3 Essential Reasons to Stay Connected to The Local Veterans’ Community
Written by E. Malik
Stay connected!
2020 has affected every department and community in its entirety, including the veterans’ community. Veterans have lost connection with their community, services, and benefits due to lockdown, which has forced the officials to work from home only. It has cut down the connection between the veterans –mostly old, who do not use the internet and only prefer interacting with the community physically. Although the officials are trying to reach out to as many veterans as possible through the new “tele-town” hall services, there is still a broad audience unanswered.
Why Should you Connect to The Local Veterans Community?
Veteran or not, staying connected and interacting with others of your kind is part of human nature. However, being a part of a community gives you a lot more than just a few parties or social gatherings. Veterans need to strengthen their bonds to help and encourage each other in their endeavors.
· Motivate Your Comrades
We always need someone to hear us out and feel our situation. However, a veteran would not connect to a chef the way he would with another veteran. Share your experiences –hardships and their outcomes, with your comrades to motivate them on their journey.
Often veterans and their families are met with painfully life-changing experiences, affecting their physical and mental states. Veterans with similar experiences can significantly help their comrades overcome this phase and return to everyday life.
· Enjoy Your Benefits
Veterans are offered tons of great benefits, including education and health. Surprisingly, most veterans are deprived of it. The most common reason behind veterans’ deprivation of their benefits is their unawareness. They don’t even know what benefits they qualify for or even qualify for any benefit at all. There are hundreds of veterans who do not bother finding out their position in the community and the services they can enjoy.
To know all about these benefits and your eligibility towards enjoying them, you have to stay connected with your community and reach out to officials offering these services.
· Overcome Connection Barriers Together
Apart from the oblivious segment of the community, many veterans are fully aware of their rights and benefits yet do not come forward to avail them. The reason? Forms and claim packages that they do not like to fill. Many do not want to put in so much effort only to get possibly rejected.
However, giving up on those benefits is still not the right thing to do. Instead, it would help if you connected with other veterans to learn more about these forms. You can reach out to official services that would help you through it from start to end.
References
- https://napavalleyregister.com/community/eagle/news/vet-2-vets-staying-connected/article_63dfd098-ecc0-11ea-838b-b35b4a8643cb.html
- https://www.veteranscrisisline.net/support/be-there
For more information on GATHER Veterans click here –> https://gatherveterans.com/subscribe-today/
