Army counselors in short supply in war zones

Army counselors in short supply in war zones

By Gregg Zoroya - USA Today
Posted : Wednesday Apr 2, 2008 7:15:22 EDT

WASHINGTON — Soldiers in hard-to-reach outposts in Iraq and Afghanistan lack timely access to mental health care, according to Pentagon officials and a recent survey. The problem comes as the Army is struggling to hire enough professionals to counsel its troops.

About one-third of soldiers in these areas say they can’t see a counselor when they need to, according to results of a survey conducted last year and released last month.

In Iraq, mental health professionals must travel in armed convoys to reach troops stationed in embattled neighborhoods. In Afghanistan, it can take an average of 40 hours for a psychologist to visit soldiers, the Army study says.

The Army surveyed 3,168 soldiers in its study. Today, there are 157,000 soldiers in Iraq and 31,000 in Afghanistan. As part of President Bush’s troop escalation in Iraq last year, many soldiers were moved to isolated outposts.

“They [mental health counselors] can’t be in every place at the same time,” says Lt. Col. Sharon McBride, an Army psychologist and researcher.

When counselors reach combat troops, they make a difference, says Lt. Col. Jim Carter, chaplain for the 4th Infantry Division in Iraq. In four months, the division has suffered only one suicide, he says. Last year, the Army reported a record number of suicides.

The Army, recognizing the need for more counseling, said nine months ago that it would hire 200 additional mental health professionals by May. It later raised the number to 288, about a 25 percent increase in staff. So far, 158 slots are filled.

Army Capt. Bryan Shea, 41, of Canton, N.Y., is a reservist and psychologist with a state psychiatric facility. He will soon go to Iraq for a third deployment.

Shea says he is eager to help soldiers, but that deployments have shattered his personal life. He says he is in the midst of a bitter divorce and that he lost custody of his two daughters, ages 10 and 15, because of his deployment.

“They got to keep recycling those of us who are in, and it gets tiring pretty fast,” says Shea, whose offer to resign from the Army has not been accepted.

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http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/04/gns_army_counselors_040108/

Endglewood Florida has three heroes today

Two pull man from flaming car while third follows a suspect

By Kate Spinner
Published Wednesday, April 2, 2008 at 4:30 a.m.

ENGLEWOOD — Witnesses to a fatal crash on South McCall Road on Monday immediately jumped into the roles of rescue workers and law enforcement, resulting in the arrest of a man now charged with manslaughter, drunken driving and fleeing the scene of an accident.

William Tyson, 77, of Englewood died in the wreck on Monday, but not before Michael McCurry, 22, and Jeff Holland, 19 pulled him out of his burning car.

The accident occurred about 1:05 p.m. -- when Tyson steered his Crown Victoria into the right, westbound land of South McCall Road, near the intersection of Ibis Drive. Behind him, William Solomon, 43, was driving a Ford Taurus at high speed and switching lanes, according to a Florida Highway Patrol report.

Solomon slammed on the brakes, leaving skid marks in the roadway and crashing into Tyson's car. The impact was so powerful that Tyson was thrown into the back seat and a streak of fire followed the car, igniting it before it hit a power pole, according to an account by McCurry.

Meanwhile, McCurry and Holland, who had stopped at the nearby Citgo to buy drinks before heading to Englewood Beach, saw Solomon flee, leaving behind his seriously injured passenger, Monica Brown, 47, of North Port, according to the FHP.

McCurry and Holland also noticed that the driver of the burning car was not getting out. They rushed to the car and pulled Tyson from the back seat just as emergency crews arrived.

Tyson later died at Englewood Community Hospital.

Meanwhile, a woman that witnesses said was in her late 50s or early 60s had followed Solomon and used a borrowed cell phone to report that he had entered Oscar's Pizza.

"I'm really thankful that she actually did that," McCurry said, appalled that Solomon left his passenger alone beside a burning car.


go here for the rest
http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20080402/NEWS/804020322/1018/news02

Wal-Mart sued for not giving job back to Airman

Business briefs

Published Wednesday, April 2, 2008 at 4:30 a.m.

ORLANDO

Wal-Mart sued over former airman

The Department of Justice has sued Wal-Mart Stores on behalf of a former airman, claiming the company did not give him his job back after he was discharged from the military. The lawsuit on behalf of Sean Thornton, a former airman with the U.S. Air Force, alleges Wal-Mart violated the Uniformed Services Employment and Re-employment Rights Act of 1994 by failing to reinstate him as a cashier at an Orange City store after he was discharged. The Justice Department filed the suit in U.S. District Court in Orlando.
http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20080402/BUSINESS/804020315/1537

They did the wrong thing here.

