had joined the Big Muddy
'Bout a half mile from where we'd gone.
We were lucky to escape from the Big Muddy
When the big fool said to push on.

Well, I'm not going to point any moral;
I'll leave that for yourself
Maybe you're still walking, you're still talking
You'd like to keep your health.
But every time I read the papers
That old feeling comes on;
We're -- waist deep in the Big Muddy
And the big fool says to push on.

Waist deep in the Big Muddy
And the big fool says to push on.
Waist deep in the Big Muddy
And the big fool says to push on.
Waist deep! Neck deep! Soon even a
Tall man'll be over his head, we're
Waist deep in the Big Muddy!
And the big fool says to push on!

Words and music by Pete Seeger (1967)
TRO (c) 1967 Melody Trails, Inc. New York, NY

The War grinds on with young life being stuffed into its great maw and death and carnage left behind. Those of us watching clamber for answers on how to stop it or how to see it as having a worth while reason for happening. No answers seem to appear that make any difference. We stare stunned as it crawls along consuming hearts and minds at a veracious pace.

A big circle of fools stands on the shore screaming, “Push on!” They’re on dry land with their hands on their hips directing those who they do not know to press on on. The flood water is rising, our knees are no longer visible, the waters at our waists, and we shove deeper into current. This same group of fools Bush, Cheney, and Brown all stood mute watching Katrina make the Big Muddy flow backwards drowning the heart beats of so many New-Orlenins. No mud on those boy’s shoes.

Larry

Whirl- winding

2007-11-18T18:25:00.000-05:00

I have been whirl-winding for the past several weeks and not able to enter anything in the blog. Now I have landed and am reflecting on where I have been, and what I have done. Two weekends ago I was invited to Mentone Alabama as a workshop leader for one hundred and ten men. There has been a men’s gathering meeting there for the past fourteen years. Author and men’s group leader John Lee is the primary organizer, Robert Bly the poet, and Robert Moore the Jungian scholar we were there to reflect on Robert Mores book The King, The Warrior, The Magician, The Lover. Robert’s book is referring to male psychological archetypes. I was obviously there to speak from the warrior perspective.

It was fantastic to be in the presents of so many open hearted men. Robert Bly spent time with me looking over my poetry and was very supportive. John Lee a long time friend presented some of his current new work which focuses on the topic of passivity. His new book will be outstanding; he is addressing a topic that is relevant to all of us.

What is left of the men’s movement is small but strong and potent. To be around men who are looking beyond their own egos is so unusual that I left being affected for several days. There were many men who brought their son’s. It was really nice to see these young men working on their issues.

War is on these men’s minds, several vets came to my workshop and we discussed Vietnam as well as the current wars. I was asked several times “What can I do to help support the vets?” The answer I most often gave was, “Be there, listen, witness, don’t turn off or turn away, offer your presents.”

Things to come on this blog will be some talk about the Grand Rounds I gave at Four Winds Hospital on the topic of PTSD. I will also report on my trip to Tallmadge Ohio where I was the key note speaker and workshop leader for the The Warrior's Journey Home. Stay tuned.

Be Well

Larry

Veterans Day

2007-11-17T22:23:00.001-05:00

Veterans Day

A day to remember my War.

A day to feel in my heart, Marines I once knew.

A day to pray for lost peace.

A day to remember that I was not welcomed home.

A day to remember my old war prayer

to commit to life with the same intensity that I feared death.

A day to see that many people do not honor veterans.

A day to hear the flag snapping at the wind.

A day for my soul to shed its uniform and stand naked in the mirror.

Oath Taker and Oath Breaker

2007-10-27T13:43:00.001-04:00

On October 3, 1967 I took the following oath to join the United States Marine Corps:

"I, Larry Winters, do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and, that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God."

Lately I've begun wondering if you, the folks I was protecting from those communist insurgents, ever took any kind of oath? The answer to this question is no. If you were born in the US, you took no oath of citizenship. If you lived outside the country and applied for citizenship, you had to take an oath.

By the time I got to Vietnam I did not believe we should be there; but I did my duty and fought. I took my oath seriously, as did many who felt as I. I was recently investigating oaths and what they have met historically and I found out that in the past oaths were considered solemn statements that had to do with the truth, allegiance, promises, honor, ethics and the preservation of life. Many oaths invoked a divine witness. In my searching I was looking for something I was calling a "citizens oath". I was hoping to find a citizen oath that dedicated the oath takers to taking care of those who were injured while protecting the citizenry in times of war. What I discovered was a citizen oath from ancient Greece called the "Athenian Ephebic Oath". The Ephebic Oath was sworn by young men the ages 18-20 upon induction into the Ephebic College.

