My wife has been working on an idea she has had for quite some time and decided to create it as a short film. Currently, the raw footage is shot but she wants to do some interesting things with the special effects and such so she created an IndieGoGo campaign to help put in a werewolf transformation, score it and if all goes well, pay everyone who volunteered. If you wouldn't mind checking out her campaign and giving some feedback either here or on her campaign site that would be much appreciated. The basic premise is getting into mental breakdowns, PTSD, and dealing with mental health stigmas by using a werewolf metaphor.

https://www.indiegogo.com/proj...rewolf-movie-short#/

Any feedback is appreciated and will be passed on.

For a cause as worthwhile as this, please consider updating your thread title to something like "Creating a video short about PTSD in Veterans and seeking input."

I look forward to seeing this progress. Other "wolf" topics could be easily created by simply exploring things like ASD, ADHD, depression, and anxiety etc. Spin the wheel of disorders and see where it lands for the next featurette.

Done and thank you. She really appreciated the feedback you gave and was glad you found it important.

A bit of a mind dump so please bear with me.

Questions:
Is 10 minutes long enough to get the material covered?

Is the goal for a one off or a series of shorts to develop the character?

Is there a platform for the shorts? YouTube etc.


Thoughts:
I watched a YouTube video today that threw out a statistic of 20%~30% of those in combat experience PTSD. Drop me an email and I'll point you to the video.

Building off of the earlier thought, it might be possible to create an entire series not only to werewolves, but even vampires. Vampires could be people who are narcissistic or sociopathic.

Anything done to help reduce the stigmas surrounding mental issues is a worthwhile cause. Wouldn't it be refreshing to be able to ask others for help without the fear of being ridiculed or worse yet ostracized? It's never easy to turn the gaze inward realizing the flaws and then being willing to work through them. Too often a "quick fix" is sought be that prescription drugs, illegal drugs, or alcohol. Getting better, at anything, doesn't happen overnight and it isn't always fun or easy.

Before you release this please speak with some Clinical Psychologists at the Veterans Administration hospital. They treat these veterans daily. Gain some more knowledge before you do this. Misinformation is worse than no information. There should be a Clinical Psychologist available to meet with you. I commend you for your wanting to do something to help.

I would move this thread to the Lounge. It fits better there and you would get more responses.

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:
I would move this thread to the Lounge. It fits better there and you would get more responses.

Thank you for your feedback on both posts. I'll certainly suggest it to her. I'll check in with the mods about getting this moved to the Lounge.

More comments from my mental treadmill:
People will possibly see this from several angles. For example as the werewolf not wanting to transform, trying not to, bit it happens. Then others will see it from the point of view of those the werewolf hurts. It will be important to convey that neither point of view is wrong. They are simply different.

There will also be those that get stuck on the monster angle and lash out against being called/compared to a monster. I don't get the vibe that the goal is to demonize the person but instead to explain how debilitating the condition can be. There will always be those who are nay sayers. Let them pound sand.

quote:

Originally posted by ffips:

There will also be those that get stuck on the monster angle and lash out against being called/compared to a monster. I don't get the vibe that the goal is to demonize the person but instead to explain how debilitating the condition can be. There will always be those who are nay sayers. Let them pound sand.

I think you are interpreting it correctly. She definitely isnt attempting to demonize the people dealing with it and isnt anti-VA doctors or therapists, its more a discussion over mental health and treatment, societal interactions etc. Atleast that's my take from talking with her about it.

Not all PTSD is about combat.

I had a hard time with drowning people, because that’s the situation I was put in when I was a sailor. I still can’t watch movies with drownings. Being shot at when I was a cop, and being in an actual gunfight didn’t make me blink. But I spent years trying to not freak out about the drownings I’ve witnessed.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Good point.

I would say a Policeman who's done a beat in a large metro area or, even in a more rural area with high call volumes and activity can suffer PTSD as well. It's just not discussed as much as war/conflict PTSD.

I have never explored the symptoms of the “disorder” in detail, but based on a quick scan of the popular sites I had some that fit for a time after I returned from Vietnam. I never considered them to be very serious and they’re long behind me now. But the first murder/rape I investigated as an Army crime investigator affected me very strongly for a time, and thinking about it can still evoke an emotional response. That was nearly 44 years ago.

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:
Before you release this please speak with some Clinical Psychologists at the Veterans Administration hospital.

...And disregard pretty much everything they tell you.

Cynical? Yep. But hear me out.

The generation of veterans that should be the most prone to PTSD should be those that experienced years of constant violent combat. WW2 veterans. Guess which group of veterans has the lowest rate of PTSD diagnoses? WW2 veterans.

Why do we suppose that is?

I submit that it is because this cohort of people grew up in a time of hardship and learned from an early age how to deal with hardship and adversity. They learned how to say, "Yep, that sucked.", and put their heads down and drove on. It's just what you do. It's how you get through life.

We have raised, now, a few generations of kids who have never learned how to deal with adversity and hardship. Kids who, while admirably, have chosen to serve their country, don't know how to deal with what they have seen and done. They have been coddled their whole lives by umbrella parents and an umbrella society.

Couple this with feel good psychologists and psychiatrists who, at least in the VA system (and yes, I have experience with this), are quick to diagnose PTSD, we have a yuge problem.

Any veteran walking into a VA clinic can say a few key phrases and walk out with a diagnosis, a disability rating, and a handful of psychotropic meds. It's quick, it's easy, and it's deadly.

I am convinced, through admittedly anecdotal evidence only at this point, that the multitude of veteran suicides of late are due to the over diagnosis of PTSD and the over prescribing of psychotropic medication.

We have to get a handle on this, somehow. The problem is not, in my opinion, PTSD and the seeing things that people should not have to see, but rather the psychiatric community over-labeling and over-treating veterans.

While a veteran, the closest thing I ever saw to combat was a few bar fights. But, I worked in EMS for many years as a paramedic and a flight nurse. I've pulled dead frozen babies from a river, I've worked on human bodies in every possible manner of destruction. Burns, gunshot wounds, explosions, you name it. There is nothing that could happen to the human body that I haven't dealt with at one time or another. Yet...I learned a long time ago that life goes on. You just put that shit on the back shelf and get on with your normal life. It's what we do and what we should do.

What we shouldn't do, IMO, is quickly diagnose these people with PTSD and throw them on medication. Yet, this is what we are doing. To what end? Clearly it isn't working.

(I'll duck for the incoming at this point.)

Good post Gustofer. Really good post.

Gustofer, I think you’re spot on.