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[intro music] Welcome back to another edition of Vanguard Radio. I'm your host, J. Richard Jones.
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Today, we have a very, uh, important topic that we'd like to talk to you about, and we have a guest who is gonna provide us quite a bit of information that, uh, is gonna give you the type of insights that we have not talked about before on this show.
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I'm talking about post-traumatic stress disorder, or it's commonly called PTSD.
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We know it's a mental health condition and that it's triggered usually by a terrifying event, either experiencing it or witnessing it, according to the Mayo Clinic.
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Some of the symptoms may include flashbacks, nightmares, and severe anxiety, as well as uncontrollable thoughts about the terrifying event.
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Some who have gone through traumatic events may have temporary difficulty adjusting and coping, but with time and good self-care, they usually get better.
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Symptoms can sometimes, though, get worse, last for months or even years, and may interfere with, uh, day-to-day functioning.
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An accurate diagnosis of PTSD symptoms is critical, and getting the proper treatment in reducing the symptoms will help improve function tremendously.
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Today on the show, we will hear from Lieutenant Colonel Retired Chris Linford, who served in the Canadian Armed Forces for 33 years.
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During the time of his service, he completed three operational deployments: the Gulf War in 1991, Rwanda in 1994, and Afghanistan from 2009 to 2010.
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In 2004, Chris was diagnosed with PTSD. With proper treatment, he returned to health and went back out to serve his country. While serving in Afghanistan, his PTSD returned.
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This led him to writing a book about his experience, Warrior Rising: A Soldier's Journey to PTSD and Back, which was published in 2013.
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Today, he and his wife, Catherine, are national ambassadors of Wounded Warriors Canada, a national charity providing innovative programming for veterans and first responders with PTSD and their spouses and partners.
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They're actively involved in promoting Wounded Warriors Canada programs called COPE, that's C-O-P-E, or otherwise known as Couples Overcoming PTSD Every Day, and the Trauma Resiliency Program, or TRP.
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Lieutenant Colonel Chris Linford, thanks for joining us on the show today. Yeah, well, thanks for having me, uh, Richard. Much appreciated. Uh, I always am quite pleased to, to talk about this topic.
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It's certainly near and dear to my heart, uh, with plenty of lived experience, I guess. [chuckles] Yes, and thank you for joining us. It is an important topic.
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Um, as we went through your biography, we, we get the sense that there's a remarkable story here of, of overcoming. Please tell us a little more about the years of service in the Canadian Armed Forces. Sure.
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I, uh, I joined in, uh, 1979 as a reservist in Calgary, having no real intent of having a, a long military career. It was just, uh, a way to, um, you know, get out and, and be social in a, in a new environment.
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I had just moved to Calgary and just wanted to meet some people, and I, uh, decided to join the, uh, the Calgary Highlanders as a, as a drummer in their pipe band.
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I had, I'd had an interest in that for some years, so no real intention there of, of serving, uh, in the regular force.
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Over that following eight years, I became quite interested in the military, uh, itself and, and started to consider, um, uh, a full-time career.
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Uh, I was in nursing school, uh, at the time and, uh, had no idea even that there was such a thing as a nurse in the regular force until it was, uh, explained to me and I thought, "Well, this could be a, a great entry, uh, into the reg force."
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So, um, sure enough, I was recruited and, uh, joined the regular force in, uh, December of 1988, uh, as a nursing officer and started my, you know, basically the following 25 years of postings and moving around Canada and the US and, and doing my operational tours.
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It was, uh, quite exciting. Not for everyone, but, uh, I, for some reason, it was, it was definitely fitting what I wanted out of a, out of a military career. Uh, I enjoyed being a, a nurse.
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I was, uh, a trauma nurse and an air medevac nurse, so I found the, the training and, and, uh, short-- even the domestic, uh, type activities to be quite interesting.
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D- deployed, you know, to the ice storms of Kingston and the floods of Winnipeg, all the places, you know, where the military gets sent, uh, to help out domestically.
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Uh, but interspersed amongst that, amongst those, uh, opportunities which kept, you know, me very busy and away from home most of the time, um, I did the Gulf, uh, tour in, uh, 1991 as part of the Canadian Field Hospital and had my first real taste of what war actually looks like vice what I thought it might look like, uh, you know, having watched, uh, you know, Hollywood movies and read books, uh, of, uh, what war was like.
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It was, it was quite a different flavor, uh, for me. Um, but what I learned from that experience was that I was doing the right thing in this world.
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I, I was, I was good at what I was doing and, uh, I enjoyed, uh, playing a role, and I found it to be quite surreal, actually, to be in the middle of this desert, uh, just south of Kuwait and engaged in the, the ground war that was going on there.
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It was only a few years later I ended up deployed to Rwanda as part of a humanitarian mission,
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uh, that, uh, then Prime Minister Jean Chrétien was, uh, sent us to basically help out with the cholera epidemic that was ongoing on the heels of the genocide in Rwanda.
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Um, we thought we were going into a very permissive environment, but when we got there, we found out it was anything but that, uh, but we were able to set up and do our job.
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Um, it was there in Rwanda that I was injured, uh, and, uh, ended up with PTSD, but I didn't really recognize it or know it for a good decade later, um, until two thousand and four when I was finally diagnosed.
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Uh, but I had spent the previous ten years in a, as a bit of a mess, although a high-functioning mess. [laughs] I was able to do my job and, and keep that, keep that going, keep that rolling, if you will.
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Um, but there was a price being paid, uh, psychologically for myself, uh, and as well through, uh, relationships with my spouse, my children were definitely impacted by that injury that, uh, I just didn't recognize at the time.
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So that kind of gets you up to about two thousand and four. Um, I was, uh, treated. Uh, when I asked for help, the military had resources available for me.
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Um, I was pretty sure I'd probably be dismissed from the military because I had PTSD, but in fact, I was not. I was, uh, able to get back to health and back to work, uh, within a year.
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Um, so I was quite appreciative of that and, uh, got back to j-- back to the job and, uh, enjoyed it.
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I ended up, uh, promoted and posted down to the United States to do an exchange tour, which was very interesting, uh, working with the US Joint, uh, Transportation Command,
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um, helping to get casualties out of Iraq and Afghanistan at that time.
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Um, then, uh, posted back to Canada in, uh, two thousand and seven and took command of one field ambulance in Edmonton, um, and then from there I deployed to Afghanistan to, uh, be the executive officer of the Role 3 Combat Surgical Hospital in Kandahar.
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Yeah, I, I mean, it sounds like you've had a life that, uh, has had a lot of travel, a lot of adventure, a lot of contribution that is, that is very rewarding, and of course, there's been some, some negative impacts as well.
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Um, it's interesting to me that your PTSD returned. I mean, that's, that's a terrible thought, but could you share with our listenerships and readership a little more about that?
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Like, how, how did, how did that come about? How did you deal with that? Yeah, it was [laughs] I guess we could argue all day long whether it was a good idea to go to Afghanistan with a diagnosis of PTSD.
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However, uh, for me, I had spent, uh, from two thousand and four to two thousand and nine becoming well again, uh, and I was really feeling quite good.
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I was probably at what I would consider the eighty-five percent solution of personal health. I was very physically fit. I was, uh, and feeling also mentally fit.
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I had a good grip, what I thought was a good grip on my post-traumatic stress disorder. I was not having recurrent nightmares anymore.