To read the full article please go to my website makingandunmaking.com

Semper Fi Parents

2007-10-21T17:20:00.000-04:00

Today I spoke at gathering of Semper Fi parents. I opened by saying that Semper Fi means "Always Faithful." This would be a good oath for the American public towards it veterans. There was a strong military presents in the room with a Marine Gunnery Sargent who spoke about the Iraq War and gave various reasons why people should be honored to be involved with the Marines.
I spoke about PTSD Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. There were several parents in the audience that had lost sons in the Iraq war. I had a number of conversation with parents that asked me to sign my book to a son in the war or recently back from war. They were concerned that their kids were suffering from PTSD and wanted to where help was available.
This was a sobering experience for me, its been a while since I'd been in a room with so many Marines and there need to justify what they were doing and had done was palpable. There was an undertone of pain and loss, but to touch this would have left parents and Marines with a feeling that the sacrifices were perhaps in vain, so the tenor was kept positive and patriotic.
I do honor those men and women who offer their lives to protect our country, but I do not honor the turning of our heads from what they have been asked to do, and our expectation they the become who they were before the left. Healing and forgiveness need to be primary elements for the recovery of the traumas of war, not the bowed out chest and the lifted chin and the Marine stance of bring it on.

Be Well

Larry

The Making and Unmaking of a Marine is now on Amazon

2007-09-30T20:36:00.000-04:00

The long wait for my book to hit amazon is over. If you would rather give amazon the 60% instead of my publishing company Millrock Collective then you may find my book on the big book seller. If you'd like to help the smaller publisher you can get The Making and Unmaking of a Marine on my website makingandunmaking.com I welcome all feed back.

Larry

Poems Can Heal

2007-09-18T16:15:00.000-04:00

There is a chapbook that was just published by Vietnam vet named Dayl Wise. There are 18 vets that have written poems including Dayl. The title of the book is Post Traumatic Press 2007 poems by veterans. It can be purchased by emailing dswbike@aol.com. I have several poems in it and of course highly recommend it to anyone who is interested in understanding what war does to human beings.
Poem

When a man kills another man
he must dig two graves.
One in the earth for the dead man.
One in his heart for his spirit,
or he will not return.

Larry Winters

Homeless Vets

2007-09-09T19:13:00.000-04:00

This past Wednesday I spoke at Montrose VA in Peekill NY. The topic was homeless veterans. There were sixty people there many from the Montrose staff including homeless vets, who by the way asked several questions, and made some important statements about there personal plight. There were also folks there from the VVA and other veteran related organizations in the community. The talk went well, my main focus was helping them to role reverse with the vet in order to understand them better when they show up in their offices unwashed, drug addicted, and angry that at once time they offered their lives for this country. Here is a little of what I said, “Yes we have a volunteer army; these men and women did sign up. Did they know the truth about what they were getting into? No. Nor did we. And yet the revelations since then has not slowed down the number of jobless volunteers enlisting. So what would support to our returning soldiers look like? To start with, let's acknowledge that they offer the ultimate - their lives. This deserves the highest honors we civilians can bestow: Care, concern and acceptance when they come home.

War is a powerful initiation. No one comes back from it the way they left. We must accept this and stop expecting to see the same young people we sent off to war return home. Their wounds, both physical and psychological, have altered them. These changes need to be integrated and healed so veterans can find productive roles in society.

Our veterans are more than soldiers who served. They are our warriors who protected our country. In today's high-tech gigabit world there is a danger in seeing our soldiers as little more than "war-bits." It becomes easy to forget that a human being is holding the joy stick in a M1 Abrams tanks and that the video feed is a killing field. Video games can be turned on and off. In war, when the power switch is turned off it's never turned back on.”

It was my experience that many at the VA are folks who are working hard with an overload of clients; they show interest in trying to understand the perspective of the vets they serve.

