Daniel Somers  Daniel Somers (14 January 1983 – 10 June 2013) was an American soldier who committed suicide in 2013. He had been suffering from various health problems, including posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and left a suicide note that was later published on Gawker, after which it went viral. Daniel Somers was the son of a physician and a health-care administrator. He married Angeline Roth, his former high school sweetheart, in 2001. (Angeline's mother was also a medical doctor - a psychiatrist.) The couple had no children. Somers enlisted in the National Guard in 2003. According to his father, Howard Somers, Daniel hadn't considered that the National Guard could be federalized. One year later he was deployed to Iraq as part of the Tactical Human Intelligence Team. In Operation Iraqi Freedom he served over 400 combat missions. He was eligible for two Purple Heart medals by the end of his second combat tour, but he declined them, saying he didn't think his combat injuries were severe enough to merit them. By 2008, a year after the end of his second deployment, he had been diagnosed with PTSD, traumatic brain injury (suffered in combat), fibromyalgia, and a host of other medical problems. After returning from the war in 2007, Somers founded a band in the Phoenix area called Lisa Savige. He served as guitarist, vocalist, songwriter, and bandleader for the group. Lisa Savige performed at various live events in the US Southwest and on KWSS-LP, the independent radio station in Phoenix, frequently donating its proceeds to benefit people wounded in the Middle East. Lisa Savidge disbanded in 2011. Somers sent a letter to the VA in October 2011, describing his symptoms as worsening in several ways, including nightly panic attacks and auditory hallucinations. In that letter, he said his situation "drives me to consider suicide very seriously on a daily basis." On June 10, 2013, Somers died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head at the age of 30 in Phoenix, Arizona. Daniel Somers left a suicide note that was described by one journalist as "devastating in its eloquence." According to his suicide note, feeling deeply troubled by his involvement in the Iraq War and a lack of post-combat support from the US government were two primary reasons behind choosing to kill himself:  Three weeks after her husband's death, Angel Somers was notified by the Phoenix VA that her husband's claim for full disability benefits had been approved retroactively to 2008. Musicians in the Phoenix area organized a tribute concert for him on August 24, 2013.