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I was-- My anxiety was under control, and I was still triggered from time to time with, with PTSD, but I had some good tools to be able to manage it. So I thought, "You know what?
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I think I'm good enough to go and, and be deployed again." And, uh, quite frankly, the opportunity to go and run the combat hospital in Kandahar was, for a medical guy, the icing on the cake of a career.
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So I was not going to pass that up. So ego kind of got in the way a little bit.
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Um, but the military was concerned about my PTSD diagnosis, and they did a pretty extensive assessment of me before they would allow me to go, and, uh, I passed that assessment with flying colors.
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Now, maybe they asked the wrong questions, I don't know, but they asked what they thought they should ask me and, and really got a, got a good handle on how I was managing, uh, my life and my career at that time, and they felt comfortable in sending me.
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Um, going to Afghanistan, I went in a very different role than I had my previous two tours. Uh, in the Gulf War and in Rwanda, I went as a clinician, and my tour in Afghanistan, I was going as an administrator.
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So this was quite a transition for me.
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Um, the-- I had-- I was leaving the clinical duties to the, to the younger folks, and, uh, you know, I was approaching fifty years of age, and, uh, I was really feeling I'd had enough of that, and I knew that it was those clinical duties that would probably hurt me again.
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Um, when I got to Afghanistan, though, um, things were very busy. Uh, kinetically, there was a lot of activity.
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Uh, there was a lot of combat going on literally right outside our, the, you know, the gates of the camp, and it was very busy across the southern province, uh, of Afghanistan, and, uh, this meant lots of casualties.
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My style of leadership is to essentially be at the teeth end of the unit. Um, I've always had the philosophy that even as a senior officer, I would never have
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junior people do something that I would not be willing to do myself. So I extended my, um, duties to be involved in all of the clinical intakes, all of the casualty intakes that were coming in.
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So the fact that we were so busy, uh, meant that I was out at the flight line quite a bit and not necessarily participating hands-on with each of the casualties that came in, but, um-
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I was seeing, uh, I was seeing what was coming in, and quite frankly, what, what I was seeing was pretty devastating as far as what IEDs do to the human body.
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Um, so I found over the first three months of my tour, I had-- if I was reflecting back on it, I was probably exposed to more trauma than I had ever been exposed to in my entire previous tours.
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Um, so I started to feel myself slipping again, feeling-- it, it, it comes in the-- for me, it came in the form of losing sleep, just inability to settle at night, inability to shut the brain down, inability to relax.
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As a result of that, anxiety rises, uh, because I can feel that I'm slipping and starting to be worried about such things, and also worried that I may lose my ability to competently execute my job in the middle of a war zone, which can affect not only me but others.
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So, uh, these things all, uh, combined together to make, uh, the middle part of my tour quite uncomfortable.
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Um, but there was no way that I was going to reach out for help at that point because given my history, they would have probably redeployed me to Canada, and I would have ended up coming home while leaving my troops behind in Afghanistan, which as a leader, uh, for me was a, an unacceptable option.
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So I found a way to, um, stay in Afghanistan. I, I, I sought the help of a, of a U.S.
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Navy physician who, uh, was sympathetic to my cause and wanted to see me succeed, so he helped out by, um, prescribing for me some sleep medication.
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Uh, that was, uh, something that, uh, he would not share with the Canadian, uh, leadership. Uh, so I ended up being able to get a few hours of sleep a night, which allowed me to sustain my seven-month tour.
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So that was pretty devastating. I can tell you by the time I was coming home, uh, I was, uh, pretty wrecked again.
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I, I was feeling probably worse than I'd ever felt, um, not only just feeling PTSD symptomology again but also feeling that I had failed somehow. Um, I was-- quite common with PTSD, you feel intense shame.
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Um, and even though I had, you know, done what I think was probably the best job I've ever done in my life, I, I could feel nothing but shame about it.
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So it was quite a devastating way to return home, um, and also to find, um, you know, my getting home and finding my ability to connect with my wife and my kids quite diminished as well.
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So overall, the feeling was, was quite devastating to, to have my PTSD return. That's, that's a horrible reward.
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I guess maybe one of the points of debate that you're probably asked is, should you have gone back, and, um, did that, did that trigger and make the condition worse?
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Um, I, I think given, given the nature of what it sounds like, you're somebody who's very dedicated, uh, and hands-on and to, to, to get the job done.
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So even though you had more of an administration role, you were still involved operationally, uh, in the whole process. So you come back home.
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I, I was just thinking about as you ta-talked about sleep routines, that's gotta play havoc with your routines with your family. Uh, and then you, you come back, and you feel even more diminished.
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What-- through the, through the, through the lens of your family, what was that like? What was that experience like for them, or what was some of the impact and results, um, do you think? Yeah.
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There was-- I, I, I can tell you when I was in the middle of that, um, it didn't even register with me how much of an impact it had on the family.
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It's really since I've become well again, uh, that I've, I've been able to recognize just how much of a devastating injury PTSD can be on the family.
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Um, and that's, you know, how the COPE program came about, and we can talk about that in a bit. But, uh,
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um, back then, you know, PTSD is pretty-- it's a pretty common side effect of PTSD has the, has the, uh, the diagnosed person pretty much staring at your belly button all day long and wondering how you're doing.
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Um, it, it can, it can make you seem very self-centered, very selfish, and, um, and quite annoying, quite frankly, to be around [chuckles] Yeah.
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Um, because, because you're, you're always so, um, focused upon yourself, and, and it really makes it very, very difficult to consider how your behavior might be impacting others.
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Um, you know, just 'cause you have PTSD doesn't give you license or permission to be a jerk. However, that's how I behaved most of the time. I was always very quick to my temper,
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which is very classic, uh, PTSD, where anger becomes the go-to emotion for literally everything. Um, I, I found myself unable to feel any other emotion other than anger.
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Even when, uh, things could have been quite-- should have and should have been quite joyful and happy, I was often resentful about something.
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So I can only imagine what that would have been like to live with, where you're just constantly, you know, angry about everything at everyone all the time.
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So it's no surprise that isolation becomes, uh, quite common for those with PTSD because you, you're angry at everyone, so why would you want to be around anyone? So it's quite common to, to isolate into the man cave.
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I hear that all the time about people go down into their man cave to get away from whatever it is that's going on in the house or, or outside. Uh, so social life drops right off.
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Uh, my ability to connect with other people, uh, became quite diminished, and quite frankly, I didn't even care about anyone else. So [clears throat] you become quite annoying [laughs]
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that, uh, to, to be that way, and as I reflect back on those times now, it's, it's, it's kind of embarrassing that, uh, that I was that way. But, um, and, and, you know,
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it was one thing for, uh, you know, my wife to put up with it, but for my three kids to also have to put up with it. Now, my kids are all-- were all teenagers and, and older, uh, when I was in Afghanistan.
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Some-- Two of them were even serving in the military while I was there. Um, so they're older kids. They're, uh, you know, young men and young women now, um, and on their own path, and, and
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they had pretty much had enough of me over the years, so they kinda checked out, uh, when it came to me and, and connecting with me, uh, which was at first, uh, not an issue for me. I, I frankly
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probably appreciated not having that stress to, to deal with.
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Um, but as I became well again and I started to lift my chin and actually see others and what the impact was of my injury upon them, I started to really desire reconnection,
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um, [clears throat] not only with myself, but with my, my spouse and, and with my children. And, uh, my s- my spouse is very forgiving and, and stood be- beside me the whole time despite my behavior.