At the end of the workshop one of the administrators approached me about buying my book “The Making and Unmaking of a Marine”, she agreed to supply her staff with books. This of course made my day selling ninety book warmed my heart and opened my mind to seeing that here were folks that had a true interest in hearing what returning soldiers feel. If you haven’t read the book yet please put your order in the website is makingandunmaking.com

The New Website makingandunmaking.com

2007-09-06T19:49:00.000-04:00

I want to say a little about the incredible support I have been getting from my friend Mike from www.HillsideAS.com. He has worked tirelessly on the site. His belief in helping the Veterans cause goes beyond the call of duty. Mike is also one of the actors in the play I have written titled “Nothing Means Nothing.” We have done one animated reading at Pumpkin Hollow NY for Soldiers Heart organization and are hoping to perform the play in January 2008. It is only with the help of folks like Mike that we can get the message out that vets need support, honor and our concern when they return from war. I raise my arm in a sharp salute to Mike for his commitment to caring for the pains of war. If you have the opportunity please check out the new website at makingandunmaking.com.

Larry

The Military Oath Soldiers Take

2007-08-31T16:10:00.000-04:00

"I Larry Winters do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God." (Title 10, US Code; Act of 5 May 1960 replacing the wording first adopted in 1789, with amendment effective 5 October 1962).

I have been thinking about the above military oath I took Oct 3, 1970 when I joined the United States Marines. Right now for the first time in my life I started wondering what oath did the citizenry I was protecting from communist insurgents take. If born in the US the answer is none, if you applied for citizenship here there is an oath you must take.

Then I started wondering if oaths were commitments that people still took seriously? Historically oaths were solemn statements that had to do with the truth, allegiance, promises, honor, ethics and the preservation of life. May oaths invoked a divine witness. As I contemplated this question of oaths I thought that maybe I’d missed the oath I was supposed to have taken as a young US citizen, my education was quite lackluster and maybe I was out the day we studied citizen oaths. Or was it as simple as the US constitution was the oath we all were given to live by. Maybe I never really understood that this was a deep commitment that should guide my personal life and behavior. Doing some research on this topic I found that there is no citizen oath for those born here in the US. I also found that there was a citizen oath in ancient Grease called the Athenian Ephebic Oath. The next installment with start with the Ephebic Oath. Comment Welcome

How to Speak with Vets

2007-08-24T18:49:00.000-04:00

I was asked by my friend Ed Tick author of WAR AND THE SOUL to give him some of my thoughts on a chapter he is working on in his new book, the chapter title is “How to Speak with Vets”

“How to Speak with Vets”

No one can speak to vets if they haven't listened to vets. The kind of listening is with more then the ears and mind, it is what you Ed Tick might call soul listening. Many can hear the facts, assess the circumstances and analyze the difficulty and then come up with a game diagram, program or treatment plan. It is the unusual listener who has taken the time needed to hear why soldiers can’t talk about war. If one has listened long enough, opened themselves enough, they may learn to pick up the subtle tones of the oblique tenor of war. It is also important to understand what is being said in the punctuating silences. Souls speak to each other in many ways other than words. Silences’ are often the most articulated statements and if heard as simply empty moments one has missed the message. Taking time, tolerating silences, waiting, witnessing, and staying in the room, are tools a vet therapist needs to know well. It has so much more to do with not speaking then speaking. If the vet feels heard, if a vet feels safe, if a vet feels not judged, if a vet feels honored, he may let you speak to him.

Ed the part that you may not be able to see could be honor. You do honor vets. Honor is a shape sword and cuts through many layers of the “Gordian Knots” of war. It is one of the strands of brotherhood that soldiers have between them. It is a doorway that civilians are allowed through. Honor is part of the fabric of identity. Please let me know how you might feel about how this subject.

Hard Question

2007-08-20T19:34:00.000-04:00

I spoke at a Veterans for Peace conference this past Saturday. My talk was about PTSD and how it is as much a society disorder as it is an individual disorder. Most of the folks in the audience were hard core fighters for peace, sprinkled in were a few vets for peace. Many of these folk seemed to have a bit of a hard time finding compassion for vets. a Comment that was made in the question answer session at the end was, "Why should I thank the vets for what they did, when I did not send the to war? I did not vote for the politicians that sent them."
I must admit this was not an easy question to address. What I said was, you are a member of the society that sent these men and women to war. You may not have voted for those who sent them but this does not excuse you from the responsibility for there care and healing when they come home. If history repeats its self returning vets have shown up in high number in the homeless population, in the addicted population, in our homes with incident of domestic violence. You and I as members of this society are paying with our dollars for this social unrest. We may not have voted to have a crack addict rob our home but it happens.