They did the wrong thing here too but pubic pressure got them to do the right thing this time.

Wal-Mart Drops Fight Against Woman
Posted: Wednesday 04/02/08 07:18 AM EDT
Filed Under: Business News, Nation News
'They DidThe Right Thing'
1 of 6
Reversing itself, Wal-Mart has given up its fight against Debbie Shank, a former employee who suffered severe brain damage after a traffic accident. Shank, 52, received about $470,000 from the retailer's health plan for medical expenses, and the the company had sued to get the payout back after she won money in a settlement.

Maj. Gen. Robert Scales Jr:U.S. has “run out of military options”

U.S. must leave Iraq, retired generals say

By Rick Maze - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday Apr 2, 2008 13:53:39 EDT

Setting a withdrawal timetable from Iraq might be a shaky strategic move, but it would provide a morale boost for service members and their families, a former Army War College commandant said Wednesday.

Retired Army Maj. Gen. Robert Scales Jr., testifying before the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee about U.S. military strategy in Iraq, said he has no doubt that a major withdrawal of combat forces is coming because the U.S. has “run out of military options” and cannot indefinitely sustain troop levels.

“Regardless of who wins the election and regardless of conditions on the ground, by summer the troops will begin to come home,” said Scales, who headed the war college in 1997. “The only point of contention is how precipitous will be the withdrawal and whether the schedule of withdrawal should be a matter of administration policy.”

Scales testified along with two other retired Army generals, Gen. Barry McCaffrey and Lt. Gen. William Odom, who also agreed a withdrawal of U.S. combat troops early in the next president’s administration is inevitable.

“We face a deteriorating political situation with an over-extended Army,” said Odom, who served as director of the National Security Agency in the Reagan administration.

“The only sensible strategy is to withdraw rapidly but in good order,” Odom said. “Only that step can break the paralysis now gripping U.S. strategy in the region.”

McCaffrey, a former chief of U.S. Southern Command and commander of the 24th Infantry Division in the 1991 Gulf War, predicted a withdrawal of U.S. forces within three years or less because there is “no U.S. political will to continue” and because allies “have abandoned us.”

“It is over,” McCaffrey said.
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http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/04/military_iraqwithdrawal_040208w/

Veterans for Common Sense:VA fails at PTSD care

VA fails at PTSD care, lawsuit charges

By Kelly Kennedy - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday Apr 2, 2008 14:06:14 EDT

Veterans for Common Sense is suing the Department of Veterans Affairs because, the group says, VA is so thoroughly bogged down with a backlog of 600,000 benefits claims that Iraq and Afghanistan veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder are not receiving the care they need.

The trial begins April 21 in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.

The lawsuit, which names VA Secretary Dr. James Peake as defendant, — is a class action filed by a large group of veterans who allege “a system-wide breakdown” in the way the government treats veterans with PTSD. They say several suicidal veterans have unsuccessfully sought VA mental health care.

Representatives from veterans service organizations, VA and mental health experts are expected to testify.

According to Gordon Erspamer, an attorney representing the veterans pro bono, the lawsuit challenges a backlog in handling claims, “appellate delays of five to 10 years” for disability ratings, waiting lists and the “inadequacy of VA care for PTSD.”

The suit asks for immediate medical help, as well as screening for suicidal thoughts, for troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan.
go here for the rest
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/04/military_veteransaffairs_lawsuit_040208w/

PTSD mind, body and spirit connection

PTSD and Older VeteransFrom the time of Homer's ancient story of the battle between the Trojans and the Greeks, and the times of the Bible and Shakespeare, military personnel have been confronted by the trauma of war. Recent books and movies have highlighted the impact of war trauma on veterans of the Vietnam War and the Persian Gulf War. However, the traumas faced by veterans of World War II and the Korean conflict have been publicly acknowledged in the media less often and less clearly. The recent movie, "Saving Private Ryan," showed the reality of war trauma during World War II. World War II was terrifying and shocking for hundreds of thousands of American military personnel. For most World War II veterans, memories of the war can still be upsetting more than 50 years later, even if the memories arise only occasionally and for brief periods. For a smaller number of World War II veterans, the war trauma memories still cause severe problems, in the form of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, or PTSD.

