Caregiver to Grief

Not-for-profit TAPS founder Bonnie Carroll takes privately funded strides on behalf of fellow survivors in seeking to improve lives after death

By Forrest Glenn Spencer / Photography by Seth Freeman

Bonnie Carroll

Founded in 1994, the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors (TAPS) is a national, nonprofit organization serving families and friends who have been affected by the death of a member of the U.S. armed services. The organization formed out of a tragic incident in November 1992 when an Army C-12 aircraft crashed in Alaska. Eight military service personnel were killed, including Brig. Gen. Thomas Carroll, the husband of Bonnie Carroll, the then-future founder of TAPS. Bonnie Carroll, who at the time was an Air National Guard Reserve officer, found courage and strength during her time of need in individuals who had also lost loved ones on that aircraft. Less than two years later, she formed TAPS as a national group to provide comfort, support and care to surviving military families.

What was the need in founding the organization?
Peer-based support programs are not new concepts in the United States, but up until 1994 this did not exist for the military families. TAPS had the luxury of benchmarking the best programs in the country after doing a careful analysis of what Veterans Affairs and the Department of Defense offer.

My background prior to my husband’s death was I working in the West Wing of the White House for President Reagan as executive assistant for Cabinet Affairs, which is basically intergovernmental coordination at the executive level. From that experience, I understood how the federal government works. In Alaska, I worked at the Department of Law on programs of victims of crimes—surviving families of homicides—program development and legislation for those who had been affected by the tragedy. So, out of those two ends of the spectrum, I saw the fruits of programs that have been put in place in this country for families affected by a traumatic event.

Concurrently throughout that experience, serving as an Air National Guard Reserve officer, I became part of a critical incident stress management team after a KC-135 crashed and killed three members. They put together this team to be available not only for the families to cope but the other unit members. Basically, the critical incident model is peer-based to normalize what is a very abnormal experience. Law enforcement and emergency responders use it to come together after a horrific event and debrief and normalize the experience. Post-trauma effects are just normal, psychological reactions to various abnormal events that we experience, the witnessing of an aircraft exploding and three people being killed. Most people won’t experience [that] in their life; seeing another person die does have an impact.

How do you serve the survivors?
After two years of research of what was currently in place through other veterans’ service organizations and state agencies, and benchmarking the best practices of other peer-based support programs, bringing all that together, we identified four services that were not offered anywhere else and where critical need existed: peer-based emotional support, which is the real core of what TAPS offers, the grief and trauma resources and information, crisis intervention and support, and case work assistance.

Are there local chapters?
We don’t organize as much by local chapters as we do by relationship and circumstance. For example, we have a very large national sibling network of brothers and sisters who have lost loved ones in the military, and they communicate by online forums or national gatherings—coming together with others who truly understand. We’ve got a network of individuals who have lost a twin, or parents who have lost an only child. Whether you live across the street or across the country, you’re going to primarily be communicating by telephone and email these days. The concept in getting together regionally has not proven as helpful as it is getting together with others who most closely match your circumstance.

What other organizations are you networked with?
We are part of a wonderful network called the Care Coalition, and we work not only with other military organizations, but also civilian groups to provide resources to families, to network support to let them know in their local area what other resources are appropriate to their circumstances. For example, a mother who has lost her only child in Iraq can be connected not only to the national support network from TAPS, but also local support through bereft parents or a program called Compassionate Friends.

What’s your relationship with the Department of Defense?
We work very, very closely with the military branches—primarily the chiefs of casualty. Each military branch has a section that provides immediate casualty and mortuary assistance to the families, primarily in regard to processing survivor benefits, which is something we don’t do. We would help families connect with agencies after they’ve gotten all the government benefits that they are eligible for, and we provide information about all the different levels of support.

How many people do you serve each year?
It’s probably close to 20,000. Everyone receives from TAPS a quarterly magazine offering information, resources and articles by other surviving families. We also send invitations to regional events, invites to regular weekly chats online for parents, siblings, teens, and special chat events, like a chat for male grief on anger.

You’ve been busy since 2001. What has changed with TAPS?
We have expanded some of our programs. For example, we’ve reached out to the families of the contractors. There are 140,000 military members in Iraq and 180,000 contractors, and more than 1,000 contractors have been killed. That’s a big part of what we do now. We are having a special survivors’ seminar in Dallas, Texas, just for the families of the contractors, and those families are also included in our regular programs. We’re the only support program for those contractors’ families.

For the kids, one of our popular programs is the Good Grief Camp. It’s been a fantastic opportunity for children to really gain a connection to the military, have that ongoing understanding what their dad or big brother or mom was part of and that America continues to honor their family because of the service and sacrifice, regardless of the circumstances of the death.

What’s your greatest challenge?
Funding. Meeting this mission as a nonprofit organization is pretty daunting. It’s all private. No government funding, mostly few private individuals, and we’re open to corporate support.

Is there one region that has responded well in terms of participation with the program?
Northern Virginia is our strongest support.

Families are going to continue needing your assistance long after we pull out of Iraq and Afghanistan; is that right?
Absolutely. TAPS existed long, long before this conflict, and what we are seeing is a lead time for folks in becoming involved. Some folks contact us immediately, and others maybe a year or two years later. They reach out for help. I think many families the first year have much more support, but they find the second year tougher. Our support would be most critical in the first three years. We have families who have been involved since the very beginning with TAPS.

We have worked very hard not to duplicate any services. The benefits to families right now are fairly comprehensive. The Department of Defense and the branches are responsive to the needs of families, and we have a great relationship. We will call on the agencies for families as we hear about them and, likewise, they will refer families to us for emotional care.

What other areas are you expanding?
We are doing a Spanish outreach. We also have a national childhood traumatic grief network, and we are working with Iraqi Women’s Affairs to establish a support program for the Iraqi women and children.
The theme of our program is “Remember the Love, Celebrate the Life and Share the Journey.” The heart of TAPS is to remember the life and the service, regardless of the death. It is the service that is honored; with the families, it’s the extraordinary life that was lived and the selfless service given to this country, who stepped out and gave of themselves. That’s what we’re about.

(April 2008)

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