Torrance Group Lends Support to Those Left Behind by Gulf Troops

The night after watching a prisoner-of-war report on television, Louisa Tennille-Miles dreamed that she was crouched in a closet, hiding from a threatening man in a long, black, flowing gown.

She was terrified that the man would open the closet door and spot her. And then, she recalls, “right when the hand hit my shoulder, the phone rang.”

It was 3:30 a.m. Tuesday in Torrance, and her only son, Christopher Cognac, 22, was at the other end of the line, calling from a telephone booth in a small town in Saudi Arabia.

As Tennille-Miles told her story Wednesday night, murmurs of recognition swept the group of men and women gathered in a meeting room at Torrance City Hall.

Most of her 40 listeners have ties to the Persian Gulf War: sons, daughters, spouses, fiances and friends who are serving in the area.

Like Tennille-Miles, they too are captive to a roller coaster of emotions: the sleeplessness, the nightmares, the rush of relief when they pick up the telephone and hear a familiar voice from the Persian Gulf.

Wednesday’s gathering was the first meeting of the South Bay Gulf Crisis Support Group, an independent group organized by Tennille-Miles, 42, of Torrance. After notices about the meeting appeared in local newspapers, she began getting calls from others like her--mostly women, mostly mothers, some crying on the telephone.

“The stress is incredible,” said Tennille-Miles, whose son is serving with the Army’s 101st Airborne Division. “We feel so totally helpless. There’s absolutely nothing you can do except sit and wait.”

Tennille-Miles contacted City Councilwoman Dee Hardison, who helped to obtain the City Hall basement aerobics room. And here, with a mirrored wall for a backdrop and surrounded by physiology charts, people sat and talked.

Many wore yellow ribbons on their lapels, sweat shirts or purse handles. One teen-ager attached a yellow bow to her right sneaker. After the formal meeting ended, a number of people lingered to share names and stories.

Shannon Leischner, 16, of Carson spoke with an air of calm maturity. But she worries about how she would learn if something happens to her 19-year-old Army boyfriend, since she is neither a relative nor a spouse.

Laura Mendes, 21, of Torrance married a Marine in August, 1 1/2 days before he left for Saudi Arabia. She plans to attend more support-group meetings.

“It feels like you’re not the only one,” Mendes said. “My friends say, ‘Well, I know how you feel.’ But they don’t know how I feel.”

Others around her nodded.

They talked of being unable to sleep, night after night.

A Redondo Beach woman, whose 19-year-old son is serving with the Army field artillery, said she is mentally coaching herself to sleep by telling herself that nighttime--daytime in California--is the dangerous time in the gulf.

“If anything’s going to happen, it’s going to happen during the day (U.S. time). . . . I’ve told myself, psychologically, I can sleep because it’s light over there. I’ve tried to pass that on.”

Some people keep one clock in the house set to Saudi Arabian time.

Some said they are taping every phone call they get from their relatives in the gulf, so they can play it back, again and again.

One woman is compiling a log, recording every telephone call she gets from her daughter, every letter she sends.

Some cringe when they hear planes overhead.

And they find themselves crying--in the middle of the day, at work, at home.

The next support-group session, a month from now, will be a potluck supper, Tennille-Miles said. The date is not set. Smaller sessions will be hosted by volunteers at their homes. A later meeting could feature a stress-management expert, she said.

Independent support groups such as this one are springing up throughout the Los Angeles area, said Air Force Chief Master Sgt. Jason Young, who attended the meeting. Young, director of the Family Support Center at the Los Angeles Air Force Base in El Segundo, said he is receiving a growing number of inquiries from people seeking to join or form a group.

Much of the meeting was devoted to questions about military procedure, directed to Young and Navy Lt. Cmdr. Steven B. Chesser, public affairs officer at the Long Beach Naval Station.

Members of the audience asked about restrictions on mail, whether troops would get vacations, what would happen if they were wounded, how families back home would find out and the quality of communications in the gulf.

“I just have this horrible hole in my chest that my kid doesn’t know what’s going on,” one woman said.

Her son is “probably better informed than we are,” Young said.

A parent suggested: “My son said Kool-Aid is like gold. And you can slip that in an envelope.”

People are asked not to send food items to the Gulf, Young cautioned, partly because of restrictions on packages. “The (military) food may taste awful--it always does. That doesn’t necessarily mean it doesn’t have the nutritional value that they need.”

He also advised the group to try not to be overly emotional when writing or talking to servicemen: “It’s easier said than done . . . (but) it’s an extra burden. To listen to mom and dad crying on the phone and then do what you have to do--it’s very distracting.”

He urged them: “Keep their spirits up. Liven them up if you can.”

Then Chesser explained how relatives learn about a death, serious injury or someone missing in action. A uniformed officer and a chaplain notify the closest family members in person, he said.

Several relatives later referred to his comments. The image is one from their common nightmare: the uniformed figure at the front door, solemn, waiting.

They lingered afterward in a City Hall lobby.

“My biggest fear is capture,” said Tana Grace of Torrance, whose 25-year-old daughter is in Saudi Arabia. She worries how the Iraqis would treat female prisoners of war. She writes her daughter a letter every day. “I find it hard to find what to write her. I’m running out of things to tell her.”

Abruptly, Grace broke off and looked at the faces around her.

“What are we doing here? This seems like a dream--it’s a nightmare,” she blurted out.

Leischner, 16, stared down at the floor.

“I wish it’d stop,” she said.