Its a Gay
Military Thing
by
Danny Ingram
President,
American Veterans For Equal Rights |
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Several years ago I was leading
the AVER Georgia Color Guard at the front of Atlanta's
annual Pride Parade when a female Marine stepped out of
the crowd and asked if she could carry a flag. She was
wearing her Marine cover and still looking every bit a
Marine. With 3 full ranks of 5 marchers each I didn't
have a place to put her. I asked the Marine if she would
mind marching as a personal escort directly in front of
the Jeep carrying retired Navy Captain Dr. Ralph Chinn,
a psychiatrist who had served in WW2, Korea, and
Vietnam, and our chapter's highest ranking member. She
replied that she was more than honored to do so because
she had been feeling really isolated in "this crowd",
but now she had found "her place", and she was ready to
serve.
"Being gay in the veteran community was OK, but being a
vet in the gay community was not", said Dr. Chris DiMaio,
recalling a story told to him by a gay veteran some
years earlier. A former Navy doctor who served in
Vietnam, and AVER's newest member, Dr. DiMaio has had a
lot of experience in working as a psychiatrist with LGBT
veterans and issues unique to the gay vets community.
One of those problems is relating to an LGBT community
that often seems alienating to former members of the
military, accustomed to a very different type of life.
Part of AVER's mission is to be the new home where LGBT
vets can celebrate both their LGBT pride and their pride
in having served the US military.
Dr. Chris DiMaio served as a medical officer in the
United States Navy from 1965 to 1969. When he was
drafted, Chris DiMaio was in Medical School at
Georgetown University. Under a program called the Berry
Plan, he was allowed to complete medical school and
internship before entering active duty as a medical
officer in the service of his choice. DiMaio chose to
serve in the Navy and was called to active duty in 1967
after completing his internship at New York's Bellevue
Hospital.
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Dr. DiMaio was sent to St. Albans Naval Hospital in
Queens for training, but was quickly transferred to the
Field Medical School at Camp Pendleton, California. He
had been assigned to the Marine Corps, and when the Tet
Offensive began in 1968 his training was again cut short
and he was sent to Vietnam as a General Medical Officer.
His first assignment was in a field hospital in Phu Bai
near the city of Hue where there was street-to-street
fighting. Dr. DiMaio recalls heavy casualties and
working long hours in triage and in surgery. When there
were rocket or mortar attacks the patients awaiting
surgery had to be moved to bunkers. |
Lieutenant DiMaio was then
transferred to Dang Ha where he was to serve as the
battalion surgeon for the Marine 1st of the Ninth, the
famous "Walking Dead", a unit that is reported to have
suffered a 90% casualty rate. This is the same unit in
which AVER Gold Coast President Marshall Belmaine served
during his Vietnam tour. On his first day in 1/9, while
Dr. DiMaio was adjusting to the 1/9 Battalion Aid
Station (BAS), the corpsman who was assigned with him
was killed, along with the wounded he was treating. The
corpsmen in 1/9 were on the edge of exhaustion because
of constant combat and heavy casualties. Dr. DiMaio
volunteered to leave the station and go up into the
field to replace the corpsmen assigned to HQ to allow
them some rest time. He took part in several ground
operations along the DMZ from Laos to Qua Viet and
participated in one helicopter assault. Dr. DiMaio got
to see the country from around Khe Sahn to Camp Carrol,
Vandergrift, the Rockpile and Cam Lo. He soon learned
that although he might improve morale and "provide a
target", the corpsmen were better in the field than he
was. Dr. DiMaio went on to Medical Civilian Action
Programs (MEDCAPS) and would be called to do triage and
minor surgery in a tent if a unit sustained heavy combat
casualties.
Dr. DiMaio developed a very bad case of cerebral malaria
and was transferred to the medical ship USS Sanctuary
where he almost died. Following his recovery he was sent
back to the 3rd Medical. That night he stayed at the
Danang Hospital Da Nang, where he recalls that on his
first day back the base was hit by rockets. His final
station was in Quang Tri where he established a medical
unit along with Doctor Ed Chow. He treated everything
from major combat injuries to the Bubonic Plague.
Dr. DiMaio returned stateside in 1969 where he served as
Medical Physician at the Brig for the Treasure Island
Naval Base. One of his patients there had been kicked
out of the military for being gay. The patient was raped
while at the facility.
After leaving the military Dr. DiMaio completed a
psychiatric residency in San Francisco and San Diego. He
practiced psychiatry from 1970 to 2007. Much of his work
in Santa Cruz from 76-85 in private practice focused on
veterans' issues. In 1985 he joined the Palo Alto VA
Hospital to work on the Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
unit at Menlo Park, and later was the clinical director
of the San Jose VA Outpatient Clinic. He switched to
Kaiser Permanente in 1990.