(UPDATE, the link was updated January 2020)


Each of them go into combat with their past life in their minds. They know the mistakes they've made, sins committed, people they've hurt, words they said and regret. In other words like the rest of us, they have baggage. They may have joined from the most noblest of reasons, defending the nation, or for a combination of that along with selfish reasons of paying for college. Each one enters in with their own purpose and at different levels. I happen to think they were born heroes and would have done something for society no matter what they chose to do with their lives.

They train to kill and in the back of their minds they think it's wrong to kill. This quiet voice is hushed in training and focusing on moment. It reawakens when they are putting their training to use and have to kill someone or come into contact after or even when they see one of their friends killed.

Trauma strikes people. For victims the wound does not cut as deep it seems. For emergency responders, it cuts a bit deeper because they come into contact with traumatic situations often. For police officers, it cuts even deeper because they are participants in it doing their job and are often in a situation where they have to kill someone. For the combat forces, it cuts even deeper than all the others because they participate in it more often.

When a bomb blows up and they survive, they either survive thinking God spared their lives or God judged them for their lives and this was punishment. They may believe that God abandoned them because of what they had done in their lives or judged them because they just killed someone.

Depending on the relationship the warrior has with God and the knowledge of how He forgives, this will predict if the baggage they carry will awaken or remain asleep. What most people do not understand is that war and the traumas of war were in the Bible and throughout recorded history. War is not murder and God did not condemn the warrior. Neither did Christ. When the Roman Centurion went to Christ seeking to have his slave cured, a slave he loved, the Roman was filled with so much faith that Christ could do it, he told Christ he didn't have to go to his house in order to heal his slave. Christ, knowing the Romans were responsible for the hardships on the Hebrews and knowing they would nail Him to the Cross, healed the slave and blessed the Centurion for his faith in Him. Those who know they are forgiven for all they have done wrong, will usually leave the trauma behind them in enough of an amount they do not feel as if it has penetrated their soul. They thank God for watching over them.

For those who do not understand, most of the time they feel God either hates them and they are paying the price with the ravages of what they lived through taking over their mind or God abandoned them and they are on their own.

This is one of the biggest reasons why the healing is so much stronger when the connection between mind/body/spirit are all treated at the same time. Mind is helped by talk therapy and medication. Body is helped with exercises that do not require aggression for most, but for some they find it helps to do something like weight training. Spirit is helped when they speak to others of their faith or a spiritual counselor. Usually with a member of the clergy or a Chaplain with a strong understanding of the spiritual needs of all people. They must be non-judgmental, which is hard for a lot of members of the clergy. Chaplains get into this because they are under no church authority and are allowed to take care of the spiritual needs of all people no matter what faith they have or if they have no faith at all. Most of the time it is the act of human kindness that goes a long way in healing the spirit.

If they feel they have been abandoned by God and then by their country, this cuts the wound even deeper. Not having someone to help them as they see their lives fall apart, cuts even deeper. By they time this happens, they are seeking someone to show some compassion for them and find it very hard to receive. Now think of what it would have been like for them to go through trauma in combat and then have the ability to debrief like police and first responders do with Chaplains. How deep do you think the wound would cut if this happened?

Read the rest from the center.

Chaplain Kathie Costos
Namguardianangel@aol.com
http://www.namguardianangel.org/
http://www.namguardianangel.blogspot.com/
http://www.woundedtimes.blogspot.com/



"The willingness with which our young people are likely to serve in any war, no matter how justified, shall be directly proportional to how they perceive veterans of early wars were treated and appreciated by our nation."

- George Washington

How does war affect "normal," "healthy" military personnel?
War is a life threatening experience that involves witnessing and engaging in terrifying and gruesome acts of violence. Most military personnel also feel that participating in war is their patriotic duty, and they do so to protect and defend their country, their loved ones, their values, and their way of life. The trauma of war is the shocking confrontation with death, devastation, and violence. It is normal for human beings to react to war's psychic trauma with feelings of fear, anger, grief, and horror, as well as with emotional numbness and disbelief.

Many studies have shown that the more prolonged, extensive, and horrifying a soldier's or sailor's exposure to war trauma, the more likely it is that she or he will become emotionally worn down and exhausted. This happens to even the strongest and healthiest of individuals, and often it is precisely these soldiers who are the most psychologically disturbed by war because they endure so much of the trauma. Most war heroes don't feel brave or heroic at the time, but they do their duty, despite often feeling overwhelmed and horrified, in order to protect others.

