That stigma interferes when that is the platoon unit. He is not coming forward. She is not coming forward. She does not want to be an outcast of that family. She does not want to be the weak link.
I served in the Royal Canadian Regiment. We have deployed so many times wherever, but particularly in Afghanistan, where I know people who have sustained, after three tours, serious mental wounds but will not come forward and will not admit it until they get out. Well, how does that work? Suddenly, they are out. They have never come forward and identified that mental wound. All of sudden, they have a wound.
There are problems there that we can resolve through creating a bond of trust, a trust in the Department of National Defence and in Veterans Affairs, where there is no stigma, where we look at them and say, “My God, you are hurt, and we can help you” and not, “Oh, well, we are going to shunt you here or punt you there.”
No, we have to change the whole cultural attitude toward mental wounds. It must be a culture of acceptance and understanding.