Suicide rates among U.S. veterans remain elevated despite expanded prevention initiatives and advances in clinical care. Research has identified important proximal risk processes, including perceived burdensomeness, thwarted belongingness, moral injury, and psychological pain. However, less attention has been given to the broader identity reorganization that occurs during the transition from military to civilian life. This conceptual review examines post-service identity disruption as a contextual vulnerability associated with suicide risk among military veterans. Military service is conceptualized as a highly structured institutional identity system characterized by role clarity, cohesion, mission orientation, and reinforced contribution. Separation from this system may involve the loss of stable identity anchors, social belonging, and recognized purpose; particularly when civilian reintegration does not provide parallel structures of meaning and role continuity. Drawing on interdisciplinary scholarship in veterans studies, psychology, and reintegration research, this review synthesizes literature on role loss, social disconnection, moral injury, and chronic pain as interacting factors that may destabilize identity during the post-service period. Implications are discussed for veteran-centered clinical practice, transition programming, and community-based supports. Situating suicide vulnerability within processes of post-service identity reorganization may enhance conceptual clarity, inform prevention strategies, and strengthen interdisciplinary dialogue within veterans studies.
Élison Silva Santos (Thu,) studied this question.