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Uh, she was really the rock and the anchor that kept me moving i- in a straight line towards health. Um, but my kids were a different story.
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They, they, um, you know, they've only known a dad with PTSD 'cause I've, I've had it really since nineteen ninety-four, so my youngest was just, uh, a couple years old when I came home from Rwanda.
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Um, and my, and my boys were, were just young boys. So they've really only known a dad with PTSD and, and that dad wasn't necessarily the, the guy they would, they would wanna hang around.
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So, um, once I started to feel well again, I became quite frustrated that they wouldn't let me back in.
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Uh, it really took them a couple of years of me just showing a whole new way of being, a whole new behavior, a whole new way of, of, um, talking to them, uh, that for them to actually let me back in.
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And, uh, fortunately, uh, all three of them have, and we're enjoying, you know, three very unique relationships, uh, between myself and them now to this day, and it's, uh, it- it's probably one of the most gratifying pieces of my healing of, uh, from PTSD is being able to reconnect with my three kids.
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Well, that's certainly, um, a positive part of the process. I mean, this condition robs men and women, uh, who serve of, of so many things. And, you know- Mm...
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to, to create an environment where you're alone and there's trouble controlling your emotions or, or more of the negative emotions are expressed, that, that certainly would be tough on a home life.
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Um, Chris, I'd be curious to ask you, you mentioned that s- some of your kids made the decision to be involved in, in military service, I think if I've heard you correctly. Did that trigger- Yeah...
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any anxiety for you or negative feelings? [laughs] Yeah.
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That's, uh, that's a great question, and, and I [laughs] I almost at one point when, uh, my son Jeffrey, he was a combat engineer, um, which is, you know, one of the more dangerous jobs within the military.
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Uh, he, uh, was sent to Afghanistan two rotations after mine. So I was already-- When I came home from Afghanistan, like I said earlier, I was already quite ill again with PTSD.
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He was just about to deploy to Afghanistan, um, to work in counter IED. So he was going-- You know, his job was to go out there and find the IEDs that were, uh, injuring and killing our, our troops.
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Um, and while I was there, I saw guys doing his job that, that made mistakes and ended up injured or dead themselves. So
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it was quite a humbling and absolutely terrifying, uh, experience for me to think that my son, um, was going to be going and doing this.
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And, um, while I was in Afghanistan and, and in the thick of, of seeing this happen, these, these really bad days for young men and women who were working counter IED, I called him and I said, "If, if you-- I'll pay for any education you want if you get out today."
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[laughs] Yeah. Yeah. " 'Cause I don't-- I do not want you to c-- I do not want you to come here."
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And I felt actually quite responsible because, um, unbeknownst to me, uh, having lived this life, I, I may have led him down the path of also going down this path. Mm.
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And I was, I was just wondering, what would that be like if he was injured or killed? Uh, I would, I would no doubt feel intensely responsible for that.
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So I, I can tell you, uh, while he was deployed, he, he did not listen to me, of course.
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[laughs] And he was very proud and very de- very determined and actually a little angry at me that I would even suggest that he leave. Um, and, uh, he went and did his tour.
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And I can tell you, I, I, I refer to his tour as, uh, the nine months that I did not breathe. Um, I-- It, it fed into my PTSD quite profoundly.
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I was up most nights, um, pacing, uh, looking out the front window, waiting for, um, a car to pull up that would contain some officers and a padre, and they would be Um, here to notify me that, that our son had been injured or killed.
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So that was a truly horrific, uh, nine months, um, and I wouldn't wish that upon my worst enemy. Um, but I made it through it, um, uh, not feeling very well for sure.
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I was certainly, uh, very relieved when he, when he made it back with all ten fingers and ten toes. Um, and he's now off, uh, you know, married and has two children and, and doing really well in life.
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So, uh, and he feels quite, um, quite proud of his, his time. In fact, he just, uh, spoke at a local high school near where he lives on his experience in Afghanistan just after Remembrance Day period.
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So he continues to-- He's no longer in the military, but he continues to be proud of his service, and I'm certainly proud of his service, although it scared the crap out of me. Yeah.
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I, I, as a parent myself, I could, I could only imagine. Um, and I-- and we're certainly glad that your, your family is okay. Chris, uh,
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is there anything that is positive that comes out of having the condition of PTSD? Yes, indeed. Um,
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you, uh, you mentioned a, a few minutes ago about asking the question as to whether it was a good idea to go back to Afghanistan with PTSD, and I can-- a-and whether, you know, I should have done that.
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And for a long time, I questioned that, whether it, it was a good idea. But I can tell you so much, so much, uh, positivity has come out of me having my PTSD get worse again. Um- Interesting...
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it connected, it connected me.
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When I got back, it connected me to, um, a couple of the best, um, psychologists that I have ever met in, in my life, um, who helped me, um, get not only as well as I was after the first diagnosis back in two thousand and four.
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Um, we know-- You know, if you compare that time to now, what we know about PTSD is probably ten times. So I was able to access that level of care.
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The issue of getting that great care, uh, was profound for me because I started to realize that one-on-one care for PTSD, although it is the gold standard in nor-- in the world really as far as getting, uh, care, the c-cognitive behavioral therapy or cognitive behavioral processing, definitely the gold standard.
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But it only works, you know, roughly thirty-five percent of the time. I was definitely in that thirty-five percentile. It was working for me.
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But I can tell you that it was getting me only to about the eighty percent solution. There was something missing as far as what my care or how healthy I felt that I should be doing. And, um,
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I ended up seeing on TV one night a program, uh, about the, uh, the Royal Canadian Legion sponsoring a program in Alberta called the, uh, Outward Bound Veterans Program. And I, I thought, "Oh, what's this all about?"
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And, and it's actually a group of veterans and first responders gathered together to do some pretty strenuous outdoor, uh, activities. So, uh, I called them, and they invited me to come.
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And I went to backcountry skiing for a week, uh, with this group of veterans, and I really discovered through this process that I absolutely needed to be in the, in the room with other veterans similarly injured.
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And the experience of that was I didn't have to feel shame. I didn't have to defend myself. I didn't have to feel judged because we were all in the same boat.
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We were all similarly feeling horrible, and we were able to support each other, not to sort of pat each other's,
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you know, the back of each other's hands or, or to, uh, be cheerleaders for each other, but to just simply be there and hear each other and the way we were feeling.
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I can tell you, I brought back to my one-on-one care a pretty interesting experience and, and, uh, my therapist was very good about, "Well, why don't you pursue other things?
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So we'll continue with the one-on-one care, but let's find you some other group work to do with regards to PTSD." So I got connected to the Veterans Transition Program out of Vancouver,
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which was an amazing, uh, three-phase program, a group of six or seven veterans, and you do some absolutely profound transitional type work, um, that I, I just found incredibly useful.
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And, uh, it actually, for the first time, allowed me to feel hope that I was going to return to full health. Um, at that time, I met a, a couple of really important people in my life, uh, uh, Dr. Tim Black, uh, Dr.
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Stu Hoover, Dr. Meaghan McElhern, uh, absolutely amazing group trauma specialists in this country.
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Um, and, uh, I worked with them for a couple of years as a, as a support person on the program and just continued to learn and become, uh, more and more healthy as, as time went on.
