Welcome to SANE's trial Veterans Forum

G'day

SANE has created this Veteran's Forum as a trial online peer-to-peer anonymous forum where anyone Veterans (current or former serving members of Australia's armed forces) can connect with others to share experiences, seek support and advice and anonymously debrief.

Key guidelines for this space: keep it anonymous, deidentified and avoid very graphic descriptions - this is because it's difficult to know what might be ok for some to talk about and triggering for others.

You can read the detailed Guidelines here: Guidelines & Info - SANE Forums

Dealing with issues transitioning back to civilian life?

Managing the impacts of PTSD?

Need to vent about challenges accessing support services and healthcare as a Vet?

You can talk about whatever you like - just keep it deidentified, and within the guidelines.

That means, don't use your name or name other people, keep location descriptions general / state or large regions to reduce the likelihood that your posts can identify you and talk about how you are feeling, what's happening for you rather than disclosing very specific information that could identify you or others or should be kept confidential.

About SANE Forums: we moderate online forums 24/7 which means we review posts and look for breaches of the guidelines (member to member conflict, conflict / abuse of moderators, posts which identify you or someone else, posts which could be defamatory that name a specific organisation, posts which discourage help seeking for others who might be in a mental health crisis and posts with graphic details that might be triggering for others). If you inadvertently breach the guidelines, the moderators will email you and let you know, and ask you to take another look at the guidelines and they may edit your post. If they think you might benefit from a brief break they'll suggest that too.

Moderators will also reach out if you are in crisis and we are worried about you, or if we believe there is a risk of serious harm to you or someone else.

Otherwise, the power of the forums is in peer-to-peer connection which is delivered through anonymous support.

This space is a trial - to see if there is value in an online, anonymous Veteran forum. We'd love your ideas, feedback and suggestions on how a space like this could be set up and you can post threads and comment on ideas for the space in here too!

Feel free to introduce yourself (anonymously of course) below - age, state are fine and maybe a bit of background.

Have you struggled from time to time with your mental health or experienced burnout or vicarious trauma as a result of your experience as a Veteran? What helps you recover? What gets in the way?

Thanks for supporting our trial.

Rachel,

SANE CEO