A man who served his country, then hit hard times, now spends his time giving back and helping the most vulnerable.<\/p>\n
His work with fellow veterans is why he’s being recognized by the local chapter of the Red Cross.<\/p>\n
On the fourth Saturday of every month, you’ll find Mike Weil here at the Stand Down in Pottstown.<\/p>\n
“Keeps me on track, keeps me grounded, reminds me of where I came from,” said Mike Weil of the Veterans Coalition of Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n
In combat, stand downs are a respite for weary soldiers. Here at home, they’re a lifeline.<\/p>\n
Mike enlisted in the army when he was 19, assigned to a mortar platoon in Fort Hood, Texas. He got married, had children, was stationed overseas and then came Operation Desert Storm.<\/p>\n
“We were called to go to combat. We had 48 hours to go home and say our goodbyes, get our stuff and come back,” he recalled.<\/p>\n
War took its toll and left him battling a war within.<\/p>\n
“I got more and more angry as time went on. I really started drinking a lot,” said Mike. “Slowly but surely, my PTSD just kept eating away at me and I didn’t really know anything about it at the time. But it took me to the point where I lost everything, ended up on the streets, under the bridge.”<\/p>\n
Ready to end his own life.<\/p>\n
“I ended up in Horsham psychiatric ward and they hit a button and every door and window locked and I just thought, man, I can go in this direction with this and this is what it’s going to be or I can make changes now.”<\/p>\n
Those changes led to a life of service.<\/p>\n
“Mike Weil helps the most vulnerable of our veterans. We’re talking about those who are ready to end it all,” said Lt. Col. Jay Ostrich with Berks County Veterans Affairs. “He’s doing it because he loves his brothers and sisters in arms. He’s doing it because he’s tired of seeing people suffer.”<\/p>\n
As director of daily operations for the non-profit Veterans Coalition of Pennsylvania, Mike oversees the Neil Kauffman Veterans Center in Mount Penn – a place where fellow veterans are learning to live again.<\/p>\n
“If I could help somebody else get to where I am in life and get to that point where they made it through it and they’re doing okay, that’s what I want to do.”<\/p>\n
Michael Weil – American Red Cross Hero.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A man who served his country, then hit hard times, now spends his time giving back and helping…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":130846,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[33742,10198,60811,60810,8668,60812,128,130,129,60809],"class_list":["post-130845","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-reading","tag-american-red-cross","tag-jay-ostrich","tag-michael-weil","tag-mike-weil","tag-mount-penn","tag-neil-kauffman-veterans-center","tag-reading-city","tag-reading-city-headlines","tag-reading-city-news","tag-veterans-coalition-of-pennsylvania"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130845","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=130845"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130845\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/130846"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=130845"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=130845"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=130845"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}