Guest essay
“He Did his Job. It Took a Toll on Him and His Family.”
Billie Kubly
Two close friends and MCW/Marquette School of Medicine alumni were drafted to serve their country during the Vietnam War. Orthopaedic surgeon Michael Kubly, MD, was sent to Vietnam. Fuller McBride, MD, an OB/Gyn, was assigned to a stateside military hospital.
Billie Kubly, the widow of Mike Kubly, MD, remembers the experience of her husband being sent overseas and how his time working in the war zone changed him...
Our family holds Veterans in high regard. My father was in World War I, and my three brothers-in-law served in World War II. My husband, Mike Kubly, was drafted for the Vietnam War in January of 1966.
Mike had just started his first year of orthopaedic surgery residency in Milwaukee working with Drs. Walter P. Blount and Albert C. Schmidt; one of the best programs in the country. At the time, we had four children. The youngest was two; the oldest was seven. We had just moved back from Atlanta, where Mike had completed his internship.
Being drafted and sent to Vietnam
I opened his orders when they came to our house. I read San Francisco and was so excited. When Mike read them, he said, “No, Billie. I am flying out from SF for VN (Vietnam).” He had to resign from his orthopaedics residency and worked in an emergency department until June, when he reported for duty as a Captain in the Army.
We went to San Antonio for six weeks of basic training, then drove back to Wisconsin. My father-in-law wanted me to move back to Monroe, where both of us were from. My mother had lots of medical problems. Her doctors thought my four children might be too much for her, so I moved in with my in-laws.
We met the McBrides in Chicago for two last nights on the town before our guys reported to duty.
I remember Mike telling me that it was hard getting used to prioritizing treatment on the wounded Soldiers that had the best chance of making it. It was just the opposite of working in the ER at the County Hospital, as he had done in medical school.
Returning home
When I met Mike in Chicago upon his return, I did not see a change in him until we moved to Fort Gordon in Augusta, GA for his second year in the Army. At Fort Gordon, he saw many of the patients he had treated in Vietnam, since that was one of the Army Ortho hospitals.
Mike felt the anger of the public; being spat upon, the lack of support and respect. That was such a disappointment after giving his all for our Soldiers and seeing what our Soldiers sacrificed. Performing so many amputations took a toll on him.
After the service, we returned to Milwaukee for Mike to finish his residency. He was recruited by the two best offices in town, Blount and Schmidt. He chose Schmidt. And so, we settled in, and Mike gave his all to Medicine with anger still lurking behind his outgoing, funny personality.
Mike and I both loved reading about World War II, but not Vietnam. It was too painful for him. The pain and anger were there underneath the surface for all those years. He talked about the experience often with our friends who had never served, and they appreciated that. But he never discussed it with our children.
Returning to Vietnam decades later
When we were in our 70s, we travelled to Vietnam. We visited where he had been stationed but, by then, the town had grown so much that he had a hard time finding the streets that he had once known so well. He had also taken care of a leper colony that had been run by the French nuns. He had loved the meals they cooked for the doctors. While we were there, they told us that the last of the nuns had died, and the government had taken it over.
He was nervous that the Vietnamese people would not like us, but that wasn’t the case. He was happy to see how prosperous the country was with beautiful resorts springing up, which many Europeans were enjoying.
We travelled from Hanoi south to Saigon (now known as Ho Chi Minh City). The guide on the bus in Saigon kept telling us that they were “the good Communists. Not like Cuba.” The Museum was painful to go through with the pictures of those who had helped Americans hanging on to the American planes as they took off for the US. That had been their only hope of freedom at the time.
Seeing the country and knowing that they did not hate Americans made Mike more comfortable. He lost lots of his anger after that, but never could decide if America should have gone to war. He did his job. It took its toll on him and on his family.
The summer before he died at 82, I said to him, “Mike, I think you had PTSD, undiagnosed.”
And he responded, “I think you might be right.”
Michael and Billie Kubly received honorary doctorates from the Medical College of Wisconsin in 2016 for their philanthropic work. In addition to their private donations in support of mental health-related projects and research at MCW, Marquette University, and Rogers Behavioral Health, the couple founded the Charles E. Kubly Foundation, a public charity committed to suicide prevention and improving the lives of those affected by depression, after their youngest son, Charlie, died from suicide at age 28 following a lengthy battle with depression. Through the generous support of donors, the foundation funds quality mental health projects that aim to reduce suicide and the stigma associated with depression and provides education and resource information.
