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Oleksandr Tkachenko: "A psychologist must help a veteran return to civilian life"

Psychological rehabilitation of our veterans and people affected by military actions is an extremely important issue for our country. Therefore, there are already many programs at both the state and community levels. However, this is still insufficient. One of the key differences in our "Veteran's Hut" program is that we aim to prepare veterans to become psychologists for other veterans. To read more about veterans' psychological trauma, the challenges they face after returning home, and the tasks of military psychologists, check out the interview with the program's author, Oleksandr Tkachenko, published in the online publication MOZHNA JOURNAL.

In a recent interview with Alena Vinnytska, it was mentioned that her foundation, together with Taras Shevchenko National University and the Employment Service, launched a charitable-social program for the psychological rehabilitation and education of veterans of the Russo-Ukrainian War. Do veterans really need psychological education?

ІThe idea of creating such a program emerged long ago, back in 2015-2016. I had just returned from the war at that time and realized that civilian psychologists cannot work effectively with veterans. They lack the necessary experience from one side, and on the other side, there is no practical toolkit required.

An effective tool for working with those returning from war is more focused on ethical concepts and values. In contrast, the civilian psychologist's toolkit consists solely of mental and psychological concepts, mechanisms, etc. That is, these are different things. I studied in a doctoral program and tried to implement this idea. However, for some reason, it did not work back then; it must not have been "the right time." Now, almost 10 years later, this problem has intensified and understanding has been reached.

Regarding the program, I noticed that the approach of civilian psychologists to military personnel is overly simplified: “sick, traumatized.” And veterans are offered almost nothing. Everyone talks about PTSD, but civilian psychologists have a very superficial understanding of it, based solely on foreign research and methodologies. However, the situation is fundamentally different. When talking about what we will have to work with, it is more about the effect of post-traumatic growth, which works simultaneously with PTSD as a reaction to trauma. This effect is what we constructed our program around.

We consider those who have returned from war and their family members as individuals who have gained valuable experience that can improve their lives and mental health, but only with the appropriate guidance – techniques, methodologies, etc.

In other words, when a person returns from war, they come back changed. A psychologist needs to help the veteran "put their head back in place," so they understand who they are now, what their meaning of existence is, and how to build their life in a new direction and new movement.

A significant portion of those who return – up to 80-90% – change their profession, lifestyle, and circle of acquaintances. Old friends fade away, and new ones come in. New interests emerge. But this needs to be recognized and to construct a new self. And that, in fact, is the most important starting point.

Our program lasts three months, and during this time we help the veteran "put their head back in place" or find themselves in a new role. Throughout these three months, we prepare them for admission to the psychology master's program at KNU. We understand that it takes more than one year to prepare a psychologist who can work effectively. But we don't have that time.



Is there a difference in the work of a psychologist with combatants at the front and with veterans who have returned home?

Work at the front is useful for subsequent work with veterans after their return. However, such work is very different. In war, you need to accomplish combat missions, and the main task is always related to destroying the enemy. Sometimes, you have to send people to places from which they won't return. And that too is the work of a psychologist.

The work with veterans is quite the opposite. A psychologist has to help the veteran return to civilian life, where there is no shooting and killing.

Unfortunately, a word can kill. The psychological problems in civilian life upon return are so serious that veterans often return to war because it is easier for them there. Our society is still not prepared to accept veterans with dignity.

Can civilian psychologists manage the mental health issues of military personnel and veterans?

Civilian psychologists live in a different system of concepts than those returning from war. Additionally, civilian psychologists often encounter their own psychological boundaries when working with veterans, beyond which they can no longer work effectively. These psychological boundaries of a civilian psychologist are often smaller than those of a veteran.

Why?

A veteran has a greater realm of absorbed traumatic experiences than a civilian psychologist. They express them, and the psychologist starts to get nervous, experiencing their own issues. You have heard of so-called secondary trauma? A civilian psychologist, after working with a veteran, must turn to a supervisor for help. We have encountered such situations. The threshold of a "peaceful" psychologist's capabilities is often lower than that of a veteran.
Does gender influence this work in any way? Do veterans find it easier to open up to a female or male psychologist?
The problems a veteran faced in war are purely masculine. The environment is masculine, and that same "female spirit" is lacking. But a female psychologist must be capable of listening. Because not every woman is capable of that.

