Dear Friend,

They come home with invisible wounds. And too many never get the chance to heal.

Every single day in America, we lose an average of 17 veterans to suicide. That’s one every 84 minutes. Think about that. While you’re reading this email, someone who once wore the uniform may be feeling like there’s no way out.

This Mental Health Awareness Month, I’m asking you to take action to help us save the lives of our veterans—not tomorrow, not “someday,” but right now.

At SoldierStrong, we’re working to tackle this crisis head-on by providing real, effective help to veterans suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). 

And one of the most powerful tools we have is BraveMind, our revolutionary virtual reality (VR) therapy program, developed by the University of Southern California’s Institute for Creative Technologies. 

You may be familiar with traditional talk therapy, but BraveMind is different. It’s immersive, high-tech exposure therapy that meets veterans where they are—bringing the battlefield to the therapy room in a controlled, supportive environment where healing can finally begin.

Because the truth is: for veterans with PTSD, the war doesn’t end when they come home.

It follows them into civilian life. It shows up in grocery store aisles, on quiet roads, or in the middle of the night. A bag of trash by the roadside might spark the memory of an IED. Driving under a bridge could bring back the image of a sniper. A child’s voice might recall a loss too deep to express.

These moments don’t just cause emotional pain. They isolate veterans from their families, their communities, and even from themselves. Some withdraw. Others lash out. Many try to numb the pain with substances. And tragically, some see no way out at all.

That’s why BraveMind is so critical. It allows veterans to face their trauma head-on, in an environment designed to be safe, controlled, and personalized.

A trained mental health professional can use the VR headset to immerse the veteran in a realistic version of the moment they’ve spent years avoiding—complete with the sights, sounds, and even smells of that environment.

It’s not easy. But this kind of exposure therapy has been proven to help reduce PTSD symptoms, break through avoidance, and restore control to those who’ve lost it.

As Dr. Albert Rizzo, the director of medical virtual reality at USC’s Institute for Creative Technologies, put it:

“You’re always looking for the next shoe to drop. That might have been a survival skill in combat, but it doesn’t work so well in civilian life.”

I’ve heard these stories firsthand. Veterans who walk around angry all the time. Who can’t sleep. Who’ve never spoken to anyone about what they’ve seen—until BraveMind helped them open up. Because this technology makes it possible to go back to the moment that shattered them—and begin to reclaim their life from it.

Marine veteran Chris Merkle is one of those heroes.

Chris served three years in Iraq and nearly four years in Afghanistan. After he came home, he struggled with PTSD—just like so many others. But when he tried BraveMind, something changed.

“You can feel it in your body when you talk,” Chris said. “You just feel so tense. You don’t get that unless you’re in a really deep therapy session… The VR handed me my experience.”

For the first time, Chris had control over his trauma. He could face it. Talk through it. And little by little, that memory lost its grip on him. BraveMind helped give him his life back—and his story is just one of many.

We want to bring this same opportunity to every veteran who needs it. That’s why we’ve partnered with the VA Innovation Center to expand BraveMind therapy nationwide. But there are still thousands of veterans waiting—and we can’t reach them without your help.

Here’s how your donation makes a direct impact:

• $100 covers 1 hour of VR therapy.
  
  
• $500 trains a clinician to deliver BraveMind treatment.
  
  
• $1,500 funds a full month of personalized therapy.
  
  
• $15,000 installs a complete BraveMind VR system at a new clinic.
  
  

These aren’t abstract numbers. Every dollar brings us closer to saving a life. Every session could be the moment that a veteran opens up for the first time. Every new clinic means more veterans in crisis can get the help they’ve been denied for too long.

And even if you can’t give a lot today, no gift is too small—every contribution brings us one step closer to saving a life.

As the founder of SoldierStrong, I can tell you this work is deeply personal to me. I started this organization to make sure no veteran ever feels left behind. BraveMind is just one of the ways we’re making that mission real—by offering hope, healing, and a future to those who’ve already given so much.

Mental Health Awareness Month is a time for action. Not silence. Not waiting. Action.

The cost of doing nothing is 17 veterans gone each day.

But together, we can make sure those numbers start to fall. We can give our veterans the tools they need to fight—and win—the hardest battle of all: the one inside.

Please, make your most generous gift today, and help save a veteran’s life.

With deep gratitude,

Dr. Chris Meek
Founder, SoldierStrong

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