“Alcohol was my poison. Pretty much been drinking the majority of my adult life and even in my teens. So, in 2006 I decided to join the Army. Did all my stuff. Basic training. AIT. Got deployed in 2007 to Iraq and I came back in 2008 and I started drinking heavily. Way more than I had before. I was drinking a fifth of Patron every day along with an 18-pack and about three packs of cigarettes.

Everything I experienced, witnessed, and done over there in Iraq, I just wanted to forget about it. But I didn’t know at the time that I was just self-medicating. I wasn’t thinking that my problems would just be there the next day. Then shortly thereafter I was diagnosed with PTSD. My drinking tapered somewhat to just the weekends but I was spending somewhere around $350 a night on booze. That’s a lot. Finally on February 19 of 2012 everything that I’d seen, done, and experienced in Iraq…I wanted to commit suicide. It finally caught up with me.

That night, the girlfriend at the time, I told her to call my chaplain, I knew him from the National Guard…but I got the shotgun and I went outside and started shooting and I didn’t even know that while I was shooting my girlfriend was getting every weapon out of the house. I didn’t even tell her anything. I just got my shotgun and went outside and started shooting. The next thing I know I was standing in my kitchen bleeding from my lip so…at that time, New Mexico State Police came and cleared the scene, they took me outside, patted me down for weapons but I didn’t have any. They put me in the back of the patrol car and called Espanola ambulance. They came in and, it seemed like I was in the back of that rig forever, pleading with them not to take me to the hospital because I was afraid that they would take me to Ward 7 at the VA in Albuquerque which is the psych ward for mental health evaluation.

I was so drunk at the time, so inebriated it wasn’t even funny.

Finally, I decided ok, lets go to Espanola hospital. Fine. So, they took me in, I got seven stitches in my lip and from that night forward I didn’t drink. I have ten years sober. I pretty much just turned it off that night. I knew that if I didn’t, I’d end up dead.

By the grace of God, my girlfriend and everyone else that was there that night, they saved my life. God talked to me. God sent them to save me. And then what hurts me the most, the chaplain that saved my life that night, I just found out that he passed away.

The first thirty days were the most difficult part. I stayed in constant prayer, praying the rosary, staying out of any place that serves alcohol and liquor. After the first year had passed, I realized that my brain was clear, I could think, I could act, I could make decisions, my body felt better, no more hangovers. It just felt right.

Now I’m on medical disability and so this job as the memorial wall is volunteer. I also play a big role with the VFW as State Commander. I’m helping the veterans here locally deal with their PTSD because of their combat experience. The thing about veterans is they trust other veterans to vent. They just want to be heard. The best advice I can give? Reach out. If you want to make the change, reach out to the people that have gone through this before. They can understand your experience.

If anyone in the state has problem, they can come to me for help. I don’t care if it is two o’clock in the morning, I will answer the call.”

-        November 2022