After their deployments ended and they returned home, Iraq and Afghanistan combat veterans Travis Weiner and Tommy Furlong were discouraged by how little the American public seemed to know or care about the wars and their cost to the men and women who were fighting them. After leaving the military, they worked together in veteran outreach at a Boston-area nonprofit, and many veterans they interacted with told them the same thing, that no one was interested in what they had to say about the wars, including, sometimes, the clinicians who were treating them.

At the time, most Americans and many clinicians had never heard of moral injury, the profound psychological and emotional wound that veterans – combat veterans especially - often carry from their wartime experiences. Moral injury can manifest in social isolation, substance abuse, cynicism and anger, despair, and suicide, all issues many veterans struggle with. While the clinical community has recently begun to study moral injury and to look for effective treatments, many clinicians who treat veterans are still unfamiliar with what it is and how it affects veterans.

Travis and Tommy decided in 2018 to make a documentary film that would allow combat veterans to share candid stories from their deployments and talk about their feelings and beliefs about the wars they fought. Their purpose was to validate veterans’ experiences and feelings, to give clinicians the information they need to understand moral injury, and to share with the American public the true cost of fighting America’s wars.

At the time, Catie Foertsch was senior producer at DigiNovations in greater Boston, producing a wide variety of film and video projects for corporate, nonprofit and academic clients in New England, nationally and internationally. She agreed to produce and direct the film because she believes America can and should do more to support veterans and their families. This is more likely to happen if we listen to what veterans want us to know about the wars we sent them to fight, and the cost to themselves and their families.