An astonishing front page Hollywood Reporter feature on our supporter and friend Alan Ritchson. Unconcealed and harrowing stories of mental health, suffering, recovery, family, resilience, and the nature of battles that do not end neatly.
The piece is a tough read, with substantial connection to our work at Heart and Armor. These issues, while often given lip service, are deep and difficult and so hard for those for whom mental health is, as Alan says in the article, “an everyday conversation.”
The Hollywood Reporter and writer Christopher Gardener deserve credit for giving that amount of airtime to unsexy issues in a front page feature. Psychiatric diagnoses and disorders, caregiver burden, sexual assault, PTSD, and ongoing vigilance is an atypical set of topics in entertainment journalism.
In honor of Alan’s bruisingly forthright self-revelation in such a high profile piece - and in response to the pervasiveness of the issues he raises in the veteran community - Heart and Armor is going to do deep dives into these issues in the upcoming months.
Beginning in May, we will use our website and social media channels to spotlight current clinical understandings, resources, science, mysteries, and myths in each of these difficult subject areas - and how they may relate uniquely to veterans. Beyond ‘awareness,’ we hope that people suffering with these problems have new insights on the pathways to recovery that may genuinely help them and their families.
Healing tools exist in all of these topic areas, but sorting through them can be logistically and emotionally overwhelming. We salute Alan (and his wife Cat) for being such open books on such serious and stigmatized topics. We are incredibly lucky to know and work with them, and to call them our friends. Thank you for letting us - and now everyone - into the dark corners.