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or Post Traumatic Society Diorder

2007-08-15T14:35:00.000-04:00

PTSD Workshop

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or Post Traumatic Society Disorder

We have given our veterans behavior a name, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or PTSD. In 1980 PTSD became a diagnosis in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders or DSM II at that time. This was seen by many health care professionals as making great strides for combat veterans now they were eligible for the treatment they had urgently needed since the ending of the War five years earlier. Finally effects of war trauma on soldiers which had been previously called “Shell Shock,” or “Solders Heart,” became legitimized and the VA was held responsible to treat this disorder.

I believe what was unseen at the time is that by declaring PTSD an illness of the individual and placing it in the mental health manual for the treatment of individual illnesses, we affectively isolated the problem into the category of a personal treatment. This places the onus of healing on the patient and the patient’s treatment team.

I will be presenting the above material on PTSD at the

The 9th annual Kateri Tekakwitha Peace Conference

"Hope and Resistance - Transforming the Course of History" will be held on Friday evening, August 17 and Saturday, August 18, 2007. Please join us in this Interfaith conference, featuring Stephen Eric Bronner and Fr. Louis Vitale OFM at the National Kateri Tekakwitha Shrine in Fonda, NY. All are welcome!

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or Post Trauma Society Disorder?:
A Deeper look at PTSD By Larry Winters
Location: Dinning Hall

PTSD is a diagnostic term that comes out of the DSM-!V, a mental health manual. It stands for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. I propose that PTSD should stand for Post Trauma Society Disorder.

This workshop will look at our returning soldiers and the obligation our society holds in healing these men and women. In fact this obligation goes well beyond parades, VA hospitals, and military metals. If we as a society don't reach down into our souls, we will never understand our returning men and women with PTSD nor the continuing disorder in their lives. PTSD is also seen as infectious adversely effecting our families, community, and nation. Until we fully accept our societal responsibility neither our returning military personnel nor our nation will have peace.

Questions we will ask in this workshop:

What do these men and women soldiers need?
How can we learn to listen to pain we'd rather turn off?
What do we do with the pain they will deliver to us?
What does honor really mean?
How do we accept the life and death reality of what our soldiers have done and must live with?
How do we remove politics from our souls and see our soldiers as human beings?
What does it mean to have a warrior in our house, at our work place, and in our communities?

Larry Winters was born and raised in New Paltz, NY. Larry entered the United States Marine Corps after high school and served in Vietnam 1969-1970. Twenty-five years later, as a licensed mental health counselor at Four Winds Hospital in Katonah, NY, Larry Winters returned to Vietnam with other heath care professionals to study Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in the Vietnamese people and to make peace with his past. Larry is a widely published poet, men's group leader and group psychotherapist. He has recently published his book titled "The Making and Un-making of a Marine". If you wish to know more about Larry or his book feel free to email him or check out his blog at:
Email: winters.lawrence@gmail.com
Blog: makingandunmaking.blogspot.com

Post Traumatic Society Disorder

2007-08-05T13:34:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I did a radio inter view with Dr. Harris Stratyner renown substance abuse expert on his show called, "Here's to your good health." Harris asked me about PTSD and other vet topics. I began to express to him an idea that I am working on, which is that PTSD which stands for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder may also have a second meaning Post Traumatic Society Disorder. The premise of this idea is that PTSD is a diagnosis which in 1980 was placed in the DSM manual of mental health diagnosis. This was great for vets coming home from war to get treated by the VA. The down side of this is that it put the onus of responsibly for the treatment of PTSD on the individual, and the health care system. What I am learning is that the responsibility for healing PTSD belongs much more on the society that has sent its people to war, than on those who suffer the effects of war. Therefore I think that Post Traumatic Society Disorder may hold more truth and certainly places the responsibility squarely where it belongs.

Comments welcome:

Larry

The War Tapes

2007-07-28T20:24:00.000-04:00

Blog July 28, 2007

Last night I watched a documentary titled The War Tapes directed Deborah Scraton and produced by Robert May. This film was shot by Army soldiers in Iraq. Several men from the National Guard were given video cameras for their year in Iraq. The film flipped back and forth between the war zone and the States. What it did for me was put faces on the war and the landscape. More was said in the jokes and facial gestures then in the dialog. Several of the story lines were classic, young men needing to prove there worth; standing up for a cause they felt noble. Then the reality of death and fear set in and we get to watch how war hardens the human charter. We see the desire for these men wanting to initiating into manhood, and how becoming a hero seduces them into trauma and pain that will infect there souls for a life time. I recommend this film, you see more of the story in the actions and behaviors of these men then they tell you.

