Description
Emerging evidence reveals elevated suicide rates amongst women veterans, particularly those involuntarily discharged for medical reasons. This paper examines the institutional structures and processes that produce these devastating wellbeing outcomes, arguing that military organisations systematically create identity injury through institutional betrayal following gendered violence. Drawing from qualitative research with Australian women veterans as an illustrative case with international applicability, this analysis reveals a consistent pattern whereby women who join with high aspirations, serve with distinction, experience institutional abuse, and are subsequently discharged as psychologically unfit—a process that pathologises victims whilst obscuring institutional culpability. Identity injury—profound damage to sense of self through institutional betrayal—differs fundamentally from moral injury's focus on ethical violations. When military institutions fail to protect women from violence, deny appropriate support, and deploy administrative processes as weapons against victims, they inflict wounds that fragment professional and personal identity. Involuntary medical discharge becomes the final corporeal rejection, whereby the institution that created trauma uses resulting psychological distress as evidence of unfitness. This transforms institutional violence into individual pathology, reaffirming gendered narratives positioning women as incompatible with military service. These institutional processes produce cascading harms extending beyond service: isolation from veteran support structures, barriers to healthcare access, loss of social connection, and compromised mental health. This research demonstrates how military institutional structures systematically produce predictable and preventable harm to women service members, with implications for understanding institutional violence, veteran mental health interventions, and the gendered dynamics of organisational betrayal internationally.
Keywords: Identity injury; Women veterans; Institutional betrayal; Veteran suicide; Wellbeing outcomes; Critical military studies
