Hero Harbor Speaks

Marine SSgt JB Brown

Marine SSgt JB Brown

Marine Veteran Omar Fuentes

Army Ranger Remi Rivera Of Ratpack Worldwide Security

Navy Veteran Matt Witkowski

WWII Battle of Peleliu Marine Veteran Vic Bond

WWII Marine Veteran Vic Bond

Marine Veteran Brian Chontosh Host of Crooked Butterfly Podcast

Marine Veteran Frank Manteau of Crayons Ready to Eat

Marine Veteran Frank Manteau of Crayons Ready to Eat Part One

Marine Veteran Frank Manteau of Crayons Ready to Eat

Recap of Conversation with Marine Veteran Fred King

 Marine Veteran Joshua Granger

Marine Veteran Joshua Granger

Marine Veteran Ray Lopez Founder of PTSD Bottles

Marine Veteran Ray Lopez Part One

Marine Veteran Lorne Moon Part Two

Marine Veteran Lorne Moon Part One

Jason Jean Air Force Veteran and Founder of Tattered Beans Part Two

Jason Jean Air Force Veteran and Founder of Tattered Beans Part One

Talking with the founders of Four Brother's Mead

Marine Sgt Adam Cummings

This is the second half of the old episode with Desert Storm-era Army veteran Rick Stevens. It has always been a very important story and one of my favorites but has taken on even more significance in light of things I recently learned.

During the pandemic, I did a lot of research via documentaries and audiobooks. From the knowledge I gained sprang the idea to shine a spotlight on and, as best I could, personalize the individual lives and losses of our Hero brothers and sisters via suicide. In the attempt to get more information, I reached out to my Hero network and was connected to a resource at the VA who shared with me some terribly disappointing and frustrating information that directly relates to Rick's story and those like him.

I would ask you to hear Rick's story in his own words, but here is what I recently learned: When I asked my VA contact about the suicide numbers, the initial response was, "Do you want suicides or overdoses?". Of course, my response was, "Dead is dead; what's the difference?" As it was then explained, the VA differentiates between the two. As a female veteran with numerous (ancient history) suicide attempts under her belt and knowing that overdose is frequently the method of choice for women, my first thought was, "Great, yet another way of marginalizing the female demographic."

As I continued to ask questions, I learned at least part of the reasoning is that due to illicit Fentanyl, which hit the streets in 2005 (long after Rick's story), many of the overdoses weren't intentional suicides. But for me, all that does is scream even louder the obvious need to reach our Heroes before they get to such an incredibly low point that substance use of any kind feels like their only option.

Therefore, the ongoing focus of this podcast is to look at both the events that lead to the escalating loss of Hero life post service and also the horrible organizations I've encountered that are paid (sometimes multi-millions of dollars) to help our Heroes but instead use that money for their own personal gain and only make the problems worse.

I would beg your patience as I put this all together. It is a very big mission, and I'm an overachieving perfectionist who wants it to be right, enabling it to make the most impact. That being said, volunteers are always welcome.

This old episode is an interview with Desert Storm-era Army veteran Rick Stevens. It has always been a very important story and one of my favorites but has taken on even more significance in light of things I recently learned.

During the pandemic, I did a lot of research via documentaries and audiobooks. From the knowledge I gained sprang the idea to shine a spotlight on and, as best I could, personalize the individual lives and losses of our Hero brothers and sisters via suicide. In the attempt to get more information, I reached out to my Hero network and was connected to a resource at the VA who shared with me some terribly disappointing and frustrating information that directly relates to Rick's story and those like him.

I would ask you to hear Rick's story in his own words, but here is what I recently learned: When I asked my VA contact about the suicide numbers, the initial response was, "Do you want suicides or overdoses?". Of course, my response was, "Dead is dead; what's the difference?" As it was then explained, the VA differentiates between the two. As a female veteran with numerous (ancient history) suicide attempts under her belt and knowing that overdose is frequently the method of choice for women, my first thought was, "Great, yet another way of marginalizing the female demographic."

As I continued to ask questions, I learned at least part of the reasoning is that due to illicit Fentanyl, which hit the streets in 2005 (long after Rick's story), many of the overdoses weren't intentional suicides. But for me, all that does is scream even louder the obvious need to reach our Heroes before they get to such an incredibly low point that substance use of any kind feels like their only option.

Therefore, the ongoing focus of this podcast is to look at both the events that lead to the escalating loss of Hero life post service and also the horrible organizations I've encountered that are paid (sometimes multi-millions of dollars) to help our Heroes but instead use that money for their own personal gain and only make the problems worse.

I would beg your patience as I put this all together. It is a very big mission, and I'm an overachieving perfectionist who wants it to be right, enabling it to make the most impact. That being said, volunteers are always welcome.

This is the old episode "When Heroes Experience Pain". It was originally aired at the end of 2018 when the Hero Harbor app was first launched. I'm including it here because it best describes why Hero Harbor was created, what we do and why we do it.

This episode is short, but the important part was to get broadcasting again. My work is always a dynamic body as the only constant is change. However, there is much to look forward to, and any ideas submitted will be given full consideration. Enjoy. It's good to be back.

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