It is, therefore, no surprise that when military personnel have had severe difficulty recovering from the trauma of war, their psychological difficulties have been described as "soldier's heart" (in the Civil War), "shell shock" (in World War I), or "combat fatigue" (in World War II). After World War II, psychiatrists realized that these problems usually were not an inborn mental illness like schizophrenia or manic depressive illness but were a different form of psychological dis-ease that resulted from too much exposure to war trauma. This form of psychological dis-ease is known as "traumatic war neurosis" or Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Although most war veterans are troubled by war memories, many were fortunate enough either to have not experienced an overwhelming amount of trauma exposure or to have immediate and lasting help from family, friends, and spiritual and psychological counselors so that the memories have become manageable. A smaller number, probably about one in twenty World War II veterans, had so much war trauma and so many readjustment difficulties that they now suffer from PTSD.

How is it possible to have PTSD 50 years after a war?Because most World War II veterans received a hero's welcome and a booming peacetime economy when they returned to the states, many were able to make a successful readjustment to civilian life. They coped, more or less successfully, with their memories of traumatic events. Many had disturbing memories or nightmares, difficulty with work pressure or close relationships, and problems with anger or nervousness, but few sought treatment for their symptoms or discussed the emotional effects of their wartime experiences. Society expected them to put it all behind them, forget the war, and get on with their lives. But as they grew older and went through changes in the patterns of their lives-retirement, the death of spouse and friends, deteriorating health, and declining physical vigor-many experienced more difficulty with war memories or stress reactions. Some had enough trouble to be diagnosed with a delayed onset of PTSD symptoms, sometimes with other disorders like depression and alcohol abuse. Such PTSD often occurs in subtle ways. For example, a World War II veteran who had a long successful career as an attorney and judge and a loving relationship with his wife and family might find upon retiring and having a heart attack that he suddenly felt panicky and trapped when going out in public. Upon closer examination, with a sensitive helpful counselor, he might find that the fear is worst when riding in his car, and this may relate to trauma memories of deaths among his unit when he was a tank commander in World War II.

How can I help an older military veteran who may have PTSD?First, if one feels emotional about past memories or experiences some of the normal changes associated with growing older (such as sleep disturbances, concentration problems, or memory impairment), it does not necessarily mean that person has PTSD. If a World War II or Korean conflict veteran finds it important, but emotionally difficult, to remember and talk about war memories, help him or her by being a good listener, or help find a friend or counselor who can be a good listener.

Second, get information about war trauma and PTSD. The Department of Veterans Affairs' Vet Centers and Medical Center PTSD Teams offer education for veterans and families, and they can provide an in-depth psychological assessment and specialized therapy if a veteran has PTSD. Books such as Aphrodite Matsakis' I Can't Get Over It (Oakland: New Harbinger, 1992) and Patience Mason's Home from the War (High Springs, Florida: Patience Press, 1998) describe PTSD for veterans of all ages and other trauma survivors and PTSD's effect on the family.

Third, learn about the specialized therapies available at Vet Centers and VA Medical Centers. These include medications to help with sleep, bad memories, anxiety, and depression; stress and anger management classes; counseling groups for PTSD and grief (some particularly designed to bring together older war veterans to support one another in healing from war trauma or prisoner of war experiences); and individual counseling. It is important that family members be involved in the veteran's care and in their own individual care.

This fact sheet was based on:
Bonwick, R.J., & Morris, P.L.P. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in elderly war veterans. International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry 11, 1071-1076.

Hyer, L., Summers, M.N., Braswell, L., & Boyd, S. (1995). Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: Silent problem among older combat veterans. Psychotherapy 32(2), 348-364.

Schnurr, P.P. (1991).PTSD and Combat-Related Psychiatric Symptoms in Older Veterans. PTSD Research Quarterly 2(1), 1-6.

Snell, F.I. & Padin-Rivera, E. (1997). Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and the elderly combat veteran. Journal of Gerontological Nursing 23(10), 13-19.
http://www.ncptsd.va.gov/ncmain/ncdocs/fact_shts/fs_older_veterans.html

Rapists in the Ranks

Rapists in the Ranks

By Jane Harman , Los Angeles Times. Posted April 2, 2008.

Women in the U.S. military are more likely to be raped by a fellow soldier than killed by enemy fire. When will Congress and the DOD take notice?

The stories are shocking in their simplicity and brutality: A female military recruit is pinned down at knifepoint and raped repeatedly in her own barracks. Her attackers hid their faces but she identified them by their uniforms; they were her fellow soldiers. During a routine gynecological exam, a female soldier is attacked and raped by her military physician. Yet another young soldier, still adapting to life in a war zone, is raped by her commanding officer. Afraid for her standing in her unit, she feels she has nowhere to turn.

