WASHINGTON (AP) The highly decorated special forces soldier who killed himself in a Cybertruck explosion on New Year's Day told a former girlfriend who had served as an Army nurse that he was suffering severe pain and exhaustion, which she said were the main symptoms of brain trauma. injury.
Green Beret Matthew Livelsberger, 37, was awarded the Bronze Star five times, including once with a V for bravery under fire. He had an exemplary military background that spanned the globe and a new baby was born last year. But he had to deal with the mental and physical consequences of his service, which forced him to kill and led him to witness the deaths of his fellow soldiers.
Livelsberger has mostly borne this burden privately, but recently sought treatment for depression from the military, according to a U.S. official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to provide details that have not been made public.
He also found a confidante in the former nurse, whom he started dating in 2018.
Alicia Arritt, 39, and Livelsberger met through a dating app while they were both in Colorado Springs. Arritt had served at Landstul Regional Medical Center in Germany, the largest U.S. military medical center in Europe, where many of the worst combat wounds in Iraq and Afghanistan were initially treated before being flown to the United States .
There, she saw and treated traumatic brain injuries, or TBIs, that soldiers suffered from gunfire and roadside bombs. Serious but difficult to diagnose, these injuries can have lingering effects that may take years to manifest.
I saw a lot of serious injuries. But personality changes can come later, Arritt said.
In the texts and images he shared with Arritt, Livelsberger lifted the veil a little on what he was facing.
Just a few concussions, he said in a text about a deployment to Afghanistan's Helmand province. He sent her a photo of a graphic tattoo he got on his arm, depicting two skulls pierced by bullets to mark the lives he took in Afghanistan. He spoke of exhaustion and pain, of not being able to sleep and reliving the violence of his deployment.
My life has been personal hell the last year, he told Arritt early in their relationship, according to text messages she provided to the AP. It's refreshing to have such a kind person among us.
On Friday, Las Vegas law enforcement released excerpts of messages left by Livelsberger showing that the manner in which Livelsberger killed himself was intentional, intended both as a wake-up call but also to cleanse the demons that he was faced with losing comrades and taking lives.
Livelsberger's death outside the Trump hotel using a truck produced by Elon Musk's Tesla company raised questions about whether it was an act of political violence.
Officials said Friday that Livelsberger apparently had no ill will toward President-elect Donald Trump, and Arritt said she and Livelsberger were Tesla fans.
I also had a Tesla that I saved from a junkyard in 2019, and we used to work on it together, bonding, Arritt said.
The couple stopped speaking regularly after their breakup in 2021, and she hadn't heard from him for over two years when he texted her out of the blue on December 28 and again on the 31st. December. The upbeat messages included a video of him driving. the Cybertruck and another of its dancing headlights; the vehicle can synchronize its lighting and music.
But she also said that Livelsberger felt things very deeply and I could see him using the symbolism of both the truck and the hotel.
He wasn't impulsive, Arritt said. I don't see him doing this impulsively, so I suspect he was probably thinking about it.
Arritt served on active duty from 2003 to 2007, then was in the Army Reserves until 2011. Along with Livelsberger, she noticed symptoms of TBI as early as 2018.
He was going through periods of withdrawal and struggled with depression and memory loss, Arritt said.
I don't know what made him do this, but I think the military didn't give him help when he needed it.
But Livelsberger was also gentle and kind, she recalled: He had a very deep inner strength and character, and he just had a lot of integrity.
Pentagon deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh told reporters Friday that she had turned over all of Livelsberger's medical records to local law enforcement and encouraged soldiers facing mental health issues to seek treatment from through one of the Army's support networks.
If you need help, feel like you need to seek any type of mental health treatment, or simply talk to someone to research what services are available, whether on base or off outside, Singh said.
When Livelsberger struggled during their relationship, Arritt pushed him to get help. But he didn't, saying it could cost him his ability to deploy if he was deemed medically unfit.
There was a lot of stigma in his unit, they were, you know, big, strong special forces guys there, no weaknesses were allowed and mental health is a weakness, that's what they had seen, she said.
Livelsberger seeking treatment for depression was first reported by CNN.
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Associated Press writer Rio Yamat in Las Vegas contributed.
