Student Marine veteran reaches out to returning soldiers

By Jonathan McFadden

mcfaddenj@mytjnow.com

Michael Widrich holds up a picture of himself volunteering at an orphanage during his first deployment to South Korea in 2004. He was later deployed to Iraq where he lost friend Jeremy Stacey, 20, in a Humvee explo dsion. The tattoo on Widrich’s arm is in honor of Stacey. Photos by Kathleen Brown • brownk@mytjnow.comAll Michael Widrich needed eight years ago was a cot, three hot meals a day and a shower.

At 18, Widrich knew he wanted to help people and stand independently as his own man.

At 21, he stood in a marketplace in the Shula neighborhood of Baghdad, Iraq, when a suicide vest attached to a mentally handicapped child went off, causing an explosion that killed 22 people. 

Now, at 25, the corporal leads Winthrop’s first student veteran’s association and, along with other veterans on campus, hopes to bring awareness to vets and non-vets alike about the new battles he and his comrades are now facing. 

As a two-time veteran who’s completed a year-long tour in Iraq from 2006-2007 and was stationed in the de-militarized zone of South Korea, Widrich wants Winthrop to take a proactive stand for veterans.

“If the school were to take an extra effort to make sure veterans were being taken care of properly, we would be able to live life like a traditional student,” Widrich said. “We’d have time to study every night, we’d have time to take more than 12 hours of class (a semester).”

Widrich, junior psychology major, said he’s disabled mentally and physically, after being caught in a roadside bomb and taking hits of shrapnel.

“It was really horrible,” Widrich said.

For a long time, Widrich preferred not to tell people—including his family—the atrocities he witnessed and endured while in Iraq.

“I don’t want to put people off,” he said. 

Since returning to civilian life, Widrich said he’s noticed many people adopting the bystander effect; that is, standing by and allowing injustices to occur.

To Widrich, it’s the choice between action and inaction that distinguishes civilians from veterans.

“I have no problem standing up for the weak, the tired, the innocent.”

It’s also a willingness to fight for true freedom.

“When you’re sitting in a classroom and people ask what does freedom mean to you and somebody just [says], ‘being able to go shopping at night;’ those aren’t the things that truly matter,” Widrich said. “Being free is having clean water to drink; having a roof over your head.”

Widrich is embarking on a mission to make sure other veterans receive the morale boost they need to keep going, despite the hardships they face when they come home. 

“Just because the war is over for us,doesn’t mean the war is over in our own lives,” Wildrich said.    

There are approximately 190 veterans receiving V.A. benefits on campus, said Jeannie Mackey, the university’s coordinator for veteran affairs.

As a combat soldier, Widrich worked his way up through the ranks of an M1 Tanker driver, to loader as a private and finally, to a gunner as a corporal. 

Though he was honorably discharged in 2008, Widrich is still fighting his own personal war.

He suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder.

Driving at night is uncomfortable for him. 

“Every time I was in a roadside bomb, it happened at night.”

Sometimes, when he sees a pothole, his mind will flash back to his time in Iraq where insurgents would place improvised explosive devices (IED’s) under manhole covers to blow up the whole road. 

When he remembers, instinct can sometimes take the wheel. 

“At night, if I’m not thinking, I can see a pothole and suddenly subconsciously snap back into that state of mind and swerve to miss that pothole,” Widrich said. 

He doesn’t like fireworks or sudden noises.

He’s been in firefights and still remembers the sound and feel of bullets zooming past his head.

Widrich holds a flag embroidered with the words “Operation Iraqi Freedom- May 2004 to May 2006.” Photo by Kathleen Brown • brownk@mytjnow.comHe works seven hours a day, 30 hours a week at Compact Power Services, goes to school and then goes home to study, clean or pay bills. Sometimes, he has to muster enough energy just to cook dinner.

On his right arm is a tattoo displaying the name of one of his closest friends in the service, Jeremy Stacey. 

