Article (series): Addictions in the Canadian Armed Forces
I wrote four articles from 2022 to 2023 for Wellness Together Canada, a government of Canada funded website which provides mental health and substance use support for Canadians. All four articles are meant to support veterans and currently serving members of the Canadian Armed Forces with issues specific to them.
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(all names have been changed to protect individual privacy)
“I went from addiction to addiction until I hit rock bottom.”
I sit across from Carol in a local restaurant and avoid looking at the kitschy decorations. She is a Navy logistician from Nova Scotia with twenty years of service in the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF), describing her situation after being put on sick leave for mental health issues.
“I was looking for a place of happiness,” Carol said, stirring milk into her steaming coffee.
“I was a very active mother until I started using cannabis,” Carol added. “It helped me relax. It gave me an escape from a husband fighting with PTSD. For the longest time before he got help, my son and I were the ones struggling.”
“I’d been taking CBD by prescription. It started with pills. I tried oils, edibles. I just got kind of curious.”
Carol was in chronic pain, and the CBD – a chemical in cannabis – helped, but after a while it wasn’t enough.
“My nurse practitioner recommended I try THC [the chemical in cannabis that makes a person feel “high”]. My mind went to smoking. I ordered my first pre-roll that night. I’d play music and smoke. It took me back to great memories and happier times. I would think about my parents who’ve both passed now.”
Month by month, she was smoking more and more.
Carol explained that a class action lawsuit for survivors of sexual misconduct (harassment, assault, and even rape) in the CAF had been initiated by a Canadian law firm. To participate, survivors had to describe their experiences in writing, an activity that was deeply troubling and re-traumatizing.
“I was trying to get back to that euphoric feeling,” Carol admitted as early Christmas shoppers hurried past outside the window. “I was trying to write my claim for sexual misconduct, and I was in a place I didn’t want to be, smoking to escape the thoughts. Soon, I was high all day.”
Her husband noticed she’d spent $1,000 on cannabis in one month and that she’d stopped paying the bills. Then she accidentally locked her husband and son out of the house, before going out onto the back porch, where she was too high to realize they were ringing the bell and banging at the back fence.
When she finally became aware of the situation and let them in, she felt ashamed, and her shame spurred her to action. “My husband was so angry. I told him, ‘I’m not in a good place. I need help to stop using.’”
Addictions and the Military
I personally don’t know the scope of the problem, but I know there is one. From my own twenty-one years in the CAF, I believe the substance traditionally abused by members is alcohol. Nearly everyone drinks, 95% of CAF members consume alcohol at least once per year, but I couldn’t find comparable statistics for the general public. However, the same source reported that 47% of Canadians who die in the workplace have alcohol in their blood. Could this be comparable in the CAF?
We’re taught to look out for each other, so when a buddy is a little tipsy at work, we might cover for him, make an excuse, send him home to sleep it off. This can make matters worse because we’re enabling our buddy to keep using.
In the short term, scratching the itch of an addiction, be it cannabis, alcohol, gambling, or something else, decreases stress, but the more time we spend scratching that itch, the more we neglect our regular lives. This leads to increased stress over time. In the case of alcohol, consuming too much affects our sleep, adding the stress of being overtired to the mix.
I’ve been drinking most of a bottle of wine most nights of the week since my retirement from the CAF five months ago. I’m always tired, so I’m not playing with my kids. I go do bed early. I don’t have time for my spouse or my responsibilities. I look forward to the next drink to take my mind off everything.
Do You Need Help?
Has any of this resonated with you so far? Do you worry about your consumption of a substance or your gambling, or the time you spend doing something – like surfing social media? Has someone you care about told you they’re worried about your activity? Are you neglecting your responsibilities?
You might need help.
Rehab
Carol is still serving. The day after she told her husband she had a problem, he went with her to sick parade where she was offered a one-week stay in hospital. She accepted.
Any military member can visit their local mental health department.
You don’t need a referral. Within two weeks, Carol was on a 60-day in-patient rehabilitation program at a beautiful place surrounded by nature where she saw a mental health professional twice per week and worked on “the things that were buried that made [her] start using.”
“It was just what I needed,” she said, the worn vinyl booth seat creaking as she leaned forward. “Rehab is a safe bubble. You’re with people just like yourself, the same struggles.”
When asked what she’d like other people who are struggling to know, she said, “Rehab is the place for you to heal, to work on your demons, on your trauma.”
Not Every Solution Requires Abstinence
I need to cut down, but I don’t want to quit. I enjoy having a glass of wine with lunch, or with friends, or whatever. Some people might say I’m fooling myself, but there is a body of research supporting harm reduction. The programs, services, and practices associated with harm reduction focus on choice, the choice of substance users and how they wish to decrease the possibility of harm that their use could have on themselves and others. The underlying ethos of those who provide harm reduction services is to help users enhance skills towards healthier living while being non-judgemental and non-coercive and without forcing abstinence.
We do harm reduction every day: we wear our seatbelts when we drive, we look both ways before crossing the street. So, I’ve been trying something different. I wait to have a drink until after my kids get home – after all, I might need to drive to the school to pick them up. I have a non-alcoholic beverage in between drinks – pop, water, tea, whatever. I distract myself – I walk, run, put the dishes away.
I. Get. Off. Social. Media.
I’ve been successful so far, but it’s early, and I have no illusions that I can do it without resources. I have the support of my friends, of Wellness Together Canada, of OSISS and Soldier On. It’s important to have a support group of people who’ve been where you are, even if it’s just one other person. I also see two mental health practitioners regularly.
If you’d like more information on supports for veterans and serving CAF members, or their families, check out [insert link to Wellness Together Canada ARTICLE ON FAMILY SUPPORT].
How Did I Get Here?
Multiple factors lead to addictions, including genetics and life experiences, particularly traumatic ones. The big issue, though, is resilience. When we’re not resilient, we don’t bounce back to ourselves after traumatic events. We don’t recover as we should.
I’ve been working on building resilience, building my connections with like-minded people through community and veterans’ groups, finding work that is meaningful to me – I went back to school! – taking time to examine the way I think, being mindful, and accepting that things happen. I cannot fight reality.
If you’d like more information on resilience, check out [insert link to Wellness Together Canada ARTICLE ON TRANSITION].
Maybe It’s Just a Phase
We all have difficult times. What’s important is recognizing whether your substance use is becoming a problem. The CAF offers robust services to assist members with mental health and addictions issues, and CAF Connection provides health promotion and community-based support.
Veterans Affairs Canada (VAC) has the VAC Assistance Service for veterans to speak with someone about the mental health support they might need. You don’t need to have approved VAC benefits or be part of any of their other programs to access the service. Once you reach out, you’ll be connected with a mental health clinician within five days.
When You Need Help, Get Help.
Carol was surprised at how seriously her condition was taken. “The military police escorted me to the civilian mental health ward because I’d had thoughts of suicide. They were there to keep me from hurting myself.”
The implications for her family and others were also taken seriously. “I didn’t know then, but children’s services had to come and do an investigation because I admitted to smoking and driving. My license was suspended for a month.”
But during that month, Carol was in rehab, getting the help she needed.
Camaraderie
Now that I’ve admitting I have a problem, I’m learning something important. Quietly but surely, friends are coming to me saying that they struggle with addiction themselves, acquaintances are reaching out to share their experiences. Addiction can be a silent problem, but it doesn’t have to be.
We are not alone.