These are true stories, and, sadly, not isolated incidents. Women serving in the U.S. military are more likely to be raped by a fellow soldier than killed by enemy fire in Iraq.

The scope of the problem was brought into acute focus for me during a visit to the West Los Angeles VA Healthcare Center, where I met with female veterans and their doctors. My jaw dropped when the doctors told me that 41% of female veterans seen at the clinic say they were victims of sexual assault while in the military, and 29% report being raped during their military service. They spoke of their continued terror, feelings of helplessness and the downward spirals many of their lives have since taken.

Numbers reported by the Department of Defense show a sickening pattern. In 2006, 2,947 sexual assaults were reported -- 73% more than in 2004. The DOD's newest report, released this month, indicates that 2,688 reports were made in 2007, but a recent shift from calendar-year reporting to fiscal-year reporting makes comparisons with data from previous years much more difficult.
go here for the rest
http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/80995/

The men who do this are twisted but the ones who do nothing about it are worse. How could any man not put their sister in arms in an equal place as their own mother or their own sister or their own wife?

House Speaker will listen to veterans

Veterans will get face time with Pelosi
Last update: April 1, 2008 - 10:39 PM
WASHINGTON - House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will meet with Minnesota veterans in the Twin Cities this month to discuss veterans' legislation, her office announced Tuesday.

Pelosi, D-Calif., accepted an invitation from freshman Rep. Tim Walz, D-Minn., a 24-year veteran of the Army National Guard and a member of the House Veterans' Affairs Committee.

go here for the rest
http://www.startribune.com/politics/state/17208296.html

Retsil Program Turning Homelessness to Hope

Retsil Program Turning Homelessness to Hope
By Chris Henry (Contact)
Tuesday, April 1, 2008

RETSIL

Evins Wilkerson, a Vietnam veteran, had a good job as mental health counselor in Oregon when he went into the Seattle Veterans Affairs Hospital for a medical procedure.

Wilkerson, 57, expected to be out of commission about two weeks, but two days before his surgery, he had a heart attack. Two weeks later, he had a stroke.

Unable to work and out of funds, he found himself homeless.

Paul Elliott, 47, is a veteran of the U.S. Coast Guard. Like Wilkerson, he had always been steadily employed, most recently on a fishing boat in Alaska.

"Through a chain of events, I got myself into trouble," said Elliott. "The scenario was bad choices of mine pushed me into homelessness."

On Tuesday, they and others with similar stories talked about the new Veterans Transitional Housing Program at the Washington State Veterans Home in Retsil, and how it gave them a second chance at life.

"I'm so blessed to be here, this place is a life saver," said Joseph Jackson, a U.S. Army veteran, was homeless as recently as January and has been diagnosed with cancer.

The program, which opened in November at the remodeled Building 9, provides a safe haven for veterans down on their luck and without a roof over their heads. But unlike a typical homeless shelter, the program teaches residents skills they need to regain independence to the best of their ability.

"These are all people who have fallen on hard times. They're not here for a hand out. They're here for a hand up," John Lee, Director of the Washington State Department of Veterans Affairs, said at the facility Tuesday.

Also present was Mike Gregoire, husband of Gov. Chris Gregoire, himself a Vietnam vet and a veterans advocate.

"It's a day to celebrate for sure," Gregoire said.

The program currently serves 20 veterans, 19 men and one woman, at a facility that will ultimately serve 75. Since opening, three residents have regained independence and moved out.

Most of the residents, like Wilkerson and Jackson, are Vietnam-era vets age 50 to 65, said program manager Ray Switzer. The youngest is a 21-year-old Iraq War veteran.

click post title for the rest

Camp Algonquin Stand Down For Homeless Vets

St. Rep. Linda Chapa LaVia Speaks to Veterans at Camp Algonquin Stand Down
- posted by Cal Skinner

This may be the last time the Veterans Stand Down sponsored by Crystal Lake's NASA Education may occur at Camp Algonquin.

It's not because yesterday's event, the fourth at Camp Algonquin, was a failure.

Just the opposite.

The over 200 veterans, many homeless, filled the camp on the Fox River.
go here for the rest
http://capitalfax.blogspot.com/2008/04/st-rep-linda-chapa-lavia-speaks-to.html

Some people will read this and think how sad it is, while others will read it and think how wonderful it is that so many people do really care about our homeless veterans. Both would be right. It's sad that in this nation any veteran would be homeless. It is wrong! The goodness of some people offer hope that one day, if enough people care, no one will ever serve this country again and end up homeless.