Stacey died in a Humvee explosion in Baghdad. He was 20.

It’s a heavy burden Widrich carries, but he said he’s willing if it brings awareness to the cause. 

Considered nontraditional students, Widrich and others like him have seen the world and all it has to offer.

He also knows how hard it is to balance classes, cultural events and studying with many responsibilities. 

Many of the veterans in Widrich’s organization work full-time jobs in addition to being full-time students. They must take care of their families and pay their bills.  

“…There are a lot more time constraints,” Widrich said. 

That’s why Widrich wants veterans to receive one cultural event credit for every month they were deployed. 

“I’ve been to nine other countries before,” Widrich said. “I’ve seen the world firsthand and I’ve seen other economies and how other people get by. The only way to truly experience a culture is to be submerged into it.” 

Back to life, back to reality

Despite the horrors at night and discomfort in crowded places, Widrich is willing to communicate the truth.

More soldiers are coming home than ever before due to advances in medicine, Widrich said. 

“Twenty years ago, 30 years ago, I wouldn’t have lived through some of my injuries,” he said. “We’re just substituting a battlefield for a different one.”

Coming home isn’t easy, nor is it idyllic.  

In an unpromising economy, employment is rare. 

Widrich said the financial coverage veterans receive isn’t enough to help them assimilate back to normal life very smoothly.

Returning to school doesn’t make the burdens lighter. 

There are no resources that help veterans get into the classes they need, receive leniency with teachers, make sure each veteran has a meal or make sure they are able to pay for their textbooks.

“I know people who aren’t buying books because their kid’s sick; they need to get them medication,” Widrich said.

Widrich receives the Post 9/11 GI Bill, which gives him $500 a year for books.

It’s not enough.

“I think the school should take some responsibility and help these people,” Widrich said.

Being a disabled veteran, Widrich knows firsthand how hard it is to try assimilating to civilian and college life.

Even with the GI Bill and veteran programs through the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs, just becoming a student is difficult. 

“We have to go through veteran affairs, then we have to go to the V.A. coordinator at the school; we have to have our schedules approved,” Widrich said.

By the time the student veterans receive any type of financial assistance, they’ve gone through the wringer.

Veterans receive the same treatment as  other students, Mackey said. 

Originally from Florida, Widrich packed up all his belongings and moved to Rock Hill to attend Winthrop because he said he wanted an education at a great school.

At first, it wasn’t easy.

“I felt really alone,” Widrich said.

He said he felt he had no one to reach out to him; no one who went through the same things he had.

“There are a lot of times when I get extremely depressed,” he said. “I feel like I’m alone sometimes.”

“My most important goal is to make sure that no veteran ever feels alone,” Widrich said.

As the organization’s president, Widrich also aims to help change the stigma against veterans.

“…The military’s gotten a bad rap, especially after Vietnam, being called ‘baby killers’ and ‘rapists,’” Widrich said.

Not all soldiers want to hurt people like those responsible for torturing several Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib in 2005, Widrich said.

Organization proposals

Other proposals Widrich hopes to make are for the university to fly the American flag at half-mast during President’s Day and Veterans Day and to hold a flag ceremony on major holidays. 

Though he feels veterans are an alienated population on campus, he doesn’t fault the university.

“The school has just never had the concern brought to them,” Widrich said.

His goal is to change that.

The organization will keep veterans active, make sure they have food to eat and ensure them transportation.

Even if the organization’s goals don’t manifest while he is a student, Widrich hopes their actions now will help veterans in the future.

“People think of soldiers as strong; they think of them as solid and unbreakable,” Widrich said. “But a soldier bleeds just like everybody else, a soldier has the same fears and same problems; the only thing that stands different is that we have the flag on our shoulders. We have to stand for the United States.”

Like disabled students, veterans need better support, Widrich said. They need extra time on tests and extra time with teachers. 

“Sometimes, we need people to stand for us, because we’re too tired to stand on our own.”