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And I was able to get off all my medications, uh, which was terrific and a, and a goal for me. So I started to see that this group work, uh, is not just a fad. This is, this is something that can really work.
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Um, and at that point, we ended up, um, uh, with much, uh, enthusiasm and encouragement from my, my spouse, Catherine, who was the spouse sitting on the sidelines at this point, watching me get all kinds of care and me becoming well again, yet there was nothing for her.
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And she was probably as damaged by my PTSD as I was,
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uh, but just in a slightly different way, having to be The caregiver, the buffer between me and the children all those years, making excuses for me to our friends of why we couldn't go to that event or why we had to leave early or why I had to sit with my back to the wall so I would feel safe.
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She had to, you know, put up with all of that business
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as well as my anger towards her and my, uh, shortness, uh, and make excuses and, and really try and keep the household going because I was really only capable of taking care of myself to the most part, never mind the, you know, things that had to be done in the house.
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So it was a huge burden on her, and, uh, it was her that really, uh, pointed out quite, quite openly to Dr. Tim Black and, and myself one night that when are we going to do something for the spouse?
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Um, she and I had just come off, uh, a six-month, uh, speaking tour across Canada, uh, for my book, Warrior Rising, where we presented to, you know, lots of different military and first responder communities, uh, in I think over ninety locations across Canada.
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And, um, we just met countless couples who were struggling so much, and they really pleaded with us quite regularly that it, it-- they were, they were amazed that we were still together de-despite the injury and all that had gone on, and they figured if the Lynfords are still together after all this, maybe you guys can teach us [laughs] how-- what to do.
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So, uh, we took that seriously, and Dr. Black, uh, said, "Well, let's, let's develop a couples program that, uh, might try and remedy this."
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So that's how COPE got started, uh, five years ago now, and we've been running, uh, programs. Uh, we now run in five provinces across Canada in both French and English, and we've just, uh, what...
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I think we're, we're well over the two hundred couple mark through our program now. Um, so we're pretty, we're pretty proud of that, and, um, we've actually,
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uh, been funded by Wounded Warriors Canada since the beginning, but we now have a shared funding stream, uh, through Military Family Services.
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So we actually have federal, uh, funding, uh, for some of our programs now and, uh, as well as charity. Um, so we're super proud of this program. We, we really didn't think it would, it would go the way it has.
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We, we were pretty sure we would be kind of like a mom-and-pop sort of organization, uh, until we got tired of doing it and we would stop. But actually, it's just been lit on fire.
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Um, we-- like I said, we run two COPE programs a month now year-round, and, uh, it's-- the demand is incredibly high. We have-- In Eastern Canada, we have about a five-year wait list to get on our program.
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Chris, um, what, what an incredible story and a personal journey- Thank you... uh, that, that, that you've gone on.
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As you were going through that, what came to mind is, well, certainly your wife is not only your partner, but she's a real trooper. But, you know, I see your leadership through all of this.
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When I asked you what are some or, or if there is anything positive about this, it's quite clear that you and your wife, uh, are instrumental in advancing the treatment of PTSD, uh, in, in finding the people that can help and uncovering the program with partners and, and giving the support to partners.
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That's, that's certainly, um, an advancement and, and something to be quite proud of. I did wanna ask you, for somebody who's suffering from PTSD, how do they become a part of these programs? Yeah.
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I'm, I'm glad you asked that because, you know, so many people are at the end of their rope, and they just, uh, feel that this is as good as it gets, and I'm just gonna need to isolate from the world for the rest of my life, and that's just not true.
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Um, what I would suggest for anyone, especially if they are a military veteran, uh, they can go through Veterans Affairs Canada. They are entitled to care, and they can pursue it that way.
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Um, if they're still serving, they can pursue it through their care delivery unit on their bases.
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There's a mental health clinic on every base in Canada that is well prepared to help, uh, uh, people get on the right track, uh, to healing. If you're in the first responder community, it's, it's not as easy.
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They're, they're not as robust as, as the military are as far as resources. But some agencies do have in-house resources that they can refer you to.
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Um, other-- and some have to refer out, uh, so, uh, sometimes there is, uh, a long queue, uh, to get, uh, care, but it's so worth, uh, the wait to get in.
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We know so much more now about the treatment of PTSD than we did even five years ago. Um, resources are available, uh, to, like our programs throu-through Wounded Warriors Canada.
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We have, uh, eight programs that are available to people. They're all free of charge, um, if you are part of the veteran or first responder community.
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If you are, uh, uh, a civilian and you don't have any affiliations with first responder community or the military, it's, it's harder for sure to get that kind of care.
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Um, it's heartbreaking when we get calls and emails from people who, who don't have the affiliation, thus they are not entitled to attend any of our programs.
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We try to refer them to good clinicians in their area, and we do have a fairly extensive list of, of clinicians that do treat PTSD. Um, not every therapist is created equal in this regard, so you have to...
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You know, when you go to a therapist and you have PTSD, you need to ask them if they can treat PTSD, if they have experience with that.
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Uh, because not, you can't treat PTSD like it's, um, you know, some of the other, uh, like personality disorders, et cetera. So you, you do wanna get someone who specializes in that, in that area.
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Um, some companies provide, uh, a certain amount of, um, uh, visits, free visits, uh, or paid-for visits to a therapist, but, uh, often they're only five to 10, and, and quite frankly, when you're dealing with PTSD, five to 10 sessions is not going to do it.
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So I, I always feel, um, terrible for those that, uh, are, are in that situation 'cause you know that they could do so much better, uh, than what, uh, they will do with just five or 10 sessions.
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But it is the reality of the situation, and our hope is, uh, that our programming will eventually be, uh, referred to across the provincial spectrum of healthcare.
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Um, that's probably years away, uh, but, uh, we can hope and we, we keep pushing for it.
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And I think the more, I think the more and more we get into the, the community as far as supporting veterans and, and first responders, and there is some opportunity potentially to support, um, NHL hockey players who are struggling with, with, um, traumatic brain injuries and such.
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That's, that's on the, uh, on the books now as well as something we're pursuing. So I think the more we do that, um, and it gets into the community conversation, I, I think eventually, um,
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uh, even the bean counters within the healthcare systems will start to understand that if we invest a little bit of money now on people to be well, they will be, uh, there's a, a chance they will be less of a financial burden later in life when their PTSD is so bad that they're now requiring, um, uh, you know, a more intense level of care.
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I, uh, I think that's wonderful. Uh, for our listeners and, uh, our readership, if you're asking yourself, "How can I help to support these programs and the work that Wounded Warriors Canada is doing?"
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There are a few ways. You can done- donate to woundedwarriors.ca, or you can subscribe to Vanguard Magazine, the organization that is behind this podcast today.
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Uh, we had the privilege of recently of partnering with Wounded Warriors Canada, and with each subscription, uh, to our bimonthly magazine, uh, we donate a percentage of our subscriptions to help Canada's ill and injured armed forces members, veterans, first responders, and their families.
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Uh, we've been speak-- You're listening to Vanguard Radio, and we've been speaking with Lieutenant Colonel Retired Chris Linford.
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He's shared his incredible journey with us today, and he's also, uh, brought light to how people suffering with this terrible syndrome can get help and how there is hope.
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I'd like to really thank you for joining the show today, Mr. Linford. Yeah, it's my pleasure. Thanks so much for having me, Richard. Yes, it's, it's, it's been excellent. [upbeat music]
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[intro music] Welcome back to another edition of Vanguard Radio. I'm your host, J. Richard Jones.