As a Vietnam vet the familiarly of the bravado, fear, and denial drew up a deep sadness in me. Where I believe the story holds its deepest truth is in the women that these men have left behind, the wife’s mothers. It was said several times by these women that their men had changed when they came home. We as viewers saw this as well.

No Roads Lead To Nome

2007-07-24T09:56:00.001-04:00

I have had some time to reflect about the Nome Alaska trip. As I have mentioned before I went to Nome to teach native Alaskans group therapy, which I did. What I didn’t realize would happen is that I got inoculated with a many new ideas as they did. In other words I went to teach and I got taught. Some of the things I’ve been thinking about are how close to the land these folk have lived for ten thousand years. And it has only been three generations that the white man has brought his germs and religion to these folks. This means that the old stories have not completely sunken out of their unconscious. Many native folks are afraid of the shamanic ways of their ancestors. They have been raised by parents who were taught by white missionaries and have become devout believers themselves. But the old stories they were told as children also live inside them yet. What I experienced in the workshop was that some folks seemed stretched between current history and the hidden past.

The shamanic way has as it central theme nature and the need for human beings to have the highest spiritual reverence for it, all of this is driven by survival, will we eat, will we be warm, will be survive the storm. What is becoming apparent is our modern culture has lost this wisdom we worry very little about our basic needs. Although what keep hearing in the news is issues about global warming, drought, food shortages, and war, all which threaten our survival.

As our environment deteriorates and food and clean water become less available the need for reverence needs to return to us at a soul level. As we look into our world for those who hold this wisdom, those stewards in this forgotten realm, it is obvious that the native peoples are closest to this understanding. The very people we deem as primitive. If you’re thinking it’s the skills we need, you’re off base; we can easily recapture the skill and even improve on them. It’s the spiritual way of being they still have access to, the ability to honor nature and not be as ego driven as we are. This is what the native people still have a faint hold on.

The Way of the Human Beings

2007-07-07T18:55:00.000-04:00

Before I left for Alaska I was given a book to read by Ed Tick the author of War and the Soul. I was going to work with Native Alaskans who were dealing with the epidemic of alcohol and suicide. The title of the book Ed gave me is The Way of the Human Beings by Harold Napoleon. What a gift this was. Having read the book I was able to understand what the Native Alaskans are dealing with. Harold writes about the “Great death” which was as series of epidemic brought by the white man during the nineteen hundreds. Harold uses the experience of the Vietnam veteran who came home with PTSD as a parallel to what happened to the Native Alaskans. Natives were left on the fringes of society jus tas the Vietnam veterans were. Natives were traumatized by the loss of so many people and are still struggling to recover the profound loss of elders. Just as the Vietnam vets with PTSD have often choose addiction, and suicide, so did the Native Alaskans.

I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in PTSD, in either population.

Larry

Vet's In Alaska

2007-07-03T20:53:00.000-04:00

I am getting ready to leave Noam Alaska after ten days of teaching and learning. The first four days I taught a group of Native Alaskan heath care workers about Directive Group Therapy, a form of group psychotherapy that I have developed working at Four Winds Hospital for the past twenty years. Many of these folks came from surrounding Native villages where they provide the primary care for the residences. There is and epidemic of alcoholism and suicide in all of these villages.

The remainder of the time my wife Helise and I spent visiting Native villages and enjoying the fantastic landscape. Each place I sought out veterans to speak with. I am hoping to put together a vets gathering here in Noam next year with the help of my friend Greg Smith who works for Norton Sound Health Corporation. Greg was an invaluable contact person who set up my coming to Noam.

Yesterday Greg and I flew in a bush plane out to the small village of Golovin. There are a hundred and fifty folks in the village and around ten vets. A man named Duane or “Bear” who was part of my workshop in Noam lives in Golovin and he introduced me to a vet named Tom who was in Vietnam 1967-68. Tom and I spent several hours talking about life on Golovin and our experience in Vietnam. I will be telling you about Tom in the blog after I get home and settled.