How "Supportive" Is Internet-Based Supportive Psychotherapy?

How "Supportive" Is Internet-Based Supportive Psychotherapy?
JOHN C. MARKOWITZ, M.D.
New York, N.Y.
To the Editor: In their article, published in the November 2007 issue of the Journal, Brett T. Litz, Ph.D., et al. presented thought-provoking preliminary data on Internet-assisted, cognitive behavioral self-management of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms (1). In a report that emphasized technology and downplayed human contact, however, it might have been helpful to clarify certain details pertaining to the control intervention. A randomized study is only as credible as its control intervention, which raises conundrums. What exactly is Internet supportive counseling—the control condition—in this trial? Furthermore, how much therapist contact did subjects actually receive?
go here for the rest
http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/full/165/4/534

I am not a psychologist or a therapist but I can tell you that this is necessary to fill in the gaps. They need to be helped as soon as they want it.

My role has been to provide the knowledge of what PTSD is as simply as possible, get them past the stigma of having it so they don't think it's their fault and then send them to get the help they need. With the VA overloaded and rural area veterans waiting too long for help, this kind of intervention is crucial to saving their lives. As soon as they begin to seek help, PTSD stops getting worse.

If they turn to the clergy, the clergy need to be there to help them. If they turn to suicide prevention phone calls, they better be there to help them and not tell the veteran they need to call back or wait for help. Everyone able to help needs to help them as soon as they can. The role of the online therapist cannot replace seeing someone face to face but given the fact some veterans need the anonymity online help offers, they should do it. We all have to understand that there is just not enough room for everyone needing help to get it and until there is, this will require whatever we can offer all of them.

High numbers of West Virginia PTSD veterans

High number of WV war vets return home with PTSD, depression
By Emily Corio
Last year, West Virginia lawmakers wanted to know how veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan were adjusting to life at home. They commissioned a study to survey these veterans about their mental health, home-life and work. So far, the results show a troubling trend.
Click here for audio
Click here to read story

Heady: Unless the primary care doctor, let’s say five years out, thinks to ask ‘Hey, did you, are you a veteran? Were you in Iraq? Did you see combat?’ Until we can understand all of those kinds of features and make sure that people are trained for that---to ask for it, to look for it, then that gives us a whole other picture to know what this, how to advise this person, how to help them, where to refer them, all of those kinds of things.

If the DOD and the VA did a better job of getting the troops and veterans to understand what PTSD is, they would not have to wait until they go to a private doctor later and take their chances the doctor would be aware of what to ask the veteran about. This is ridiculous!

Are they not doing more outreach work on purpose hoping more don't show up to seek treatment for their wounds and reduce the budget? I know it sounds like a conspiracy but given the fact PTSD has been well known under different names since the beginning of recorded history, you'd think everyone would know what it is, but they don't. I still get emails from veterans and their families trying to understand this. You would also think that since the Vietnam veterans rate of PTSD and astronomical numbers following Korean veterans and WWII veterans, they would have used all these years to be pro-active in addressing this. Then you would also have to think that if it was about saving a buck here and there, they would take advantage of early intervention to make sure that PTSD was stopped from getting worse before they became chronic and before their lives were destroyed to the point they could not work, saw their families fall apart and end up homeless. But, you must be among those who still think that when the administration claims they take care of the wounded, they actually do. We know what works and they are not doing it!

PTSD out of control, under-staffed VA and Akaka wants to know why

Akaka and Sanders Meet with Veterans Affairs Secretary Peake
Urge action on health care eligibility for middle-income vets, National PTSD Center
By Kawika Riley, 4/1/2008 7:45:46 PM
WASHINGTON, D.C. – On Tuesday, U.S. Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee Chairman Daniel K. Akaka (D-HI) and committee member Senator Bernard Sanders (I-VT) met with Veterans Affairs Secretary James Peake. They discussed funding for the National Center for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and a proposal to modify VA’s income threshold to make more middle-income veterans eligible for VA healthcare. Akaka, Sanders and other committee members have pressed Secretary Peake on both issues since his recent confirmation as VA Secretary.

“As we move through the final year of this Administration and this Congress, we must work together to find common ground for the sake of our veterans. I appreciate the Secretary’s willingness to work with us on these issues,” said Akaka. Secretary Peake agreed during the meeting to look more closely into the income threshold for veterans, as well as strengthening support for the National Center for PTSD.

