Editor’s note: This story includes discussion of suicide. If you or someone you know needs help, call or text 988.
It’s been a year and a half since his son died by suicide at the San Antonio Veterans Affairs hospital. For Larry Miller, change isn’t happening fast enough.
Like other soldiers, his son Mark Miller came back from war different. An artist at heart, his steady hand made him a great shot.
“He was a very kind and gentle young man. He was not born to be a sniper; he was born to be a painter,” Miller said.
Returning home in 2004 from deployments in the Middle East kicked off a new battle for Mark, a mental one.
He struggled with PTSD, depression and suicidal thoughts, and he was prescribed Prozac, an antidepressant.
After several suicide attempts he appeared to turn a corner, and he and his father wrote a book, “Suicide Stalks the Sniper,” about his time in the military and his struggle to get help.
But in April of 2025 Mark was consumed again by his internal struggle, visiting the Audie L. Murphy Memorial Veterans’ Hospital for assistance. He was prescribed Seroquel, a medication used to treat schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and depression.
“They did not listen to anything I said — just prescribing stuff — unreal. It is a crime. They are murdering vets,” he wrote in a text message to his dad.
One week later, he died by suicide in the Audie Murphy parking lot.
In September, the VA instituted new guidance for prescribing antidepressants, opioids and psychotropic medications, requiring added informed consent discussions between patients and doctors.
Miller said the guidance doesn’t go far enough.
Veteran suicide epidemic
Last month, the VA also released its annual report on veteran suicide, compiling data from 2001 through 2024.
In Texas, 568 veterans died by suicide in 2024. The VA estimates that the veteran suicide rate per 100,000 for the state is 37.1.
Last December, U.S. Marine veteran Ricky Ramos also died by suicide in the parking lot outside of the San Antonio VA hospital.
Nationally, more veterans died by suicide in 2024 than in 2023. Despite both the VA and veteran service organizations across the country working to address suicide, the rate has remained stubbornly in place for many years.
The stagnant nature of the problem has left some veterans questioning traditional treatment methods and exploring alternative ones.
“If you’ve seen combat, if you’re struggling as a veteran, you are more or less rubber-stamped as having PTSD, and the treatments for PTSD are SSRIs, which they came to market nearly four decades ago,” said Amber Capone, the cofounder and CEO of VETS, an organization supporting psychedelic research and treatment for veterans, at a Texas Tribune Festival veterans panel last month.
SSRIs are selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, and they are a prescription medication commonly used as a first-line treatment for depression and anxiety disorders.
They function by blocking a process called reuptake, which allows more serotonin to pass between brain cells. The FDA requires that all SSRIs carry a box warning, its strictest warning, for potential side effects.
Policy changes
The VA’s new protocol for prescribing medications requires patient education and signature consent before prescribing antidepressants, but only to veterans younger than 30. Similar guidance was issued for opioids and benzodiazepines.
A recent OIG report on Audie Murphy found it often failed to document having these conversations.
“Mark was 50. Why only people under 30?” Miller said. “You’re discriminating (against) the soldiers from 30 on up to 80. Why shouldn’t they know also?”
After Mark’s experience with the VA and prescription drugs, Miller hopes that future veterans in similar situations will be offered more types of treatment. Based on his own experience as a board-certified emergency medicine physician and his son’s in the VA healthcare system, he thinks doctors are often too quick to see prescription drugs as the first solution to patient problems.
“They’re passed out like candy… See a psychologist, see a counselor, go to church, find a purpose, get out there and do something, get on the right exercise, the right food, try some of these other things,” Miller said.
He hopes for solutions that can address the root causes of anxiety, depression and PTSD, including facilitating a better transition between military and civilian life.
“When soldiers come back from the military, like my son, he had no purpose. One purpose you could do, for example, is let them be guards at the schools,” Miller said.
He suggested talk therapy, neurofeedback, group therapy and psychedelics under supervision as possible treatment methods for veterans in need of mental health help.
Missing Mark
While Miller’s last year and a half has been filled with research and advocacy about drug policy, it’s also been consumed with thoughts about Mark.
“I feel guilty. I feel sad that I didn’t catch my son in time,” he said. “He was just such a sweet, dear part of my life, part of my family, and I miss talking to him and I miss being with him.”
Mark and his brother Larry Jr. would call him Yoda, from their love of Star Wars. The two created a language based on the movies that they would use to write back and forth while Mark was deployed.
Miller said Mark’s absence is felt immensely among his 12 nieces and nephews. And it’s also left him with lingering questions.
When Mark arrived at the VA that day planning to kill himself, he had with him a copy of the book he wrote with his dad. He gave the bus driver a book. Miller has always wondered why he did that.
“I’m going to have to have another edition to this book and put what happened afterwards. It’s incomplete now,” he said.
He also stressed that this was never the path he envisioned for Mark, nor the one Mark envisioned for himself.
Mark had already wrapped up his time in the Navy when 9/11 happened and he felt called to serve his country again. He had been studying to be an artist at the time, his lifelong dream.
His love of painting remained with him even after his time in the service. He left one painting unfinished before he died. Miller keeps it in its study.
The painting is full of life. A waterfall flows into a lake, ducks swim around and pink flowers on trees are in full bloom. A rainbow cascades over a mountain.
“He wanted to be an artist. He is an artist.”
The San Antonio Report’s military and veterans coverage is supported by Report for America.