Return from Soldiers Heart Retreat at Pumpkin Hollow June 2007

2007-06-20T17:04:00.000-04:00

Returning from Soldiers Heart Retreat feels like coming back to base camp from a long trek in the bush. Or maybe like flying so many missions that your bones vibrate at the same frequency as the chopper.

There we plummeted into War depths seldom known. The sweat lodge separated egos from bodies. We planted and watered veteran support trees and watched the roots and branches grow. We allowed each others love to become the salve of our own healing. Ed and Kate as our stewards led us into the underworld and we emerged knowing that the human heart is stronger then any evil made by man.

Larry

Alaskan Veterans

2007-06-10T10:42:00.000-04:00

Alaska

I am about to embark on a trip to Alaska to teach social workers how to use a technique called Directive Group Therapy. DGT is an approach I use with groups at Four Winds Hospital where I work. The folks that will be in my class are working with the Eskimo population. I have been told that a high percentage of Eskimo’s men are veterans. I hope to be able to meet with vets on my trip. If anyone has information about Eskimo vets please email me at winters.lawrecne@gmail.com I would love to be more educated before I leave. I am planning on taking The Making and Unmaking of a Marine with me and hope to do some book signings in Noam. If possible I will be doing blog postings from Noam.

Soldiers Heart Workshop June 13-17th 2007

2007-06-10T10:32:00.000-04:00

Soldiers Heart

Soldiers Heart is an organization run by Ed Tick and his wife Kate Dahlstedt. They choose the name Soldiers Heart because it was used during the Civil War for identifying men who’d been affected by the trauma of war, in other words Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or PTSD. PTSD is what Ed Ticks book War and the Soul addresses. Why I mention this now is because there is an up coming Soldiers Heart four day workshop starting June 13, at Pumpkin Hollow NY. Information about the workshop can be gotten at info@mentorthesoul.com. I attended the first Soldiers Heart workshop in Jan 2007 and found it to be a life changing event. The Albany community came together to support there vets in a miraculous way. That alone was deeply healing. Then we went through Ed and Kate’s structured program on healing the wounds of war and I left with many new friends, a first time opportunity to speak my truth about Vietnam, and a committed direction to start working in, which is to help in healing vets and myself. I highly recommend the Soldiers Heart workshop as well as Ed’s book War and the Soul. Check out the website and sign up or tell someone who you car about who would benefit from a deep and profound healing experience. See you there.

Journey's End

2007-06-06T20:53:00.000-04:00

I went to NYC today to spend time with my good friend Peter. We had plans to go to the Museum of Modern Art, before getting there Peter spotted the Belasco Theatre and said to me, “My friend Author told me he and his wife saw a very good play called Journey’s End,” its about soldiers in World War I, maybe we could catch a matinée.”

“Sounds like a great idea,” I said, and we bought tickets.

The play started with the sounds of mortars and bombs going off which caused me to hunker down in my seat. The entire play then unfolds in a bunker at the front lines. The play was written by R.C. Sherriff in 1928. For me the core message of the play was about how men use different strategies to cope with the impossible realities of war. Other than the British euphemisms and dated colloquialisms of the time it could have been in Iraq or Afghanistan to day. One difference that became apparent to me is that in our current Wars there is no behind the lines location like there has been in all our proceeding wars. There simply is no safe place to relax from the fear of death.

The play ended with high volume bombs and mortars and I had to put my fingers in my ears and blow my nose before leaving the theater. The language of war spans all generations, and all combat soldiers speak it.

Four your information:

2007-06-03T10:43:00.000-04:00

Four Winds Hospital is where I work as a group psychotherapist, I have been there twenty years. I have been in conversation with the administration of the hospital and we are thinking of starting a veteran’s track. Currently we have a very supportive program that welcomes vets. It is out hope in the future that we will have treatment specifically for vets and their families. I will keep you posted to how this is working. Four Winds has a location in Westchester NY as well as Saratoga NY. I work in Westchester and would be directly involved with any vet coming to that facility. If you know of a vet or the family member of a vet who may need help please call the hospital at 1-800-888-5448 Westchester or 1-518-584-3600 Saratoga.

