Dying in Silence, Living Through Laughter

“Should I kill myself or have a cup of coffee?” It is a quote often (and likely mistakenly) attributed to the 20^th century French philosopher and writer Albert Camus; but it also perfectly captures the spirit of what he and his existentialist contemporaries sought to do in their plays known as Theatre of the Absurd: to shock its audience out of complacency and bring it face to face with the harsh realities of the human condition. For instance, that the world isn’t always fair or rational; that bad things happen to good people, and good things happen to bad people; that good and bad people do both good and bad; that while fate is out of our control, the future is our responsibility; that ultimately, our life is up to us—despite, at times, it seemingly being meaningless and absurd.

While the masses may need this kind of soul-stirring shock, veterans need hardly; “Deployment is the definition of absurdity,” as one Green Barret and former client once told me. War is a dizzying world of contradictions lived in the extremes far removed from “normal” life: thrilling highs and tedious and sometimes agonizing lows; the honor of service, pride of purpose; the charge of danger; the rush of crude power; inflicting intentional violence for the greater good; tugs of war between loyalty and betrayal; the immediacy of life and the ubiquity of death; an all-consuming devotion to an intimate brother- and sisterhood. As David Wood wrote in his book What Have We Done,

“War is an alternate moral universe where many of the rules and values we grew up with are revoked. Do unto others, suspended. An alien world in which complex moral puzzles, like confronting a child combatant, demand instant decisions by those who are least fit to make them, for reasons of incomplete neurological development and life experience. An environment for which the United States has trained its warriors exhaustively in physical fitness and military tactics but left them psychologically and spiritually unprepared. An environment from which they return to find their new understanding of the world and who they have become fits awkwardly or not at all into their old lives in peacetime America. They return to a civilian public whose sporadic attention to veterans largely fails to comprehend or acknowledge the experiences they have absorbed on our behalf.”

The problem with absurdity, as Joe Kincheloe points out in Fiction Formulas, “is that it dances with fate around the quicksand of nihilism.” Absurdity leads to the question, why should someone continue to live?

In my clinical experience and research on moral injury, plenty of veterans who return from war have, at least, some sense of internal disquiet about what they have seen or done, what they’ve been forced to do, or what they couldn’t prevent on the battlefield; likewise, how they (and others) have—or have not—lived up to their own standards of right and wrong. Many vets struggle to metabolize feelings of guilt, shame, anger, disgust, contempt, sorrow, grief, and remorse. They become plagued by a lack of meaning and purpose and cynicism and bitterness. They come to distrust others and, in some instances, themselves. Whether it’s because of crushing emotion, the fear of stigma, the numbing from scars, the sense that others “wouldn’t understand,” “couldn’t understand,” “don’t really care,” or would “judge them,” many veterans struggle to find their way back to “normal” life and ordinary relationships. As a result, they suffer in solitary silence, questioning what “it” all adds up to and whether they’re too tired of trying to do the math.

Dying in silence

Researchers and official government estimates (U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, 2023) are that 17 to 22 veterans die by suicide per day. An interim report by America’s Warrior Partnership and Duke University (n. d.) put the number as high as 24 suicides per day and an additional 20 who die by “self-injury mortality” (otherwise known as an overdose). From 2020 to 2021, the rate of suicide among veterans increased by 11.6% percent (U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, 2023). In 2021, suicide was the 13th-leading cause of death for Veterans overall, and the second-leading cause of death among Veterans under 45 years old (U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, 2023). Veterans are also 1.5 times more likely to die by suicide than Americans who never served in the military (Morral, 2023). For female veterans, the risk factor is 2 times more likely (DAV, 2024).

“We went to war to serve our country, but we come home someone else,” said a retired Special Operations Forces retiree, who served three tours of duty in the Middle East but wished to remain anonymous. “Who are you kidding,” said his buddy, also a retired Operator. “There is no more sense of ‘home’… we didn’t lose our life, but nothing about our life is ‘normal’ anymore.” A third Operator said, “I was trained to be what many would call ‘a monster,’ if they knew what I did. Then society expects us to just come back and have all that savagery disappear. We lie to ourselves that we’re dealing with it, but deep down we’re really not.” A Green Beret, also retired, added, “We thought there was meaning, order, and right and wrong in the world, but all it is, is a chaotic cesspool of f***ed-upedness.”

Living through laughter

“What the military leaves out is that they create great soldiers, but when you leave, nobody really helps you to systematically become a member of society,” said author and trauma psychiatrist Bessel van der Kolk. “Comedy is a great way to open up people’s minds because you show the absurdity of it all.”

Studies (Kafle, 2023) performed in seven countries show that humor can have significant positive effects on mental health symptoms, such as increasing connectedness, hope, self-concept/identity, and empowerment. This can be particularly valuable for “invisible wounds” like moral injury and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) that can cause loneliness, isolation, social anxiety, self-criticism, and perfectionism.

Veterans groups are also getting hip to the healing benefits of humor. Retired Army Lt. Col. Robin Johnson is the executive producer for Operation HEAL*ARIOUS, a resilience training and suicide prevention program that teaches participants how to use humor to reframe harmful thought patterns. Veterans art groups, such as the Comedy Boot Camp, are also using comedy to help veterans to both connect and communicate by stepping out of their comfort zones and working together to write and perform standup routines. Similarly, is the Armed Services Arts Partnership, a nonprofit that teaches creative- and performing-arts classes, including humor, for veterans and military families. Others using humor to heal include Comedy Vets who produce live comedy shows for military personnel and their families to “help veterans laugh” and “help veterans survive,” as well as The Veterans of Comedy, a group using laughter to help bridge the gap between service and civilian life.

Laughter Essential Reads

Look Who’s Laughing: Are There Differences in Men and Women?

Can We Compare New and Old Theories of Laughter?

History is overflowing with individuals who gave their life in service to their country and the values it upholds. On Memorial Day we honor their “ultimate sacrifice.” And yet history is also overflowing with military men and women whose dizzying post-war life is filled with exhausting contradictions, existential absurdities, and haunting memories—some that can be spoken of, many that can’t—and which can only be described in the military's well-known phrase, “that’s f***ed up.”

It is said that comedy and tragedy are two sides of the same coin—both startle the mind, stir the soul, challenge norms, provide tough truths, and surface incongruities. The tragedies of war leave many veterans feeling trapped and alone with only their distressing thoughts, but increasingly, humor is proving to be a much-needed balm or therapeutic companion that provides relief from the absurdity of war—and the world.

SUICIDE AND CRISIS LIFELINE

Get Help Now — Call 988. If you’re a veteran in a mental health crisis and you’re thinking about hurting yourself—or you know a Veteran who’s considering this—get help now.

The 988 Lifeline provides 24/7, free and confidential support for people in distress, prevention and crisis resources for you or your loved ones.