So, it might be easier for female psychologists to work with veterans. And what about age? Does the age of the psychologist make a difference? There is a stereotype that veterans find it harder to talk to young women than to older women.
There is such an opinion. However, our experience shows that if a woman is quite young, competent, has significant traumatic experience, withstands pressure, and understands the situation, then a veteran who comes to a session finds it pleasant to work with such a psychologist and benefits from it. A woman with a wealth of life experience, including unresolved negative experiences. Who knows how she will react herself? In our practice, young women who successfully overcome their traumatic experiences have shown themselves to be quite capable. After all, they will be raising and educating the children of the new Ukraine.
How would you characterize the psychology of our veterans? Are there any specific features?
I can sum it up in one phrase: it is the "psychology of a defender." Someone who goes to fight in foreign territories has a fundamentally different psychology - "the psychology of an invader." They go to kill. Whereas those who defend are there to protect.

Additionally, but importantly, the psychology of a defender is based on ethical values, while the psychology of an invader is the psychology of a killer. The best fighter is a beast. They enter a "reptilian" state, destroying indiscriminately. Here, the difference is radical.

One more important nuance. Our psychologists traditionally train in "the psychology of the attacker," mainly using Western methodologies. Well-known American developments focus on the psychology of a fighter who fights on foreign territory and is oriented towards destroying those who defend it. Therefore, when such psychologists come across a person whose psyche is forming as that of a defender, misunderstandings arise. A notable exception is the psychology of Israeli military personnel. This is why they have the lowest recorded PTSD rates.

I saw this misunderstanding when "crisis" psychologists came to us who had undergone training with Western specialists and began communicating with our fighters. They really did not understand what they were talking about. The psychologists recounted the mechanisms of combat stress learned from foreign materials, which they had never experienced themselves, to those who had been in that stress for months.

Are NATO programs suitable for Ukrainian soldiers?

I am familiar with these programs. I even participated in one when I returned from war. At that time, the most popular was the "Peer-to-Peer" program, where military personnel work with military personnel, sharing their experiences, etc. In our circumstances, it is more or less effective. It seems to ease their burden, but the question remains - what to do with it? To address this question, you need education, to allow the sublimation of experience into something else. These programs work, but only at some preliminary stage.
Everyone talks about the multitude of problems veterans will bring back from war in the next twenty years. Is that so, and what will they be?
Yes, it will be so. But these won't be the problems everyone thinks they will be. Everyone is expecting PTSD. But I am expecting the return syndrome.
Return syndrome? What does that mean?It means that society does not understand veterans, starts creating artificial problems for them, and thus provokes not always adequate responses. And the veterans will not forgive this and will give feedback. What that feedback will be, no one knows.

Veterans have learned to shoot; they have learned to detonate. It is better not to touch a person for whom this is work. Yet they will constantly be provoked. Therefore, it is very important for a veteran to come to a psychologist and begin to understand in the process that no one is waiting for them, and no one will lay down carpets for them. The psychologist just needs to help them understand that.
So, besides PTSD, we will also face the trauma of returning?Regarding PTSD, there have been many studies, mostly conducted by Americans. Once, I asked a well-known American researcher at a conference if he had results from PTSD studies in Afghan mujahideen who defended their country? Or among Vietnam veterans? He pondered and said he had not seen any official research on that.

And I have a question: how are we different from the Vietnamese who defended their home or the same Afghans? We are defending our own. Therefore, I do not see any grounds for expecting PTSD specifically from the war.

I have researched this issue and concluded that if PTSD exists, it is more likely in a man and comes from the family. And he returns to war to "burn it out."

In our case, we are likely to see more of the return syndrome and the effect of post-traumatic growth. After all, we have the psychology of defenders, we are defending our own, and paying for a proper understanding of this will be necessary.

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