PTSD Iraq Veteran Gets Job Back, After News Report

Veteran with stress disorder back on the job
Houston Chronicle
By L.M. Sixel
September 9, 2014

Xavier Watt, the Iraq war veteran with post-traumatic stress disorder who was profiled in a Houston Chronicle story on Sunday, was allowed to return to his job at SunEdison in Pasadena on Tuesday.

He hadn't been working for six months because officials at the manufacturing plant believed Watt's PTSD posed a danger to himself or to others.

"I was elated," said Watt, describing his emotions when he walked back through the gates after getting clearance from the company doctor Tuesday after passing a battery of fit-to-work tests. "I got so many hugs and handshakes, and there were so many smiling people. I felt like I was home."

Watt, an instrument and electrical technician, had not been permitted to return since he backed away from a tense workplace conversation in March. Watt received permission to take a day of vacation and stopped at the nurse's office on his way out of the plant.

An ensuing conversation about his PTSD set off alarm bells, and Watt had to go through a battery of psychiatric visits and lengthy inpatient treatment at the Veterans Affairs hospital to prove he was neither a danger to himself or to others if he returned to work.

On Monday, Sun Edison's doctor cleared Watt to return to work, a day after Watt's story was featured in the Chronicle, United Steel Workers Local 6000 President Debbie McDonald said. Watt also has filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
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