By DaisyMae VanValkenburgh-Haftel, VETS Email Marketing Manager + HubSpot Administrator
There is a moment that arrives for many veterans–quietly, unannounced, and unseen by almost everyone around them. It doesn’t happen on a battlefield under fire or in the adrenaline of a mission. It arrives in the stillness, in the hollow hours that stretch between midnight and dawn, when the rest of the world sleeps soundly and they’re left alone with the weight of everything they’ve carried. It’s in this quiet that the noise inside their mind becomes deafening–memories sharpen, emotions churn, and the body responds as if danger is still right outside the door. In that moment, they’re not thinking about parades or medals or the dozens of “thank yous” they’ve received from strangers. They’re thinking about survival in the most personal way: How do I get through this night? Will it always feel like this? Is there a way out of this pain?
At Veterans Exploring Treatment Solutions (VETS), we know this moment deeply. We hear it echoed in emails, whispered during intake calls, woven into stories from families who are terrified of losing someone they love. We exist because too many veterans reach a crossroads where traditional care has helped them endure, but not heal. We exist to meet that moment not with another dead end or another “wait and see,” but with a real path foward–one that honors their humanity and acknowledges the complexity of what they’ve lived through. A path that doesn’t just promise change, but proves it.
When Traditional Options Aren’t Enough
For decades, the same menu of treatments has been offered to veterans navigating PTSD, TBI, addiction, and moral injury. Some find relief through these options, but far too many do not. They go to appointments, fill prescriptions, try new combinations of medications, talk through their trauma repeatedly, and attempt to “push through” the parts of themselves that feel stuck in another time, another place, another life. And when those tools fail to reach the source of their pain, the burden shifts inward. Veterans begin to believe the story that there is something uniquely broken in them, something unfixable.
By the time they reach us, they rarely arrive hopeful. They arrive exhausted. They arrive battle-worn from the fight happening inside their own minds. They arrive searching for something–anything–they haven’t already tried. Not because they expect a miracle, but because they’re desperate to feel even the smallest shift toward lightness.
They want a reason to believe that healing is still possible. For many of the veterans we serve, that reason arrives through psychedelic-assisted therapy.
A New Paradigm: No Escape, Not Trend–A Return to Self
Let’s be clear: what we support is not about chasing a trend, escaping reality, or offering a one-size-fits-all solution.
Psychedelic-assisted therapy in the context we support is intentional, grounded, and profoundly structured. It is done under careful medical supervision in international settings where these therapies are legal. It is not escapism. It is not a shortcut. It is not a recreational experience.
It is a journey inward–a guided, supported, clinically-informed process where veterans finally have space to unravel the tightly wound knots of trauma that have fused into their identity. Psychedelic compounds create openings that conventional therapies often cannot reach. But the treatment itself is only the catalyst. The real transformation is carried by the preparation, the safety, the integration, and the community that surrounds it.
That is why every veteran funded through our Foundational Healing Grant Program receives more than access to treatment. They receive preparation coaching, integration support, peer mentorship, therapeutic workshops, and lifelong community connection. Healing is not the moment on the mat, nor the peak of the experience. It is the tapestry woven afterwards, as meaning is made and the self begins to rebuild from a place of clarity rather than crisis.
This is not passive care. It is active participation in one’s own resurrection.
Where Science Begins To Mirror What Veterans Have Been Telling Us for Years
Even if all we had were the stories–stories of renewed relationships, restored hope, and reclaimed purpose–this work would still matter. But the science now stands firmly beside these stories, validating what veterans themselves have been reporting for years.
In collaboration with Stanford University, VETS helped coordinate an observational study with 30 U.S. Special Operations veterans who underwent ibogaine and 5-MeO-DMT therapy . In the study results, only ibogaine was dosed for the participants up to the one-month data point. After that time, participants were afforded the opportunity to return to the clinic for 5-MeO-DMT.
These were individuals who had tried every treatment available to them in the United States. They arrived to the study not with optimism, but with last-resort energy.
The outcomes were beyond what many expected:
- Suicidal ideation decreased from 47% to 7% in just one month.
- Emotional regulation, sleep, and quality of life all improved significantly.
- Quality of life soared.
Our internal data echoes these findings again and again.
Among nearly 500 VETS-supported veterans:
- Over 85% reported slight or no PTS symptoms one year post-treatment (up from 16%).
- Slight or no depression increased from 2.5% to 82%.
- Quality of life jumped from 23% to 86%.
- And 99% of recipients expressed satisfaction with VETS’ wrap-around support
The science does not just support the stories. It amplifies them. It honors them. It proves that what so many veterans have been asking for is not just anecdotal… it is effective.
And it is needed.
What Healing Feels Like, Long After the Treatment Ends
Healing rarely unfolds in dramatic cinematic sweeps. It emerges in the everyday moments veterans once believed were lost to them forever. It shows up quietly, in the corners of their lives, in the small shifts that ripple outward into everything and everyone they love.
Healing looks like a father stepping into his child’s bedroom and realizing he feels present–not dissociated, not numb, not bracing for something that isn’t happening. Just present.
It looks like a couple driving home from dinner without the tension that once filled the space between them, discovering that silence can finally feel peaceful rather than strained.
It looks like a veteran picking up a journal they’ve avoided for years, writing a sentence they were once terrified to put into words. Then another. And another.
It looks like someone sitting beneath a morning sky and feeling the world soften in a way they didn’t believe was possible anymore.
Healing is not the erasure of trauma.
Healing is the integration of it–carrying it differently, more lightly, with the knowledge that it no longer defines every decision, every moment, every breath.
Why More Veterans Haven’t Accessed This Yet
Because access remains a barrier.
Because stigma still shadows the conversation.
Because U.S. legislation is only now beginning to catch up with the evidence.
Because the cost of traveling abroad for legal treatment is prohibitive for most.
That is the gap VETS is filling: providing not only financial support, but guidance, integrity, and community. We are creating a continuum of care where veterans are not just funded–they are held.
And none of it happens without donors who believe that healing should not be a luxury or a privilege reserved for the few. It should be an option for every veteran who needs it.
This Isn’t Experimental. This Is Urgent.
We are not preparing for a distant future.
We are acting in the present.
Every dollar raised directly fuels:
- Access to psychedelic-assisted therapy for veterans who qualify
- Comprehensive preparation and integration support
- Peer mentorship and family guidance
- Research partnerships with leading institutions
- Advocacy efforts that push policy toward what veterans need, not what systems have historically offered
But the truth is stark: the demand is rising faster than our ability to say yes.
Veterans are reaching out.
Families are pleading.
And the moment to intervene–to change someone’s life–often opens and closes in a matter of weeks.
Your support expands our capacity to catch them before that moment disappears.
This Is the Fight That Matters
Ending the veteran suicide crisis will not happen through slogans or sympathy. It will happen through boldness, innovation, and a willingness to invest in solutions that go deeper than anything we’ve tried before.
At VETS, we are fighting for a world where veterans are not left to navigate their wounds alone. Where they receive care that matches the weight of what they’ve lived through.
Where healing is not the exception, but the expectation.
And we’re inviting you into that fight.
Not because it’s easy, but because the people we serve are worth every ounce of effort.
Not because giving is simple, but because its impact is profound.
Not because you owe something, but because you can create something–
A life reclaimed. A future restored. A story that continues.
Be the reason a veteran gets their life back.
Be part of The Next Wave.
Be part of the chapter where hope returns.