Workshop Lets Veterans Share Their Stories

The workshops, including lodging and airfare, are free to participants, who can apply on the organization's Web site, http://www.vets4vets.us. Vets4Vets is funded by the Iraq-Afghanistan Deployment Impact Fund, one program of a California charity that gives grants to nonprofit groups serving U.S. military members and their families.

Not all parts of the workshop were serious. A musical-chairs-like game had the veterans in stitches. There were plans for basketball and water volleyball during an afternoon break.

But the point was bonding, which would lead to trust, Driscoll said.

After the morning session, the veterans broke into groups. Rogers and Alexandria resident Euneka Joseph, 27, the two female participants, moved to a smaller room.

Joseph, who served as an executive secretary to Air Force generals in Kuwait and Iraq, told Rogers the stress of her tours and guilt over a close friend's death had led to four years of struggles with post-traumatic stress disorder and schizophrenia. She is no longer with her husband and lost custody of their two daughters. She had been unable to work. She said that she still puts on her uniform for a few minutes each day, to feel like she has a purpose.

Rogers said she remained haunted by memories of small-arms fire and roadside bombs, of the faces of Iraqi children whose deaths she said she blames herself for. Now, she said, she hardly leaves her Fort Belvoir home. If not for her husband and four children, she said, she is not sure she could keep going.

They listened to one another, nodding as the other spoke.

"I commend you, because you're fighting," Joseph told Rogers.

"You're a fighter, too," Rogers responded. "Everybody who's been to Iraq and come back is a fighter."