Veterans face daily challenges

Veterans face daily challenges
By Bernie Delinski
Staff Writer
Last Updated:November 11. 2007 11:46PM
To this day, James Hogan has trouble talking about the horrors he witnessed in the Vietnam War.
The Florence resident remembers an explosion that literally blew a fellow soldier's head into Hogan's face and mouth."You taste it," he said. "I still taste the blood. I can taste it from now on."He still suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder and has undergone numerous surgeries from cancers that are believed to have been caused by the military's spreading of Agent Orange during the war.
Trying to ease the conversation about his physical trials with humor, he remarks that "they get a little bit of me each year."But emotionally, Hogan wonders whether he'll ever fully be put back together. "How do you wipe something out of your mind when you constantly are having cancer removed because of it? You can't," he said.Many of the nearly 24 million U.S. veterans suffer from physical or mental problems related to their time in the service.
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