Senators Akaka and Sanders wrote Secretary Peake on January 24, 2008, urging him to dedicate more funds to the National Center for PTSD. The Center has taken on a larger mission and workload in recent years, due in part to the increased number of veterans suffering from PSTD. Already, more than 100,000 servicemembers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan have reported mental health disorders, according to the Congressional Research Service.

Meanwhile, the PTSD Center’s budget, adjusted for inflation, has been flat for the past half-decade, and overall staff levels have been reduced since 1999.

click post title for the rest

Now maybe the media will understand why advocates get so angry over all of this! Paul Sullivan of Veterans For Common Sense wouldn't have taken on the enormous task of suing the VA if this was not going on. There would be no need for any legal action if they had taken care of the wounded.

Gen. Petraeus and a High-Level Suicide in Iraq

Gen. Petraeus and a High-Level Suicide in Iraq

Posted April 1, 2008 12:34 PM (EST)

The scourge of suicides among American troops in Iraq is a serious and seriously underreported problem. One of the few high-profile cases involves a much-admired Army colonel named Ted Westhusing -- who, in his 2005 suicide note, pointed a finger at a then little-known U.S. general named David Petraeus. Westhusing's widow, asked by a friend what killed this West Point scholar, had replied simply: "Iraq."

Now there is a disturbing update on this case.

Before putting a bullet through his head, Westhusing had been deeply disturbed by abuses carried out by American contractors in Iraq, including allegations that they had witnessed or even participated in the murder of Iraqis. His suicide note included claims that his two commanders tolerated a mission based on "corruption, human right abuses and liars." One of those commanders: the future leader of the "surge" campaign in Iraq, Gen. Petraeus.

Westhusing, 44, had been found dead in a trailer at a military base near the Baghdad airport in June 2005, a single gunshot wound to the head. At the time, he was the highest-ranking officer to die in Iraq. The Army concluded that he committed suicide with his service pistol. Westhusing was an unusual case: "one of the Army's leading scholars of military ethics, a full professor at West Point who volunteered to serve in Iraq to be able to better teach his students. He had a doctorate in philosophy; his dissertation was an extended meditation on the meaning of honor," as Christian Miller explained in a major Los Angeles Times piece.

"In e-mails to his family," Miller wrote, "Westhusing seemed especially upset by one conclusion he had reached: that traditional military values such as duty, honor and country had been replaced by profit motives in Iraq, where the U.S. had come to rely heavily on contractors for jobs once done by the military." His death followed quickly. "He was sick of money-grubbing contractors," one official recounted. Westhusing said that "he had not come over to Iraq for this." After a three-month inquiry, investigators declared Westhusing's death a suicide.

Mobile law office helping vets get benefits

Low-income guidelines used by Project SALUTE

Project SALUTE qualifies low-income veterans by using 200 percent of the federal poverty level. For 2008, that translates to the following:

$20,800 Single individual

$28,000 Family of two

$35,200 Family of three

$42,400 Family of four

$49,600 Family of five

$56,800 Family of six

$64,000 Family of seven

$71,200 Family of eight

Source: Mark Gordon, UDM School of Law Dean

Mobile law office helping vets get benefits
By Rick Vasquez, Stars and Stripes
Pacific edition, Thursday, April 3, 2008


WASHINGTON — The University of Detroit Mercy School of Law has launched a national tour of its Mobile Law Office to provide low-income veterans free assistance or representation on federal benefits issues, and is training local attorneys to continue assisting veterans on a local level.

Project SALUTE, which stands for Students And Lawyers (Assisting) U.S. Troops Everywhere, will make stops in cities across the country, and has just finished touring Florida. Tentative dates for Atlanta have been set and additional dates will be added as the tour continues. Updates are available at www.law.udmercy.edu.

“We have had tremendous success since we began our national tour in February,” said Mark Gordon, the school’s dean. “We have seen more than 500 veterans and have trained well over 100 attorneys to handle their cases pro bono.”

Project SALUTE first offers veterans an informational session on getting federal benefits. Interviews are then conducted, giving veterans a chance to state their case. Local attorneys are also offered the opportunity to obtain continuing legal education credits by attending a training session on handling federal benefit issues.

“Based on the training, we then refer some of the cases,” said Gordon. “We refer cases only to those attorneys who are going to do it pro bono.”