Check out the comentary on the website

2007-05-30T08:44:00.000-04:00

Please check out the commentary on the website makingandunmaking.com I have just posted two articles of interest the first titled "Memorial Day" the second "An Accounting"
it worth your time.
Larry

Memorial Day 2007

2007-05-28T14:08:00.001-04:00

Memorial Day 2007
Flags hang limp in the summer heat, as a few come out to meet the parade of old men marching down Main Street. I didn’t think much of these men when I was a boy; just old guys my dad drank with. Most of them were nice guys and the only time I associated them with war was on Memorial Day, when they got into their uniforms and marched in the parade. What I have come to learn these many years later is that these men are hero’s, they’d offered their lives for their country. Not everyone I know has done that.

Only after putting my own life on the line in Vietnam did I understand what this means. It’s rather simple, you either do it or you don’t. If you have done it, that should mean something to those who did not. Honor is what it should mean, a word that seems not to fit well in our vocabulary anymore. We would all do well to revisit this word.

Listen to man speak

2007-05-28T13:46:00.000-04:00

If you have not checked my website calendar I wanted to let you know about an up coming radio interview that will be happening on June 2, 2007 on WJFF. Gandalf was the man who interviewed me. What a pleasure to have someone ask questions after they have actually read the book, not only that, he sent me the questions to read before the interview, which made our conversation go deeper. It was a pleasure to work with this man who said he had tears in his eyes when he was reading my story. The day after the interview I will be doing a book signing at the Henry & Hamish Booksellers 34B Main Street, Livingston Manor, New York 12758, 845-439-8029. My wife Helise tells me that Hamish means inviting, cozy, well tended in Yiddish. If you have not checked out the Press menu on my website makingandunmaking.com go there and you can listen to my interview with Doug Grunther on The Woodstock Roundtable on WDST (100.1 FM) Woodstock Doug did this interview with me on Sunday April 15, 2007, its worth a listen. There are also recorded poems on my website also worth checking out. Any and all feedback welcome.

Umbilical Cord was being streatched

2007-05-27T14:28:00.000-04:00

I will be doing a reading at the local New Paltz Library this coming Tuesday June 22, 2007 as I was looking for what to read in the book I decided to choose something that both had a little to do with New Paltz the town I grew up in as well as something that had to do with the small town boy going off to the Marines. I decided to read chapter 16 in The Making and Unmaking of a Marine, which focus’s on the bus ride from Albany NY where I went to get the final physical to Parris Island boot camp. There are many men through out our history that have taken such a ride, and like me felt the umbilical cord being stretched during the trip. When I stepped off the bus onto the yellow footprints painted on the asphalt and heard the DI bark orders the cord snapped. Anyone out there who may have traveled a similar trip from childhood to adulthood in one day let me know what it was like for you.

The Book War and the Soul by Dr. Ed Tick

2007-05-27T14:17:00.000-04:00

Edward Ticks book War and the Soul a tremendous healing tool.
Some of you may know that what I do for a living is work at Four Winds Hospital in Westchester NY. I am a Licensed Mental Health Counselor LMHC and work with group of adults in a dual diagnosis setting in other words drugs and alcohol and psychiatric diagnosis, thus making up the dual. In my twenty years at this job I have treated many war vets as well as holocaust survivors, 911 victims, and abuse victims of every sort. Post Traumatic Disorder better known as PTSD is a common diagnosis. Anyone who has an interest in understanding such disorder would find reading Dr. Edward Ticks book War and the Soul a tremendous tool. Ed has gone beyond the common understand of this illness and has put a lot of the responsibility for healing veterans back on the community or county that sent their soldiers to war. He has done an historical study gleaning from the ancients’ knowledge that has long been put aside. During the reading of Ed’s book I would spend nights weeping along side my wife whose warm hand was comforting. It was the most powerful tool I have found for my healing from the war. It has my highest recommendation. Ed Tick has also started a nonprofit organization called Soldiers Heart a term that comes from the Civil War meaning PTSD “That man has soldiers heart”. Check out the link at the bottom of the page for more info on Soldiers Heart. I have gone to a workshop in Jan and am going again in June13-17, 2007. The info’s in the newsletter you can get from the link. If you’re a vet, someone interested in veterans and how to help them in their return, or simply someone who has been affected by war or knows a loved one who has been, there is no stronger medicine. I will be speaking more about Ed and his work, he and I are going to be working together in the future, keep posted.

