WHAT’S NEW
Mind Beyond the Mission
‘Who am I if not a soldier?’ Exploring creativity, identity and healing after service with Ryan Hawkyard
In a new Mind Beyond the Mission episode, hosts Laryssa Lamrock and Brian McKenna are joined by Ryan Hawkyard, a Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) Veteran with 20 years of service.
Ryan reflects on identity and purpose after leaving the military and how acting and improv supported his recovery following his diagnosis of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). They explore the role of creativity and the arts as pathways to meaning-making in life after military service.
Perspectives
When it’s no longer enough to ‘just survive’
“I had to take responsibility for my own healing. No one forced me to join the military. No one forced me to sign a contract accepting unlimited liability… when I started to shift my thinking, everything began to change. I didn’t just want to survive. I wanted to really live again.”
Moving from survival mode to truly living after a severe PTSD diagnosis is no small task. In a new Perspectives blog post, Dany, a CAF Veteran with 35 years of service, shares his personal experience of living with PTSD and the effort it took to reclaim his life and start really living again. Drawing on his decades of service, lived experience and work in peer support, Dany reflects on his healing journey and the powerful belief that change is possible.
COMMUNITY CORNER
Thank you for attending our fourth annual Veteran Family Summit!
“This space matters. Families are showing up for one another in a way that is brave and deeply human.”
— Fardous Hosseiny, President and CEO, Atlas Institute for Veterans and Families
It was wonderful to connect with members of the Veteran Family community at this year’s Veteran Family Summit, offering another powerful opportunity to continue supporting healing, growth and connection. Participants explored powerful topics including peer support, overcoming grief, self-love and innovative approaches to trauma recovery. The summit highlighted the evolving landscape of support available to Veteran Families and reinforced the importance of creating spaces that foster hope, healing and new possibilities.
If you were unable to attend the live event, or if you would like to revisit specific sessions, full summit recordings are now available on our event webpage. Look out too in the coming months for our report summarizing the highlights of the summit, including what we heard from attendees and key takeaways from each session.
As the summit grows each year, we look forward to continuing to create a space for the voices that matter most — people with lived experience. See you in 2027!
EVENTS AND TRAINING
February 25, 2026 — Community Mental Health and Wellness Exposition in North Bay, ON
Atlas is honoured to have been invited to the ninth annual Community Mental Health and Wellness Exposition, which will be held on February 25, 2026 at 22 Wing, Canadian Forces Base North Bay. This event is designed to bring mental health supports directly to the people who serve and have served, and the Families who support them.
By bringing together military leadership, community organizations and trusted service providers, the Expo creates opportunities for Veterans, active service members and their Families to learn about resources, ask questions and make connections that can strengthen well-being. Atlas will have a booth with resources for Veterans, their Families and the service providers who work with them. Come say hello!
SELF-PACED TRAINING
Managing problematic anger
Trauma-exposed professionals training
FEATURED RESOURCE
Peer support program directory
“Peer support turns our shared struggles into a collective strength and our shared journeys make us stronger together.”
— Howie Johnson, Veteran and peer supporter
“You truly are not alone and we will walk this journey with you. Holding space, with compassion, empathy, lived experience, together finding our community.”
— Danielle Kelly, Veteran Family member and peer supporter
Peer support can be a powerful tool in a person’s healing journey, providing a space for community, connection and the sharing of common experiences with other people who understand what you are going through.
Whether you are navigating life with a posttraumatic stress injury, experiencing grief due to the loss of someone you care about or looking for support during transition or retirement, peer support can be helpful for these and many other concerns, either on its own or alongside other supports.
Explore our interactive directory and map to see some of the peer support programs and services that are available for Veterans and Veteran Families across Canada. This peer support program directory can be filtered by location, topic, format, cost and more. The data used to create this resource was collected by the Canadian Institute for Public Safety Research and Treatment (CIPSRT) and shared with the Atlas Institute.
Interested in more information and resources on peer support?
RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS
New publication
Bridging the self to the world: Resting-state functional connectivity of the temporoparietal junction in PTSD and its dissociative subtype
A research article titled Bridging the self to the world: Resting-state functional connectivity of the temporoparietal junction in posttraumatic stress disorder and its dissociative subtype, co-authored by Dr. Andrew Nicholson, Vice-President, Research at Atlas, was recently published in NeuroImage: Clinical. This research explored functional connectivity in PTSD and its dissociative subtype.
This study:
- Was the first of its kind to examine how communication patterns in a key brain region involved in attention and self-awareness differ between people with PTSD (including a dissociative subtype) and individuals without trauma-related conditions.
- Helped clarify the role of this brain region in how people experience their sense of self in relation to their body and surroundings, and how disruptions in this system may contribute to difficulties with attention, emotion regulation and social understanding following trauma.
These findings may have implications for psychotherapeutic treatments targeting disembodiment and altered social cognition.
PARTNERSHIP AND STAKEHOLDER SPOTLIGHT
Mental health dialogue sessions for RCMP Veterans
Over the past 10 months, Atlas hosted two in-person and four virtual dialogue sessions to hear directly from Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) Veterans and Families about their needs and perspectives relating to mental health. We had the opportunity to meet and connect with more than 50 RCMP Veterans and Family members from across Canada.
We have begun to review and summarize these critical insights into a publicly available report that will be released later this year. In addition, we will share about the process and findings at the 2026 Canadian Institute for Public Safety Research and Treatment (CIPSRT) Conference in Calgary, AB on May 5–6. Stay tuned!
COMMEMORATIONS CALENDAR
| February | Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) Awareness Month |
| February 1 | RCMP Appreciation Day |
We want to hear from you!
What did you think of this newsletter? Are you a Veteran or Family member with a story to tell? Get in touch with us!
Get more updates
Join our mailing list to receive this monthly newsletter and regular updates about Veteran and Family mental health from the Atlas Institute for Veterans and Families.