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Today, we have a very, uh, important topic that we'd like to talk to you about, and we have a guest who is gonna provide us quite a bit of information that, uh, is gonna give you the type of insights that we have not talked about before on this show.
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I'm talking about post-traumatic stress disorder, or it's commonly called PTSD.
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We know it's a mental health condition and that it's triggered usually by a terrifying event, either experiencing it or witnessing it, according to the Mayo Clinic.
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Some of the symptoms may include flashbacks, nightmares, and severe anxiety, as well as uncontrollable thoughts about the terrifying event.
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Some who have gone through traumatic events may have temporary difficulty adjusting and coping, but with time and good self-care, they usually get better.
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Symptoms can sometimes, though, get worse, last for months or even years, and may interfere with, uh, day-to-day functioning.
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An accurate diagnosis of PTSD symptoms is critical, and getting the proper treatment in reducing the symptoms will help improve function tremendously.
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Today on the show, we will hear from Lieutenant Colonel Retired Chris Linford, who served in the Canadian Armed Forces for 33 years.
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During the time of his service, he completed three operational deployments: the Gulf War in 1991, Rwanda in 1994, and Afghanistan from 2009 to 2010.
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In 2004, Chris was diagnosed with PTSD. With proper treatment, he returned to health and went back out to serve his country. While serving in Afghanistan, his PTSD returned.
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This led him to writing a book about his experience, Warrior Rising: A Soldier's Journey to PTSD and Back, which was published in 2013.
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Today, he and his wife, Catherine, are national ambassadors of Wounded Warriors Canada, a national charity providing innovative programming for veterans and first responders with PTSD and their spouses and partners.
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They're actively involved in promoting Wounded Warriors Canada programs called COPE, that's C-O-P-E, or otherwise known as Couples Overcoming PTSD Every Day, and the Trauma Resiliency Program, or TRP.
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Lieutenant Colonel Chris Linford, thanks for joining us on the show today. Yeah, well, thanks for having me, uh, Richard. Much appreciated. Uh, I always am quite pleased to, to talk about this topic.
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It's certainly near and dear to my heart, uh, with plenty of lived experience, I guess. [chuckles] Yes, and thank you for joining us. It is an important topic.
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Um, as we went through your biography, we, we get the sense that there's a remarkable story here of, of overcoming. Please tell us a little more about the years of service in the Canadian Armed Forces. Sure.
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I, uh, I joined in, uh, 1979 as a reservist in Calgary, having no real intent of having a, a long military career. It was just, uh, a way to, um, you know, get out and, and be social in a, in a new environment.
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I had just moved to Calgary and just wanted to meet some people, and I, uh, decided to join the, uh, the Calgary Highlanders as a, as a drummer in their pipe band.
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I had, I'd had an interest in that for some years, so no real intention there of, of serving, uh, in the regular force.
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Over that following eight years, I became quite interested in the military, uh, itself and, and started to consider, um, uh, a full-time career.
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Uh, I was in nursing school, uh, at the time and, uh, had no idea even that there was such a thing as a nurse in the regular force until it was, uh, explained to me and I thought, "Well, this could be a, a great entry, uh, into the reg force."
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So, um, sure enough, I was recruited and, uh, joined the regular force in, uh, December of 1988, uh, as a nursing officer and started my, you know, basically the following 25 years of postings and moving around Canada and the US and, and doing my operational tours.
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It was, uh, quite exciting. Not for everyone, but, uh, I, for some reason, it was, it was definitely fitting what I wanted out of a, out of a military career. Uh, I enjoyed being a, a nurse.
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I was, uh, a trauma nurse and an air medevac nurse, so I found the, the training and, and, uh, short-- even the domestic, uh, type activities to be quite interesting.
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D- deployed, you know, to the ice storms of Kingston and the floods of Winnipeg, all the places, you know, where the military gets sent, uh, to help out domestically.
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Uh, but interspersed amongst that, amongst those, uh, opportunities which kept, you know, me very busy and away from home most of the time, um, I did the Gulf, uh, tour in, uh, 1991 as part of the Canadian Field Hospital and had my first real taste of what war actually looks like vice what I thought it might look like, uh, you know, having watched, uh, you know, Hollywood movies and read books, uh, of, uh, what war was like.
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It was, it was quite a different flavor, uh, for me. Um, but what I learned from that experience was that I was doing the right thing in this world.
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I, I was, I was good at what I was doing and, uh, I enjoyed, uh, playing a role, and I found it to be quite surreal, actually, to be in the middle of this desert, uh, just south of Kuwait and engaged in the, the ground war that was going on there.
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It was only a few years later I ended up deployed to Rwanda as part of a humanitarian mission,
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uh, that, uh, then Prime Minister Jean Chrétien was, uh, sent us to basically help out with the cholera epidemic that was ongoing on the heels of the genocide in Rwanda.
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Um, we thought we were going into a very permissive environment, but when we got there, we found out it was anything but that, uh, but we were able to set up and do our job.
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Um, it was there in Rwanda that I was injured, uh, and, uh, ended up with PTSD, but I didn't really recognize it or know it for a good decade later, um, until two thousand and four when I was finally diagnosed.
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Uh, but I had spent the previous ten years in a, as a bit of a mess, although a high-functioning mess. [laughs] I was able to do my job and, and keep that, keep that going, keep that rolling, if you will.
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Um, but there was a price being paid, uh, psychologically for myself, uh, and as well through, uh, relationships with my spouse, my children were definitely impacted by that injury that, uh, I just didn't recognize at the time.
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So that kind of gets you up to about two thousand and four. Um, I was, uh, treated. Uh, when I asked for help, the military had resources available for me.
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Um, I was pretty sure I'd probably be dismissed from the military because I had PTSD, but in fact, I was not. I was, uh, able to get back to health and back to work, uh, within a year.
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Um, so I was quite appreciative of that and, uh, got back to j-- back to the job and, uh, enjoyed it.
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I ended up, uh, promoted and posted down to the United States to do an exchange tour, which was very interesting, uh, working with the US Joint, uh, Transportation Command,
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um, helping to get casualties out of Iraq and Afghanistan at that time.
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Um, then, uh, posted back to Canada in, uh, two thousand and seven and took command of one field ambulance in Edmonton, um, and then from there I deployed to Afghanistan to, uh, be the executive officer of the Role 3 Combat Surgical Hospital in Kandahar.
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Yeah, I, I mean, it sounds like you've had a life that, uh, has had a lot of travel, a lot of adventure, a lot of contribution that is, that is very rewarding, and of course, there's been some, some negative impacts as well.
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Um, it's interesting to me that your PTSD returned. I mean, that's, that's a terrible thought, but could you share with our listenerships and readership a little more about that?
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Like, how, how did, how did that come about? How did you deal with that? Yeah, it was [laughs] I guess we could argue all day long whether it was a good idea to go to Afghanistan with a diagnosis of PTSD.
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However, uh, for me, I had spent, uh, from two thousand and four to two thousand and nine becoming well again, uh, and I was really feeling quite good.
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I was probably at what I would consider the eighty-five percent solution of personal health. I was very physically fit. I was, uh, and feeling also mentally fit.
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I had a good grip, what I thought was a good grip on my post-traumatic stress disorder. I was not having recurrent nightmares anymore.
