by Dennis Dalman
Even though Vietnam-era veteran Phil Ringstrom of Sartell did not serve in that Southeast Asian country, he knows all too well the pain, anxieties and suffering that war and many other wars caused in so many veterans and their loved ones.
Ringstrom was a naval hospital corpsman in the U.S. Navy during the Vietnam era and later worked at a series of veterans’ hospitals, including the one in St. Cloud, as well as in Sioux Falls, S.D., and Duluth. Having earned a four-year degree in nursing, he also worked at Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland and Balboa Naval Hospital in Orlando, among many others.
Although he is not retired, Ringstrom still spends a good deal of his time helping veterans.
There were two parts to Ringstrom’s lifelong work: one involved his being a commander of training for development of military Army surgical hospitals and medical evacuation units, and the other was a clinical nurse dealing directly with veterans in many hospitals.
“It’s who I am,” he said of his lifetime service to veterans.
Ringstrom began work at the St. Cloud VA Health Care System in 1980. It wasn’t until that year that medical experts began to agree so many veterans were suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, which didn’t even have a name attached to it in previous years.
Estimates range as high as 30 percent for the number of Vietnam veterans who will suffer from one or more symptoms of PTSD. The incidence of the disorder is also high among the many veterans, both men and women, who have been deployed in conflicts in the Middle East, many of them having served multiple deployments far from homes and families.
Some symptoms of PTSD include traumatic flashbacks, avoidance of social situations, outbursts of anger, sleep disorders, panic and anxiety attacks, hyper-vigilance and suicidal feelings. Sadly, all too many veterans succumb to those suicidal impulses.
The terror of PTSD is often compounded by the chronic pain so many veterans endure, often for a lifetime.
Ringstrom has seen such suffering up-close and first hand, so much so he himself has had to seek counseling from time to time.
Pilot program
Nearly 30 years ago, Ringstrom was instrumental in developing a Readjustment Counseling Service, which was a pilot program to help veterans cross the bridge between two very different worlds – the world of war-torn conflicts and the back-home world of civilian life.
That pilot program was started in St. Cloud, Minneapolis, Fargo and Sioux Falls and has brought many insights and treatment methodologies to military hospitals throughout the world. Ringstrom and his peers worked long hours in the readjustment process, which included soldiers experiencing the emotional aftermath of sexual traumas (both women and men), the bereavement process loved one’s experience, suicide prevention and the many symptoms of PTSD.
He and his wife, Marcia, and their two adopted children – Paul and Anne – moved to Sartell in 1994. But duty kept calling, and Ringstrom was asked to serve at the Sioux Falls Veterans’ Hospital, and later he and his family moved to Duluth while he worked at a hospital there for four years before moving back to Sartell.
Even as a young man, Ringstrom resigned himself to the fact when duty calls, he would answer, especially when it came to the needs of veterans.
During an interview with the Sartell Newsleader, Ringstrom vividly recalled how veterans in so much pain physically and/or mentally would come to the St. Cloud VA Health Care System. There, they were expected to fill out so much paperwork before any kind of treatment would be given.
“It was B.S.” Ringstrom said. “All that paperwork.”
Thanks in part to Ringstrom, a new policy was implemented: treat the veteran’s immediate needs first as soon as she or he walks in the door; paperwork will follow in due time.
Steady stream of wounded
During the war in Iraq, Ringstrom saw a steady stream of combat veterans arriving at Bethesda Naval Hospital and at Walter Reed Hospital, both in Bethesda, Md. After the battle for Falujah in Iraq, there was a massive influx of wounded soldiers to those hospitals.
Ringstrom said he vividly remembers one wounded warrior he happened to meet on the grounds of the Walter Reed Hospital. The man, who was missing most of one arm and a leg, was in a wheelchair, and his wife was with him. Ringstrom could tell at once the man was on morphine for intense pain. Later, in an elevator, Ringstrom saw the man again and asked him if he had any definite plans. The man looked up at Ringstrom and said, “As soon as I get a new arm and leg, I’m going to return to my unit.” Then he said with a firm determination in his voice, “Semper Fi,” the Marine slogan for “Always Faithful.”
Ringstrom felt sadness because he had heard that before from other veterans, the iron-clad determination to go back to his unit, to help fellow soldiers, and Ringstrom knew once the morphine wore off, the soldier would have to face extreme disappointment and a long healing process, far from his unit.
Some of the veterans Ringstrom saw were missing their faces.
“In just one month, there were 1,100 wounded soldiers in those hospitals,” Ringstrom said. “They just kept coming.”
The grief is unbearable for so many loved ones. Ringstrom well remembers the anguish in the voices of parents, wives or husbands when they would wail with the one-word question: Why?
“It wasn’t easy hearing that,” he said.
Older veterans
A big difference of veterans these days, as opposed to previous wars, including Vietnam, is so many of today’s returning soldiers are in their 30s or even older. That’s because there is no longer a draft; it’s an all-volunteer system, which means many men and women are serving two, three, four and even more tours of duty, away from their families.
“It affects the whole family,” he said. “And it can mean drinking, drugs and suicides.”
But there are also success stories, men and women veterans who manage to recover even from hideous wounds and who convalesce courageously and readjust to life in a civilian world. That, in brief, is the goal of Ringstrom and other caregivers, to help veterans and their families re-adjust to life. It is often, he said, very difficult, and the more difficult for the veteran, the harder it is for families.
“People too often forget the families,” Ringstrom said. “And soldiers don’t have to be deployed overseas to get PTSD. It can happen to anybody who serves in the military. And soldiers who were not even wounded have uppermost in the minds the sacrifices of the fallen.”
Ringstrom’s advice to people is this:
- Reach out a helping hand to the families of veterans – help them with a repair, a yard task, groceries, gift certificates, rides, a cooked meal. Even the smallest of kindnesses is a boost to families.
- Support organizations that help veterans, including service clubs.
- Never, ever ask a veteran what he or she thinks of the war, or a president or presidential candidate. Veterans can become very angry when someone approaches them trying to score a partisan, political point.
“When you’re in uniform, when you serve, you serve with each other and support each other and our country – you’re not supporting a political party,” Ringstrom said.
People who honor the fallen, he added, should remember that fact on Veterans Day and every day of the year.
Military family
Born in Devil’s Lake, N.D., Ringstrom felt a “calling” to the military even when he was a child.
His father Norm, now deceased, joined the Army when he was only 17 during World War II. Ringstrom’s older brother Bob, who was the Sartell police chief for many years, joined the Marines and served in Vietnam. His oldest brother, Bruce, served on a nuclear submarine. Their sister, Karen, became a nurse – another profession for which Ringstrom heard a “calling.”
There’s not a day in his life when Ringstrom is not helping in some way or another veterans and their needs. He belongs to the East Side St. Cloud VFW, the American Legion in Sartell, the Marine Corps League, and he is a life member of the Vietnam Veterans of America, the Iraq-Afghanistan Veterans of America and many other veterans-related groups.
Most recently, he has served as a coordinator and fundraiser for the Little Falls Art Project at the military cemetery at Camp Ripley near Little Falls. That project, with huge wall murals painted by Little Falls master painter Charles Kapsner, is nearing its completion after years of work. Kapsner is now completing the large panel that will honor the Marines. Those honoring the other branches of military services have been completed.
Ringstrom’s daughter, Anne, works for the “Choice” program at the St. Cloud VA Health Care System, and son Paul, who lives in Duluth, works in an outreach program for the Girls Scouts.
“I’m very proud of them,” he said.