Women Veterans

2007-05-18T16:15:00.000-04:00

May 18, 2007

My friend Dave president of the New Paltz VFW has been telling me that the public attention is now on women vets and their issue. I am sure the proportion of men to women in combat is so much greater that less is being said about women vets. I also have been told that there is no safe place in Iraq including the green zone so all soldiers men and women are possible victims to PTSD. The added issue for women is sexual harassment from fellow male soldiers. I would love to hear how women vets understand this issue and what kind of support do these returning women need? How should it differ from what men are getting or not getting? I would love it if some one would begin to write me about this issue.

Long Over Due Support

2007-05-17T17:10:00.000-04:00

Posted from Bethany Beach Delaware where my wife and I are vacationing: For you folks in blog-land I want to give you a heads up on what kind of comments my book has stirred up in people coming to the readings. I just recently did a book signing at the New Paltz VFW. Several vets were in attendance. I spoke on the issue of Vietnam vets not being recognized for the service they had preformed during the Vietnam War. I read a new poem titled “Now” that attempts to capture some of the pain of the returning soldier. Buy the end of the reading I had several men and women come up to me to share a war experience they or a loved one had. There were tears released for addressing a topic so long over due.

Most of the welcoming home I have experienced as a Vietnam vet has come in the form of other vets welcoming me home. I went to a Soldiers Heart works shop run by Ed Tick author of War and the Soul a book I can not recommend highly enough. At this work shop I was in my room reading the workshop info and saw that there were over twenty vender's who had contributed time, materials, and money to make the workshop happen. This was the first time in forty years that I felt my community acknowledge what I had done by going to Vietnam and I wept.

Now

I first wrote this poem after watching a ticker-tape parade honoring the Vietnam veterans ten years after the end of combat -- "ten years too late." With the present relevance of that experience I rewrote the poem in 2007.

Now!

Now! It's the style, it's the vogue.

Now! Writers are finally writing about blood that's nothing but red dust.

Now! Kids are wearing camouflage to school and packing plastic M-16s

Now! It's the rage to think about him, 'cause the rage in the Vietnam vet is old. Tears and beers have grown cataracts over eyes that once sighted M-60 machines guns.

Now! Step up. It's hip to notice him after forty years down the road.

Now! It's safe to slap him on the back; his metals are still hidden, family broken.

Now! Don't be afraid; he's no longer the baby killer, he long ago slipped into the darkness of the seventies, to cool.

Now! Don't you worry that you gave him a parade ten years too late. You watched him slapping leather down New York City's main drag while he got ticker tape in his gray hair as the media ground one last dry hump out of him.

Now! You can raise your hand and slap a thanks gig on the 58,000 boys who laid down in the Nam. Over 100,000 lay down here at home, and we don't count them, suicide man, our kids know about that.

Now! Let's thank the old vets for selling those hearts and minds so cheap so we could keep what we could keep.

Now! Let's not forget today's young vets who are finding out their lives are just as cheap.

by Larry Winters May 5, 2007

As I become more aware of the returning soldiers I wonder what they need from us here at home?

2007-05-16T15:34:00.000-04:00

Do they want the yellow ribbons around the tree in the front yard? Do they want their families to ask questions? Do they want you to be interested in their war stories? Do they want to be left alone? Do they what you to stop asking where the person you knew before they left went? I'd like know what your thinking about these questions is.

Larry

The book The Making and Unmaking a Marine is now Published

2007-05-16T15:07:00.000-04:00

Press Release: The Book The Making and Unmaking of a Marine is now available please check out my website to purchase it makingandunmaking.com you may use Pay pal to buy the book.

2007-05-16T11:24:00.000-04:00

Rocket Attack

Sirens scream.
A card table hangs for an instant in the air
kicked by a retreating player.
The screen door slams and the hooch is empty.
Twelve men scramble in to a would be grave.
Deep in the guts of the bunker their
bodies pressed into the sandy floor.
Scared men telling jokes.

Escabeto

2006-11-12T11:01:00.000-05:00

Rotors spank the air
the green wasp lifts
from the jungle flowers of Vietnam.
In her thorax and abdomen crawl
men with wings on their chests
stamped from cheep metal.
50 calibers machine guns rained down
on the tree tops.
White flicks of soft light float up
from the jungle below
rising in silence of engine roar.
The wasp’s thin green skin explodes as
tracer rounds dissect the space.
Exiting, entering, exiting, entering
the soft life within.
Oil flows, blood flows.
Cheap metal wings beat against beating chest.
Rotors spank the air.
The green wasp sinks
into the jungle flowers of Vietnam.