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I was-- My anxiety was under control, and I was still triggered from time to time with, with PTSD, but I had some good tools to be able to manage it. So I thought, "You know what?
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I think I'm good enough to go and, and be deployed again." And, uh, quite frankly, the opportunity to go and run the combat hospital in Kandahar was, for a medical guy, the icing on the cake of a career.
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So I was not going to pass that up. So ego kind of got in the way a little bit.
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Um, but the military was concerned about my PTSD diagnosis, and they did a pretty extensive assessment of me before they would allow me to go, and, uh, I passed that assessment with flying colors.
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Now, maybe they asked the wrong questions, I don't know, but they asked what they thought they should ask me and, and really got a, got a good handle on how I was managing, uh, my life and my career at that time, and they felt comfortable in sending me.
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Um, going to Afghanistan, I went in a very different role than I had my previous two tours. Uh, in the Gulf War and in Rwanda, I went as a clinician, and my tour in Afghanistan, I was going as an administrator.
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So this was quite a transition for me.
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Um, the-- I had-- I was leaving the clinical duties to the, to the younger folks, and, uh, you know, I was approaching fifty years of age, and, uh, I was really feeling I'd had enough of that, and I knew that it was those clinical duties that would probably hurt me again.
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Um, when I got to Afghanistan, though, um, things were very busy. Uh, kinetically, there was a lot of activity.
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Uh, there was a lot of combat going on literally right outside our, the, you know, the gates of the camp, and it was very busy across the southern province, uh, of Afghanistan, and, uh, this meant lots of casualties.
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My style of leadership is to essentially be at the teeth end of the unit. Um, I've always had the philosophy that even as a senior officer, I would never have
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junior people do something that I would not be willing to do myself. So I extended my, um, duties to be involved in all of the clinical intakes, all of the casualty intakes that were coming in.
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So the fact that we were so busy, uh, meant that I was out at the flight line quite a bit and not necessarily participating hands-on with each of the casualties that came in, but, um-
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I was seeing, uh, I was seeing what was coming in, and quite frankly, what, what I was seeing was pretty devastating as far as what IEDs do to the human body.
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Um, so I found over the first three months of my tour, I had-- if I was reflecting back on it, I was probably exposed to more trauma than I had ever been exposed to in my entire previous tours.
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Um, so I started to feel myself slipping again, feeling-- it, it, it comes in the-- for me, it came in the form of losing sleep, just inability to settle at night, inability to shut the brain down, inability to relax.
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As a result of that, anxiety rises, uh, because I can feel that I'm slipping and starting to be worried about such things, and also worried that I may lose my ability to competently execute my job in the middle of a war zone, which can affect not only me but others.
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So, uh, these things all, uh, combined together to make, uh, the middle part of my tour quite uncomfortable.
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Um, but there was no way that I was going to reach out for help at that point because given my history, they would have probably redeployed me to Canada, and I would have ended up coming home while leaving my troops behind in Afghanistan, which as a leader, uh, for me was a, an unacceptable option.
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So I found a way to, um, stay in Afghanistan. I, I, I sought the help of a, of a U.S.
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Navy physician who, uh, was sympathetic to my cause and wanted to see me succeed, so he helped out by, um, prescribing for me some sleep medication.
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Uh, that was, uh, something that, uh, he would not share with the Canadian, uh, leadership. Uh, so I ended up being able to get a few hours of sleep a night, which allowed me to sustain my seven-month tour.
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So that was pretty devastating. I can tell you by the time I was coming home, uh, I was, uh, pretty wrecked again.
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I, I was feeling probably worse than I'd ever felt, um, not only just feeling PTSD symptomology again but also feeling that I had failed somehow. Um, I was-- quite common with PTSD, you feel intense shame.
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Um, and even though I had, you know, done what I think was probably the best job I've ever done in my life, I, I could feel nothing but shame about it.
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So it was quite a devastating way to return home, um, and also to find, um, you know, my getting home and finding my ability to connect with my wife and my kids quite diminished as well.
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So overall, the feeling was, was quite devastating to, to have my PTSD return. That's, that's a horrible reward.
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I guess maybe one of the points of debate that you're probably asked is, should you have gone back, and, um, did that, did that trigger and make the condition worse?
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Um, I, I think given, given the nature of what it sounds like, you're somebody who's very dedicated, uh, and hands-on and to, to, to get the job done.
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So even though you had more of an administration role, you were still involved operationally, uh, in the whole process. So you come back home.
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I, I was just thinking about as you ta-talked about sleep routines, that's gotta play havoc with your routines with your family. Uh, and then you, you come back, and you feel even more diminished.
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What-- through the, through the, through the lens of your family, what was that like? What was that experience like for them, or what was some of the impact and results, um, do you think? Yeah.
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There was-- I, I, I can tell you when I was in the middle of that, um, it didn't even register with me how much of an impact it had on the family.
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It's really since I've become well again, uh, that I've, I've been able to recognize just how much of a devastating injury PTSD can be on the family.
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Um, and that's, you know, how the COPE program came about, and we can talk about that in a bit. But, uh,
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um, back then, you know, PTSD is pretty-- it's a pretty common side effect of PTSD has the, has the, uh, the diagnosed person pretty much staring at your belly button all day long and wondering how you're doing.
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Um, it, it can, it can make you seem very self-centered, very selfish, and, um, and quite annoying, quite frankly, to be around [chuckles] Yeah.
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Um, because, because you're, you're always so, um, focused upon yourself, and, and it really makes it very, very difficult to consider how your behavior might be impacting others.
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Um, you know, just 'cause you have PTSD doesn't give you license or permission to be a jerk. However, that's how I behaved most of the time. I was always very quick to my temper,
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which is very classic, uh, PTSD, where anger becomes the go-to emotion for literally everything. Um, I, I found myself unable to feel any other emotion other than anger.
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Even when, uh, things could have been quite-- should have and should have been quite joyful and happy, I was often resentful about something.
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So I can only imagine what that would have been like to live with, where you're just constantly, you know, angry about everything at everyone all the time.
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So it's no surprise that isolation becomes, uh, quite common for those with PTSD because you, you're angry at everyone, so why would you want to be around anyone? So it's quite common to, to isolate into the man cave.
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I hear that all the time about people go down into their man cave to get away from whatever it is that's going on in the house or, or outside. Uh, so social life drops right off.
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Uh, my ability to connect with other people, uh, became quite diminished, and quite frankly, I didn't even care about anyone else. So [clears throat] you become quite annoying [laughs]
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that, uh, to, to be that way, and as I reflect back on those times now, it's, it's, it's kind of embarrassing that, uh, that I was that way. But, um, and, and, you know,
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it was one thing for, uh, you know, my wife to put up with it, but for my three kids to also have to put up with it. Now, my kids are all-- were all teenagers and, and older, uh, when I was in Afghanistan.
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Some-- Two of them were even serving in the military while I was there. Um, so they're older kids. They're, uh, you know, young men and young women now, um, and on their own path, and, and
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they had pretty much had enough of me over the years, so they kinda checked out, uh, when it came to me and, and connecting with me, uh, which was at first, uh, not an issue for me. I, I frankly
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probably appreciated not having that stress to, to deal with.
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Um, but as I became well again and I started to lift my chin and actually see others and what the impact was of my injury upon them, I started to really desire reconnection,
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um, [clears throat] not only with myself, but with my, my spouse and, and with my children. And, uh, my s- my spouse is very forgiving and, and stood be- beside me the whole time despite my behavior.
