This story discusses suicide.  If you or someone you know is contemplating suicide, please call or text the National Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988. For the Veteran Crisis Line, press 1, text 838255 or chat online. For information on resources available to Kentucky veterans, visit this site.  Donnie Distler, a 21-year Navy veteran who lives in Bloomfield, spent years as “part of the stigma” around mental health.  Then, right before retirement, he saw a military psychologist because his blood pressure was “through the roof” as he struggled with the anxiety of what his life would look like as a civilian.  The embedded psych he saw broke down his misconceptions about what it means to need — and get — help, he said. He realized he was having a common experience and that help was available.  This time of transition between military and civilian life is a key stressor veterans face, experts say. They need strong community and ample resources during this time, which is why the Humana Foundation says it gave $5 million this month to Face the Fight to aid in the coalition’s efforts to prevent veteran suicide.  The foundation helped found Face the Fight in 2023 alongside USAA and Reach Resilience. The coalition now has 300 partners. In 2025, Face the Fight gave money to a slew of organizations aimed at supporting veterans and their families and preventing suicide, including the Crisis Text Line and the Wounded Warrier Project.  Veterans may also be feeling some “angst” around the U.S. military actions in the Middle East that have already resulted in the deaths of at least 13 American soldiers, including Kentuckians Sgt. Benjamin N. Pennington, 26, and Tech Sgt. Ashley B. Pruitt, 34, of Bardstown.  “It’s hard for all of us that love those that serve and have served, and those that care, and you can’t help but … have some angst about what could happen,” said Babs Chase, executive director of the Face the Fight Coalition, who spoke with the Lantern before Pennington’s and Pruitt’s deaths were announced. “These are our friends. This is our community, and you feel that loss so broad, and you take that to heart.”  Deaths in the community are all the more reason for mental health support, Chase said. “The more we look out for each other and make sure it’s OK to let people know you’re struggling, and then you lift everybody up at the same time.”  According to a 2025 VA report on veteran suicide, Kentucky had a rate of 39.3 veteran suicides per 100,000 people in 2023, the 17th highest in the nation.   “What we know is the veteran suicide rate is higher than that for civilians, and we just sort of felt like for people who’ve done so much for us, we should do something to help address stigma, but then also reduce that rate across the board,” Tiffany Benjamin, CEO of the Humana Foundation, told the Lantern.  The $5 million will help fund grants that “focus on underserved veterans and community based solutions to prevent suicide,” Benjamin said. That includes a focus on veterans with historically less access to resources: those in rural areas, women and younger veterans, for example.  Not all the money will stay in Kentucky, but Chase said veterans need to be able to access help anywhere. “Particularly in the military community, people are moving around,” she said, “so we want to make sure that people have access to resources close to home, but also these are programs that can help them, no matter where they end up landing.”  ‘Part of something’   Distler, the Kentucky veteran who now works at Humana, said the transition back to civilian life is difficult because it is a time of routine adjustment.  “When we were a part of the military, we were a part of something, and the same thing happened every day at the same time. The flag goes up at 08, rain or shine, no matter where you are in the world, that’s something we can count on,” he said. “And you know what else you can count on? The people to your left and to your right. And you just keep walking that line. That’s what we did.”   Donnie Distler (photo provided) Becoming a civilian means losing that stability and embedded trust in the people around you, which many veterans seek out through community-based programs and organizations that the Humana grant money will support.  “My personal experience with these kind of organizations is it’s a place where the community that you once had still exists,” Distler said.  “There’s no one single approach that cares and cures and solves this problem with veteran suicide, right?” he added. “There’s not a one-size-fits-all answer. But what there is is bringing people together, putting resources on the table, and showing people the impact in that.”   Face the Fight has a goal of saving 15,000 veteran lives by 2032. Chase said coalition efforts have saved an estimated 6,500 so far.  “We understand this is not a problem you solve in 10 minutes,” Benjamin said, “and it was really important for us to pick a long term goal.”   Fighting stigma with hope Distler believes stigma around mental health is often tied to pride and social isolation exacerbated by technology.  “I feel like we are more socially involved in a screen than we are socially involved with one another,” he said.  “In the military, strength is the thing that is often exemplified, but we really believe that true strength is saying, ‘I need help,’” Benjamin said. “True strength is saying, ‘I’m not OK and I need someone to help me pull through.’”  The more conversations people have about stigma, Chase said, the more it will dissolve.  “I think we are seeing a culture shift because there’s more conversations around the fact,” she said. The COVID-19 pandemic contributed to that shift, Benjamin said.  “I think COVID really laid bare some of the challenges that already existed, and we sort of globally went through some real mental health trauma,” she said. “For all the downsides of that, it opened up everyone having a conversation about mental health.”  With more openness comes increased hope, said Chase.  “Veteran suicide is not inevitable,” she said. “It is preventable, but it takes all of us coming together to make that difference.”  GET THE MORNING HEADLINES. SUBSCRIBE The post Veteran suicide is preventable. $5 million grant aims to save lives in Kentucky and beyond. appeared first on The Lexington Times. ...read more read less