For a brief moment, the chatter was subdued as the sound waves dissolved into silence outside the VA clinic in Decatur. Faces in the crowd displayed empathy and sympathy, and some eyes glistened as Army Veteran Lamar Lyons shared a deeply personal reflection.
“Ten days ago I turned 68, but 30 years ago I didn’t think I would live to see 38,” Lyons said from the podium, wearing a t-shirt that read Fort Bragg Alumni. The former military switchboard operator and paratrooper served 26 years in the military. During some of those years, Lyons said he hit “a bottom he never thought he would recover from.”
On Wednesday morning, with dew drying from the grass and temperatures in the low 80s, veterans, VA staff, family members, and non-veterans gathered for the Atlanta VA’s 4th Suicide Prevention and Recovery Month Walk-N-Roll. The walk honors and raises awareness for national suicide prevention during April. In the United States, an average of 131 people die by suicide each day, and veterans account for roughly 17 of those deaths…