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Uh, she was really the rock and the anchor that kept me moving i- in a straight line towards health. Um, but my kids were a different story.
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They, they, um, you know, they've only known a dad with PTSD 'cause I've, I've had it really since nineteen ninety-four, so my youngest was just, uh, a couple years old when I came home from Rwanda.
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Um, and my, and my boys were, were just young boys. So they've really only known a dad with PTSD and, and that dad wasn't necessarily the, the guy they would, they would wanna hang around.
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So, um, once I started to feel well again, I became quite frustrated that they wouldn't let me back in.
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Uh, it really took them a couple of years of me just showing a whole new way of being, a whole new behavior, a whole new way of, of, um, talking to them, uh, that for them to actually let me back in.
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And, uh, fortunately, uh, all three of them have, and we're enjoying, you know, three very unique relationships, uh, between myself and them now to this day, and it's, uh, it- it's probably one of the most gratifying pieces of my healing of, uh, from PTSD is being able to reconnect with my three kids.
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Well, that's certainly, um, a positive part of the process. I mean, this condition robs men and women, uh, who serve of, of so many things. And, you know- Mm...
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to, to create an environment where you're alone and there's trouble controlling your emotions or, or more of the negative emotions are expressed, that, that certainly would be tough on a home life.
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Um, Chris, I'd be curious to ask you, you mentioned that s- some of your kids made the decision to be involved in, in military service, I think if I've heard you correctly. Did that trigger- Yeah...
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any anxiety for you or negative feelings? [laughs] Yeah.
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That's, uh, that's a great question, and, and I [laughs] I almost at one point when, uh, my son Jeffrey, he was a combat engineer, um, which is, you know, one of the more dangerous jobs within the military.
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Uh, he, uh, was sent to Afghanistan two rotations after mine. So I was already-- When I came home from Afghanistan, like I said earlier, I was already quite ill again with PTSD.
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He was just about to deploy to Afghanistan, um, to work in counter IED. So he was going-- You know, his job was to go out there and find the IEDs that were, uh, injuring and killing our, our troops.
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Um, and while I was there, I saw guys doing his job that, that made mistakes and ended up injured or dead themselves. So
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it was quite a humbling and absolutely terrifying, uh, experience for me to think that my son, um, was going to be going and doing this.
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And, um, while I was in Afghanistan and, and in the thick of, of seeing this happen, these, these really bad days for young men and women who were working counter IED, I called him and I said, "If, if you-- I'll pay for any education you want if you get out today."
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[laughs] Yeah. Yeah. " 'Cause I don't-- I do not want you to c-- I do not want you to come here."
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And I felt actually quite responsible because, um, unbeknownst to me, uh, having lived this life, I, I may have led him down the path of also going down this path. Mm.
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And I was, I was just wondering, what would that be like if he was injured or killed? Uh, I would, I would no doubt feel intensely responsible for that.
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So I, I can tell you, uh, while he was deployed, he, he did not listen to me, of course.
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[laughs] And he was very proud and very de- very determined and actually a little angry at me that I would even suggest that he leave. Um, and, uh, he went and did his tour.
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And I can tell you, I, I, I refer to his tour as, uh, the nine months that I did not breathe. Um, I-- It, it fed into my PTSD quite profoundly.
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I was up most nights, um, pacing, uh, looking out the front window, waiting for, um, a car to pull up that would contain some officers and a padre, and they would be Um, here to notify me that, that our son had been injured or killed.
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So that was a truly horrific, uh, nine months, um, and I wouldn't wish that upon my worst enemy. Um, but I made it through it, um, uh, not feeling very well for sure.
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I was certainly, uh, very relieved when he, when he made it back with all ten fingers and ten toes. Um, and he's now off, uh, you know, married and has two children and, and doing really well in life.
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So, uh, and he feels quite, um, quite proud of his, his time. In fact, he just, uh, spoke at a local high school near where he lives on his experience in Afghanistan just after Remembrance Day period.
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So he continues to-- He's no longer in the military, but he continues to be proud of his service, and I'm certainly proud of his service, although it scared the crap out of me. Yeah.
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I, I, as a parent myself, I could, I could only imagine. Um, and I-- and we're certainly glad that your, your family is okay. Chris, uh,
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is there anything that is positive that comes out of having the condition of PTSD? Yes, indeed. Um,
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you, uh, you mentioned a, a few minutes ago about asking the question as to whether it was a good idea to go back to Afghanistan with PTSD, and I can-- a-and whether, you know, I should have done that.
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And for a long time, I questioned that, whether it, it was a good idea. But I can tell you so much, so much, uh, positivity has come out of me having my PTSD get worse again. Um- Interesting...
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it connected, it connected me.
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When I got back, it connected me to, um, a couple of the best, um, psychologists that I have ever met in, in my life, um, who helped me, um, get not only as well as I was after the first diagnosis back in two thousand and four.
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Um, we know-- You know, if you compare that time to now, what we know about PTSD is probably ten times. So I was able to access that level of care.
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The issue of getting that great care, uh, was profound for me because I started to realize that one-on-one care for PTSD, although it is the gold standard in nor-- in the world really as far as getting, uh, care, the c-cognitive behavioral therapy or cognitive behavioral processing, definitely the gold standard.
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But it only works, you know, roughly thirty-five percent of the time. I was definitely in that thirty-five percentile. It was working for me.
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But I can tell you that it was getting me only to about the eighty percent solution. There was something missing as far as what my care or how healthy I felt that I should be doing. And, um,
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I ended up seeing on TV one night a program, uh, about the, uh, the Royal Canadian Legion sponsoring a program in Alberta called the, uh, Outward Bound Veterans Program. And I, I thought, "Oh, what's this all about?"
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And, and it's actually a group of veterans and first responders gathered together to do some pretty strenuous outdoor, uh, activities. So, uh, I called them, and they invited me to come.
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And I went to backcountry skiing for a week, uh, with this group of veterans, and I really discovered through this process that I absolutely needed to be in the, in the room with other veterans similarly injured.
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And the experience of that was I didn't have to feel shame. I didn't have to defend myself. I didn't have to feel judged because we were all in the same boat.
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We were all similarly feeling horrible, and we were able to support each other, not to sort of pat each other's,
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you know, the back of each other's hands or, or to, uh, be cheerleaders for each other, but to just simply be there and hear each other and the way we were feeling.
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I can tell you, I brought back to my one-on-one care a pretty interesting experience and, and, uh, my therapist was very good about, "Well, why don't you pursue other things?
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So we'll continue with the one-on-one care, but let's find you some other group work to do with regards to PTSD." So I got connected to the Veterans Transition Program out of Vancouver,
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which was an amazing, uh, three-phase program, a group of six or seven veterans, and you do some absolutely profound transitional type work, um, that I, I just found incredibly useful.
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And, uh, it actually, for the first time, allowed me to feel hope that I was going to return to full health. Um, at that time, I met a, a couple of really important people in my life, uh, uh, Dr. Tim Black, uh, Dr.
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Stu Hoover, Dr. Meaghan McElhern, uh, absolutely amazing group trauma specialists in this country.
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Um, and, uh, I worked with them for a couple of years as a, as a support person on the program and just continued to learn and become, uh, more and more healthy as, as time went on.
