Women veterans are dying by suicide at an alarming rate, especially when compared with their male and civilian counterparts, according to a recent report from Disabled American Veterans.
The findings of DAV's newest report, “Women Veterans: The Journey to Mental Wellness" indicate that from 2020-21, the suicide rate among women veterans jumped 24.1 percent, which is four times higher than male veterans and vastly higher than the 2.6 percent increase for nonveteran women.
“Military sexual trauma, intimate partner violence, substance abuse disorder, pregnancy, menopause those are all unique factors that put a women veteran at risk for suicide,” said Air Force veteran and DAV Assistant National Legislative Director Naomi Mathis.
A combat veteran herself, Mathis said she understands the unique challenges women veterans face.
“There are risk factors associated with women veterans, things like military sexual trauma,” she said. “One in three women was found to have experienced MST. One in five women veterans report being exposed to intimate partner violence and substance use disorder.”
Issues related to reproductive health can also impact the mental health of women veterans.
“I had that challenge after my pregnancy with my son,” she said. “I was having some really bad thoughts. You have reproductive issues going on, hormone issues going on, and later combat-related PTSD and it all comes together in the perfect storm.”
Mathis said the report also details definitive changes the system charged with their mental health care —the Department of Veterans Affairs — must make quickly.
“It identifies gaps in care and offers more than 50 policy and legislative recommendations that can be implemented to save women veterans lives,” she said.
Mathis said VA has an innovative model it uses to predict suicidality among women veterans at high risk for taking their own lives.
“It uses male veterans as the normative baseline and it does not include things like military sexual trauma, so our recommendation is for them to revamp their algorithm and include MST as a risk factor,” she said.
Over 650,000 women veterans currently use VA health care services and 900,000 are enrolled in VA, according to Mathis.
“VA really needs to handle that and really needs to be able to tailor their programming and their services to meet the growing need,” she said.
Speaking directly to women veterans who may be having suicidal thoughts, Mathis encouraged them to stay in the fight.
“You do matter,” she said. “The world is better with you in it.”
Reach Julia LeDoux at Julia@connectingvets.com.
If you or someone you know is having thoughts of suicide, contact the Veterans Crisis Line to receive free, confidential support and crisis intervention available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. Dial 988 then Press 1, text 838255 or online here.