Breaking the silence: Bend veteran helps group that helped him

Save a Warrior is an organization dedicated to serving veterans and first responders. By providing a week-long camp geared toward behavioral and physical practices, participants strive to rebuild a healthy life after war or amid other traumatic stress.

Bend veteran Matt Bassitt encourages those struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder and thoughts of suicide to seek out Save a Warrior. After going through the program himself, he has seen the positive change it can help bring about.

“They do a 5 1/2-day ‘cohorts,’ they’re called — like camps,” he said. “They put these veterans and first responders through this course that literally changes their life forever. It gives them their life back. Not that it prevents them from wanting to take their life, but gives them purpose back.”

After extensive research on Save A Warrior, Bassitt, an Air Force Reserve veteran, joined the organization and helped raise about $38,000 in just his first year with the program.

He believes the program has helped him become a better father, husband and co-worker.

The organization said that in the past four years, it’s raised about $200,000 and funded 57 people to participate in the program. Of those participants, 20 of those members were directly connected to Central Oregon.

Bassitt believes a person has to be self-motivated.

“Ultimately, to go through the program, you have to want to go through the program. You can’t sign someone up and say, ‘You have to go.’ It doesn’t work that way. Usually, its out of desperation. You’ve tried everything else and you’ve seen psychiatrist and medications and you’re just like, ‘This stuff is not working.’ Save a Warrior tends to be the last house on the block.”

Save a Warrior emphasizes that it’s a personal journey of recovery, motivated by self. Veterans and first responders are guided by those who’ve gone through the program before and share similar experiences. The program provides meditation, storytelling and story-listening, resiliency exercises and behavioral practices.

Veterans and first responders who have completed the program serve as mentors, called shepherds. They guide new recruits and, through shared experiences, are able to help them through the process.

Awareness of suicide prevention is growing and Save a Warrior hopes to bring a cohort to Oregon in the near future.

“It’s not just that veteran, that policeman’s life we’re saving,” he said. “It saves their family, it saves their workforce, their community.”

Save a Warrior is hosting its fifth annual The Scotch Golf Tournament on Sept 13-14 at Pronghorn Resort to raise funds for the organization. For more information, visit https://saveawarrior.org/.