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And I was able to get off all my medications, uh, which was terrific and a, and a goal for me. So I started to see that this group work, uh, is not just a fad. This is, this is something that can really work.
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Um, and at that point, we ended up, um, uh, with much, uh, enthusiasm and encouragement from my, my spouse, Catherine, who was the spouse sitting on the sidelines at this point, watching me get all kinds of care and me becoming well again, yet there was nothing for her.
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And she was probably as damaged by my PTSD as I was,
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uh, but just in a slightly different way, having to be The caregiver, the buffer between me and the children all those years, making excuses for me to our friends of why we couldn't go to that event or why we had to leave early or why I had to sit with my back to the wall so I would feel safe.
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She had to, you know, put up with all of that business
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as well as my anger towards her and my, uh, shortness, uh, and make excuses and, and really try and keep the household going because I was really only capable of taking care of myself to the most part, never mind the, you know, things that had to be done in the house.
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So it was a huge burden on her, and, uh, it was her that really, uh, pointed out quite, quite openly to Dr. Tim Black and, and myself one night that when are we going to do something for the spouse?
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Um, she and I had just come off, uh, a six-month, uh, speaking tour across Canada, uh, for my book, Warrior Rising, where we presented to, you know, lots of different military and first responder communities, uh, in I think over ninety locations across Canada.
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And, um, we just met countless couples who were struggling so much, and they really pleaded with us quite regularly that it, it-- they were, they were amazed that we were still together de-despite the injury and all that had gone on, and they figured if the Lynfords are still together after all this, maybe you guys can teach us [laughs] how-- what to do.
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So, uh, we took that seriously, and Dr. Black, uh, said, "Well, let's, let's develop a couples program that, uh, might try and remedy this."
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So that's how COPE got started, uh, five years ago now, and we've been running, uh, programs. Uh, we now run in five provinces across Canada in both French and English, and we've just, uh, what...
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I think we're, we're well over the two hundred couple mark through our program now. Um, so we're pretty, we're pretty proud of that, and, um, we've actually,
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uh, been funded by Wounded Warriors Canada since the beginning, but we now have a shared funding stream, uh, through Military Family Services.
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So we actually have federal, uh, funding, uh, for some of our programs now and, uh, as well as charity. Um, so we're super proud of this program. We, we really didn't think it would, it would go the way it has.
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We, we were pretty sure we would be kind of like a mom-and-pop sort of organization, uh, until we got tired of doing it and we would stop. But actually, it's just been lit on fire.
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Um, we-- like I said, we run two COPE programs a month now year-round, and, uh, it's-- the demand is incredibly high. We have-- In Eastern Canada, we have about a five-year wait list to get on our program.
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Chris, um, what, what an incredible story and a personal journey- Thank you... uh, that, that, that you've gone on.
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As you were going through that, what came to mind is, well, certainly your wife is not only your partner, but she's a real trooper. But, you know, I see your leadership through all of this.
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When I asked you what are some or, or if there is anything positive about this, it's quite clear that you and your wife, uh, are instrumental in advancing the treatment of PTSD, uh, in, in finding the people that can help and uncovering the program with partners and, and giving the support to partners.
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That's, that's certainly, um, an advancement and, and something to be quite proud of. I did wanna ask you, for somebody who's suffering from PTSD, how do they become a part of these programs? Yeah.
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I'm, I'm glad you asked that because, you know, so many people are at the end of their rope, and they just, uh, feel that this is as good as it gets, and I'm just gonna need to isolate from the world for the rest of my life, and that's just not true.
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Um, what I would suggest for anyone, especially if they are a military veteran, uh, they can go through Veterans Affairs Canada. They are entitled to care, and they can pursue it that way.
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Um, if they're still serving, they can pursue it through their care delivery unit on their bases.
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There's a mental health clinic on every base in Canada that is well prepared to help, uh, uh, people get on the right track, uh, to healing. If you're in the first responder community, it's, it's not as easy.
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They're, they're not as robust as, as the military are as far as resources. But some agencies do have in-house resources that they can refer you to.
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Um, other-- and some have to refer out, uh, so, uh, sometimes there is, uh, a long queue, uh, to get, uh, care, but it's so worth, uh, the wait to get in.
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We know so much more now about the treatment of PTSD than we did even five years ago. Um, resources are available, uh, to, like our programs throu-through Wounded Warriors Canada.
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We have, uh, eight programs that are available to people. They're all free of charge, um, if you are part of the veteran or first responder community.
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If you are, uh, uh, a civilian and you don't have any affiliations with first responder community or the military, it's, it's harder for sure to get that kind of care.
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Um, it's heartbreaking when we get calls and emails from people who, who don't have the affiliation, thus they are not entitled to attend any of our programs.
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We try to refer them to good clinicians in their area, and we do have a fairly extensive list of, of clinicians that do treat PTSD. Um, not every therapist is created equal in this regard, so you have to...
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You know, when you go to a therapist and you have PTSD, you need to ask them if they can treat PTSD, if they have experience with that.
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Uh, because not, you can't treat PTSD like it's, um, you know, some of the other, uh, like personality disorders, et cetera. So you, you do wanna get someone who specializes in that, in that area.
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Um, some companies provide, uh, a certain amount of, um, uh, visits, free visits, uh, or paid-for visits to a therapist, but, uh, often they're only five to 10, and, and quite frankly, when you're dealing with PTSD, five to 10 sessions is not going to do it.
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So I, I always feel, um, terrible for those that, uh, are, are in that situation 'cause you know that they could do so much better, uh, than what, uh, they will do with just five or 10 sessions.
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But it is the reality of the situation, and our hope is, uh, that our programming will eventually be, uh, referred to across the provincial spectrum of healthcare.
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Um, that's probably years away, uh, but, uh, we can hope and we, we keep pushing for it.
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And I think the more, I think the more and more we get into the, the community as far as supporting veterans and, and first responders, and there is some opportunity potentially to support, um, NHL hockey players who are struggling with, with, um, traumatic brain injuries and such.
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That's, that's on the, uh, on the books now as well as something we're pursuing. So I think the more we do that, um, and it gets into the community conversation, I, I think eventually, um,
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uh, even the bean counters within the healthcare systems will start to understand that if we invest a little bit of money now on people to be well, they will be, uh, there's a, a chance they will be less of a financial burden later in life when their PTSD is so bad that they're now requiring, um, uh, you know, a more intense level of care.
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I, uh, I think that's wonderful. Uh, for our listeners and, uh, our readership, if you're asking yourself, "How can I help to support these programs and the work that Wounded Warriors Canada is doing?"
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There are a few ways. You can done- donate to woundedwarriors.ca, or you can subscribe to Vanguard Magazine, the organization that is behind this podcast today.
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Uh, we had the privilege of recently of partnering with Wounded Warriors Canada, and with each subscription, uh, to our bimonthly magazine, uh, we donate a percentage of our subscriptions to help Canada's ill and injured armed forces members, veterans, first responders, and their families.
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Uh, we've been speak-- You're listening to Vanguard Radio, and we've been speaking with Lieutenant Colonel Retired Chris Linford.
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He's shared his incredible journey with us today, and he's also, uh, brought light to how people suffering with this terrible syndrome can get help and how there is hope.
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I'd like to really thank you for joining the show today, Mr. Linford. Yeah, it's my pleasure. Thanks so much for having me, Richard. Yes, it's, it's, it's been excellent. [upbeat music]
