Combat Vet With PTSD Booted From Army, Barred From Healthcare

Combat Vet With PTSD Booted From Army, Barred From Healthcare
OPB News
Austin Jenkins
Aug. 11, 2012

SALEM, Ore. – In Salem , a former Army staff sergeant named Jarrid Starks has run out of the medications that keep him stable. He has severe Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and other mental and physical wounds of war. But he’s currently not eligible for veterans’ health benefits that would include prescription refills. That’s because Starks was kicked out of the Army for bad behavior. He’s far from alone.

Jarrid Starks joined the Army right out of high school with dreams of a 20-year career.

He left the Army earlier this year in disgrace. Starks recalls being escorted from the psychiatric ward at Madigan Army Hospital to an out-processing center and then to the front gate of Washington’s Joint Base Lewis-McChord.

“I had a 90-day supply of medication that I received from Madigan in a paper lunch sack,“ he says.

That sack of pills was Stark’s lifeline: a combination of antidepressants, beta-blockers, anti-psychotics, muscle-relaxants and sleep aides. A daily cocktail that allowed Starks to keep his anger and anxiety in check.

He sports a baseball cap that reads, “Warning this vet is medicated for your protection.”

It’s a joke, but not really.

“Ya, in every joke lay a bit of truth," Starks quips.
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