Volunteers display signs expressing encouragement during a suicide prevention campaign at Travis Air Force Base, Calif., on May 20, 2025. Suicidal thoughts in military veterans have increased dramatically over the past five years, according to a national study. (Robert Nichols/U.S. Air Force)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Ken Fisher is chairman and CEO of Fisher House Foundation.
I have spent countless hours walking the halls of Fisher Houses, learning to read the exhaustion on a military spouse’s face after days in a hospital room. I have held the hands of parents waiting for test results they are terrified to hear. I have watched children make the best of a new place while a parent awaits surgery. This is the work of Fisher House Foundation, and it has shown me that the wounds of service do not always end when the fighting stops. The ones we cannot see are often the most important to watch.
Since February, when the U.S. entered conflict with Iran, the number of American troops in the Middle East has surged significantly. The fighting has already cost American lives and left hundreds wounded. But a hard truth, one I have spent my career watching play out, is that the deadliest phase for many service members and veterans often comes next: the challenge of returning to day-to-day life, navigating appointments that can take weeks to get, and facing friends and family who are not sure what to say.
According to research from the Department of Veterans Affairs, veterans die by suicide at a rate more than 50% higher than their civilian neighbors. In 2023 alone, that meant more than 6,000 lives lost. Every one of them was someone’s neighbor, child, parent or friend; someone who came home from deployment still fighting an invisible war no one else could see.
We already know what works: access to mental health care, peer support programs, and adaptive sports like the Warrior Games and the Invictus Games. These tools help replace isolation with a room full of people who understand without requiring explanation. They are not medical innovations waiting to be discovered. What is missing is urgency, and the resources to match it.
We can’t treat this new wave of deployment as business as usual for a mental health system that was already stretched thin. We must build transition support that starts before a service member steps off the plane ride home, not months later.
It’s going to take policymakers coming together to support the one thing we should all agree on: welcoming our service members home with the support they have earned for keeping us safe. It can’t stop there, though. It’s going to take something from all of us. You don’t need a title or big budget to play a role. Volunteer with organizations that support service members and veterans, call out stigma when you hear it, check on your neighbors and loved ones.
I have seen grief and trauma up close, but I have also seen triumph and joy, and I can tell you: those who get there rarely do it alone.
In a time of uncertainty, a new generation is lacing up their boots to go into harm’s way, and we’ve seen this story play out time and again. The question is: are we ready to write a new ending?
