Soldier’s struggles didn’t cease upon return from Iraq
25TH STREET — When Army Sgt. Ananda das McClure volunteered for his third tour of duty in Iraq — often referred to as the “jinx tour” by the enlisted — he sold off all of his belongings and gave up his Santa Monica apartment, thinking he would never make it out of the war-torn country alive.
McClure, 37, did return home, but not before suffering a serious, career-ending injury in a roadside bomb attack. An ordinance disposal specialist, McClure was escorting a convoy through hostile territory when his unit was hit by an improvised explosive device, or IED. The force of the explosion slammed McClure into the wheel well of his Humvee, crushing several vertebrae.
He was the lone survivor. Following his recovery, McClure, who enlisted when he was 21, was sent home, never to serve again with the men who became his brothers. That was in April 2005. Just over a year later, on May 11, McClure would take his own life in the one-bedroom apartment in the north of Wilshire neighborhood that he shared with his new bride.
While he wasn’t on active duty at the time of his death, McClure’s widow, Laura Hanson, still considers the love of her life to be a casualty of war. She believes her late husband — like countless other soldiers returning home from battle zones overseas — committed suicide to escape the emotional and physical pain that comes with fighting a war — pain that torments one so much that they will take extreme measures to end it.
“I know he had a lot of guilt because he was the only survivor in his unit,” Hanson, 33, an architect and designer, said shortly after McClure’s death. “I know there were a lot of things that deeply affected him over there, things he saw, things he had to do to survive. I think they just haunted him to the point where he couldn’t take it any longer. He just had a weak moment when he thought he could escape the pain.”
SUFFERING FROM DISEASE McClure didn’t leave a suicide note. He wasn’t the type to write letters. But Hanson believes the cause of his death is clear — post traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, an often-debilitating mental condition that can produce a range of unwanted emotional responses to the trauma of combat or any other life-threatening situation.
It can emerge weeks, months or years after an episode, and if left untreated, it can severely affect the lives of not only victims, but their families as well.
Of the more than 250,000 veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars already discharged from service, about 12,500 have been in Veterans Administration counseling centers for readjustment problems and symptoms associated with PTSD.
The number of victims suffering from the disease has dramatically increased since PTSD was first diagnosed following the Vietnam War, according to the National Center for PTSD, which is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.
“There has been a steady influx in the last nine years of patients seeking treatment for PTSD,” said Dr. Leslie Martin, director of the Post Traumatic Stress Disorder Outpatient Services at the VA in Westwood where McClure sought treatment following his return. “During that time the number of our patients has increased from 34 to 800. People are slowly coming into the program as they find out what exists.”
With awareness about the harmful effects of PTSD lacking, along with federal funding to properly address the disorder, Hanson is hoping that by sharing her late husband’s story, more attention and resources can be directed towards treatment. Just because the wounds are not visible doesn’t mean they are less deserving of care, she said.
“I know that Ananda would have wanted me to speak out,” Hanson said. “That’s the kind of person he was, very passionate about what he believed was right.”
And that included the war on terror. “Ananda believed strongly in the military and the mission he was involved in,” Hanson said. “He loved the men he served with. The reason he volunteered was because a friend of his was going and he didn’t want him to go alone.”
DEPRESSION SETS IN People who suffer from PTSD often relive the experience, such as an IED attack, through nightmares and flashbacks, have difficulty sleeping, and feel detached or estranged. The symptoms can be severe enough and last long enough to significantly impair the person’s daily life.
For McClure, it was no different. Not only did he suffer daily from the debilitating pain of nerve damage from the explosion but also the constant horror of it.
When Hanson first met her husband in December 2004, she said it was “love at first sight. The two were introduced to one another at Ma’Kai, a restaurant on Broadway and Ocean Avenue. Hanson said she was immediately charmed by the tall, dark and handsome man who seemed to be the antithesis of metrosexual. He was tough, chewed tobacco and loved doing “Mind Eraser” shots.
However, he had a sensitive side as well, a product of a rocky childhood in Maui when he was separated from his mother at the age of 5 and forced to live with Hare Krishna monks in India. He stayed there until he was 15, enduring a decade of abuse, Hanson said, which seemed to make him more sensitive to the suffering of others.
The two married in February 2005 during a small ceremony on a beach in Malibu. It was McClure’s second marriage, the first occurred when he was in his 20s which produced two children.
“He had a tremendous outlook on life, which I admired even more once I learned about some of the hardships he had to endure growing up,” Hanson said.“He just seemed so outgoing. He loved his children, his friends … We really brought out the best in each other.”
McClure, a former bouncer at Renee’s on Wilshire Boulevard, also was a friendly face for those who attended the local bar. His name, Ananda, actually means “divine bliss” or “happiness” in Sanskrit.