During his time working with veterans it became
increasingly clear to Dr. DiMaio and other mental health
professionals that many Vietnam veterans were displaying
abnormal behavior that was new to the VA. Vietnam
veterans were experiencing a high divorce rate and a lot
of substance abuse. Suicide and attempted suicide rates
were very high. Veterans were barricading themselves
inside their homes, and others were falling out of
society, becoming homeless. Obviously something had gone
wrong, but there wasn't a lot of understanding about
mental injuries from combat. It was the early days of a
growing understanding of PTSD on a massive scale that
the military was largely unprepared to handle
effectively.
Thirty-five years later the military is much more
prepared for dealing with PTSD. Dr. DiMaio and other
mental health providers serving veterans and service
members have developed Vet Centers in the community as a
way of bringing support out of the hospitals where help
can be more easily accessed. One more reason to admire
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Admiral Mike Mullen is that
both the admiral and Mrs. Mullen have been very
proactive in challenging the military culture's belief
that psychological problems are a weakness to be
overcome by discipline and fortitude. The military now
talks to service members about the dangers of PTSD
before they deploy overseas and screens them after they
return home.
But there are still problems, according to Dr. DiMaio.
"It's really hard for young people to admit PTSD because
they don't want to be kept", he notes, referring to the
military's policy of retaining potential PTSD patients
for testing and treatment, postponing their return home.
Most service members returning from deployment want to
get home as quickly as possible, forgoing help with PTSD
and hoping that getting back to family will solve any
problems they may be experiencing. Unfortunately that is
not always the case, and frequently families may be the
ones to suffer from a combat veteran's problems with
PTSD.
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Now retired, Dr. DiMaio continues to volunteer his time
with veterans and college students, many of whom are
veterans themselves returning from overseas deployment.
He and Mark Sandman, a PTSD specialist and a fellow
Vietnam veteran, consult once a week with The County
Veterans Advocate Dean Kaufman, a Gulf War veteran, and
are on call for Dean "24/7". Both Dr. DiMaio and Sandman
also consultant with Peer Counseling for Veterans at the
University of California Santa Cruz and Cabrillo
Community College. Dr. DiMain has also been active with
Rainbow Vets, a group of LGBT veterans that he helped
form in Santa Cruz.
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In September Dr. DiMaio and I will both speak about the
unique challenges of LGBT military veterans at the Gay
and Lesbian Medical Association (GLMA) annual conference
that is being held this year in Atlanta. Monica Helms,
president of the Transgender American Veterans
Association (TAVA), will discuss issues that transgender
veterans encounter and the new VA policy regarding
transgender vets. Nicole Knight, Team Leader for the
Atlanta Vet Center, will discuss what the Vet Centers
are and what they can offer in the way of rehabilitation
counseling and referral to other resources at the
nearest VA Hospital. Dr. DiMaio will discuss Mild
Traumatic Brain Injuries (TBI), the signature wound of
Iraq and Afghanistan, and how TBI can be overlooked even
when it is causing significant problems for the veteran
and their significant others. And I will discuss
"double" PTSD in LGBT veterans, the increased stress
caused by having to maintain a false identity and the
detriment to psychological healing caused by having to
lie in therapy. This will be the first year that GLMA
will feature veterans' issues in its programming.
Dr. DiMaio and I discussed future directions for AVER in
helping to define and meet the needs of today's LGBT
veterans. The challenges are many. Along with the major
challenges of benefits for same-gender spouses, there
are a wide new range of issues unique to a military with
growing experience of LGBT service members. What will
PTSD look like for women, especially mothers? How will
military family support groups integrate same-sex
partners of LGBT service members? Dr. DiMaio sites the
story of a transgender grandmother, herself a veteran
and Purple Heart recipient, trying to get support from
Blue Star Mothers, a support group for mothers who have
children deployed overseas, in caring for her
grandchildren. Integration will require the challenge of
a wide range of barriers. "It took a long time for
integration [of the military] to get done", notes Dr.
DiMaio, "and it will require the breakdown of more
barriers than people think."
And there is the issue of LGBT veterans finding "their"
place. There is a strong bond in the military, a bond
that most people do not understand. Veterans stick
together. I remember the slogan a few years back used my
many African-Americans, "It's a Black Thing". It could
just as easily be said "It's a Military Thing". Veterans
understand each other, but not all straight veterans are
willing to extend that understanding and acceptance to
LGBT vets. And the LGBT community has not always been
especially welcoming to members of the military or proud
veterans. AVER is the place where the two come together.
In AVER we understand each other as veterans, AND we
understand each other as LGBT people, with all the
mutual challenges that come with each identity. As we
examine our on-going mission to be of service to LGBT
veterans and service members, we need to keep our unique
position in mind. Each of us found our home. We should
strive to "be" home for those "coming" home.
©
2011 Gay Military Signal