(Feb 24, 2026)
Bernie Stafford is a former Marine and a past member of our Club. He attended with his wife, Kristine, also a past member. He has worked for several years with Warfighter Advance (https://warfighteradvance.org/), dedicated to the successful reintegration into society of every warfighter. Many of them have experienced severe sustained stress while on active duty, resulting in difficulties in subsequent reintegration back into civilian life.
Warfighter Advance attempts to support the trajectory of the warfighter’s post-deployment life, so that rather than an existence characterized by an endless cycle of mental illness diagnoses, medications, medical appointments and disappointments, the warfighter has a life characterized by pride, productivity, healthy relationships, continued service, and advocacy for the same outcomes for their fellow service members.
Warfighter Advance was created by a team led by Mary Neal Vieten, PhD, CDR, USN(ret), a board certified Navy psychologist, now retired after 22-years of service. During her career, Dr Vieten worked with thousands of military members and developed strategies for returning members to the fight without medical-model interventions. Her team turned that knowledge into a 7-day training program for warfighters at Elks Camp Barrett in Annapolis, Maryland. Approximately 600 warfighters have been trained through the program, leading to the vast majority of them significantly changing their lives for the better.
Warfighter Advance has been featured in articles and documentaries such as Medicating Normal (www.medicatingnormal.com) and Wounded Heroes (www.wounded-heroes.org). The program is available to any warfighter who self-identifies as having a need to attend, including active duty, reserve, and veterans from any war, at no cost to them, including for transportation.
The program uses linguistic analysis of recorded pre- and post-evolution interviews to learn where they are on a scale from “Non-Functional” to “Action, Implementation, and Positive Change”. Data are collected at pre- and post-evolution and a year after graduation. Many participants come in describing themselves as non- or minimally functional. A year after graduation, 60% report that they are actively implementing positive changes in their lives, and nearly 40% are developing action plans.
Warfighters are allowed to determine their own successful outcomes. Participants enter in one of these 5 stages, with progress defined as moving through these steps toward Stage 5:
- Non-Functional – Feeling broken/disordered/helpless, house bound or otherwise isolated, requiring care to survive, with little or no purpose or hope, often medicated.
- Minimal Function – preferring to be isolated, un/underemployed, difficulty with relationships, haunted by memories, struggling with hyper-vigilance/arousal, probably medicated.
- Light-Bulb Transition – realizing origin of issues, what life patterns need to change, not helpless/powerless, hopeful about getting control of life, starting to reconnect with earlier warfighter identity and self-esteem.
- Action Plan Development – setting self-directed goals, may be angry because of lost time or harm caused by psychopharmacology, rallying social support, becoming analytically critical about information sources, understanding the need to move forward rather than longing for the past.
- Action, Implementation and Positive Change – implementation of plan at each participant’s individual ability, acceptance of one’s reality, progress assessment, goal reevaluation/realignment, gratitude, service to others.