“Always ready with a joke and a firm handshake and a smile, Ananda was a fixture (at Renee’s) even after he stopped working there,” wrote good friend Eric Passchier. “Ananda was an amazingly intelligent and generous man …”
Things changed slightly after his injury, friends and family said. While still a passionate, fun-loving family man who enjoyed hanging out with loved ones, McClure would sometimes fall into episodes of deep depression, during which he would pull out a picture album comprised of photos from the war. One photo was of an Iraqi fighter he killed at close range during combat.
“That haunted him a lot,” Hanson said of the killing.“He would constantly have nightmares. He’d talk in his sleep. It was always something that had to do with the war … There were times when he would just shut down. He would watch his children playing basketball and he’d want to join in, but he couldn’t because of his injuries. I know that hurt him.”
TREATMENT Martin, who could not confirm nor deny that McClure was a patient at the VA, said she hears stories similar to his every day during group therapy sessions, the preferred method of treatment. During the sessions, veterans of 14 different wars talk openly with those who are experiencing the same symptoms about their difficulties adjusting to everyday life after spending time in a war zone.
“It’s very hard sometimes for people to stop playing the warrior role,” Martin said. “No two people react the same way with PTSD and that has a lot to do with the whole tapestry of a person’s life up to the moment of the trauma. Earlier experiences have a great deal to do with how the person deals with adversity.”
Martin said vets who are injured have an especially tough time readjusting to civilian life. They are confronted with having to form a new identity, particularly if they can no longer do the things they used to. Some have to give up their jobs and can no longer work, putting further strain on their relationships at home.
“There are those who wanted to be a career marine, but at the age of 20 or whatever, they’re hurt by an IED and now that will never happen,” Martin said. “We have many people who find their injuries to be a major source of depression.”
While critics argue that the federal government has failed to dedicate adequate resources for the treatment of soldiers, thereby limiting the services the VA provides, Martin said a lot of work has gone into enhancing programs to help those suffering from PTSD. There are family support groups, psychosocial education, emotions management, substance abuse rehabilitation and recovery, plus relapse prevention. There is also assistance for those with sleep disturbances.
“Of course we never have enough funding,” Martin said. “But that’s something we cannot control. Our focus is on being very creative with the resources we have and hiring quality people to provide services. We’ve come along way from when we first started and we continue to knock ourselves out trying.”
Martin said her staff is like a bunch of bulldogs — once they sink their teeth into a patient, they never let go. She does admit that some slip through the cracks, as it is up to the vets to maintain treatment.
“We are deeply saddened when something happens to one of our vets,” Martin said. “We definitely go through a mourning period in which we ask ourselves what we could have done to prevent (a death or suicide). But we can’t be in everyone’s heads and hearts 24/7. Our energy is better spent on what we can do.”
THE DAY HE LOST CONTROL McClure was a regular at the VA, attending meetings every Tuesday, Hanson said. During the week in which he took a handgun and shot himself, McClure overslept and missed his session.
Hanson was in Paris with her mother on vacation when she heard the news. One of her girlfriends had stopped by the newlyweds’ apartment to check up on McClure and found his body lying on the couple’s bed. The bullet is still stuck in a window frame.
“I was devastated,” Hanson said as she sat on a couch in the apartment she shared with McClure. “I just broke down crying. I couldn’t believe it happened. He had been making plans for us when I got back. We were going to have a bigger (wedding) ceremony … There were no signs that he was going to do this.”
Hanson said before she left, McClure was depressed because of all the medications he was forced to take. He started to develop an intense ringing in his ears, something which may have sent him over the edge.
“He hated taking drugs. He did everything he could not too. Eventually he just stopped,” she said.
THE ROAD TO RECOVERY As the days pass, it becomes easier to cope with the loss, Hanson said. There are good days and bad, but she has managed to keep herself busy with work. She’s spent a considerable amount of time with friends, sharing stories about her man.
“It’s hard not having him here,” she said, fighting back tears as she looked upon a black leather chair she bought for McClure to help ease his back pain. “Sometimes I’ll be just fine and then I’ll remember something he said or I’ll pass by some place where we used to go and I’ll start crying. It’s tough, but I know with time it will get better.”
Hanson said she struggles to understand why McClure took his own life. She knows he was in a lot of pain, but his selfish act has caused so many others to hurt as well. When talking with other vets fighting with depression, Hanson begs them to never go down that road.
McClure believed the only reason he survived that attack in Iraq was to meet Hanson, she said. Now that he’s gone, Hanson feels as if she has a purpose — to educate others before they too lose a loved one to PTSD.
“If I can be an advocate, then that’s what I’ll do,” she said. “I know that he would have wanted us to stand up and speak out against the way our government is treating our veterans. He loved the military. He loved the stability and the sense of finally belonging to a real family.
“Now I feel like I’ve inherited that family and it’s my duty to look out for them, just as he is up there smiling, looking down on me.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on July 29, 2006. Read the original PDF.