Project SALUTE only provides assistance on cases relating to federal benefit issues.

go here for the rest

http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=53773

Army unit working to get blind Iraqi girl eye treatment

“We’ve taken a real vested interest in the people here,” Kendrick said. “We empathize with the people.

Army unit working to get blind Iraqi girl eye treatment
Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Wednesday, April 2, 2008
Soldiers from the 1st Battalion, 30th Infantry Regiment are working to help a young girl in Iraq go beyond having a mental picture of her father to actually seeing him with her eyes.

Noor Taha Najee has been blind since birth, the result of a condition caused by poorly developed corneas. Though the condition can be corrected with surgery, the procedure isn’t available to the family, which lives near Kalsu, south of Baghdad.

The soldiers are working with a nongovernmental organization in Los Angeles to have the surgery done. “We’re on standby now, waiting for a doctor in L.A.,” said 1st Lt. Michael Kendrick, platoon leader of 2nd Platoon, Company D.
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http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=53760
Climbing up on my soapbox to get a better view. There are always these very heart warming stories of what some of the men and women serving in Iraq and Afghanistan are trying to do. We see so much of the horrifying images of the wounds they suffer from yet very little of what they have to go through. We see how human these warriors are in stories like this.

They want to help. They didn't go there to kill Iraqis. They were told they were going there to free them from Saddam and find the WMD they were told were meant for us back here at home. That's what they cared about. Ever since the day Iraq was taken, they have been serving and dying and so have the people of Iraq. We still don't know why that was. Still the notion of going in for a good cause is what they had in mind. They still want to hang onto that. They still want to do some good there but they have nothing to do the good with. They can do great and wonderful things here and there, they can try to rebuild what gets blown up and they can try to make peace in a nation that every expert knew would fall apart the way it did. We can argue all we want about what supporting them really means but you would have to be a fool to believe they had any evil intent going there.

We need to see them as humans, fathers and mothers, sons and daughters, as much as possible if we are ever going to understand them when they come home and suffer wounds for their service. I get about as angry as anyone about all of this but it gets me even more upset to know when they come home wounded, there isn't enough room for all of them to be taken care of. I see them as humans, courageous humans born with the tendency to be heroic already in them. I see them as noble but within that they are still humans asked to do the abnormal. We send them into this kind of life altering experiences and then we are the first ones to complain when they come home changed by them instead of being ready to take care of them. What the hell is wrong with us? We still don't get it. I still haven't heard of any huge mail drop onto the steps of congress demanding we take care of them. I have yet to read a flood of editorials or special report followed by special report on how we don't. Aren't they worth it?

Pentagon gave Tim Ngo, wounded Iraq Vet, 10% solution

Linked from ICasualties.org

Eamon Coyne
Tim Ngo (center) suffered a serious head injury while serving in Iraq. The military recognizes him as only "10 percent" disabled, which makes him ineligible for continued military health care. Above, Ngo stands with his girlfriend, Ani Cerghizan (left), and his mother, Hong Wyberg.

Health Care
Injured Troops Struggle to Get Health Care
by Joseph Shapiro


“I don't fully think they were prepared for the length of time this war is going to last. They had no idea of how many injuries or the type of injuries that were going to come out of this.”

Hong Wyberg, Mother of Tim Ngo, who sustained a serious head injury in Iraq.

Mark Wilson
Gordon England, deputy secretary of defense, says there is no incentive for the Department of Defense to reduce disability ratings. "We try to treat people fairly and accurately," he said last week. Getty Images




“It's counterintuitive. Why are the number of disability retirees shrinking during wartime?”
Mark Parker, Retired Army Lieutenant Colonel




All Things Considered, April 20, 2007 · When service members are forced to leave the military by war injuries or illness, they face a complex system for getting health and disability benefits. Sometimes, health care gets cut off when new veterans find they need it most. Some retired soldiers and their families say they are worried that the Pentagon won't spend enough money to give the injured the care they deserve.

'10 Percent Disabled'

Tim Ngo almost died in a grenade attack in Iraq. He sustained a serious head injury; surgeons had to cut out part of his skull. At Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., he learned to walk and talk again.

When he got back home to Minnesota, he wore a white plastic helmet to protect the thinned-out patches of his skull. People on the street snickered, so Ngo's mother took a black marker and wrote on the helmet: U.S. ARMY, BACK FROM IRAQ. On this much, everyone agrees.

But here is the part that is in dispute: The Army says Tim Ngo is only 10 percent disabled.

"I was hoping I would get at least 50 or 60 or 70 percent," Ngo says. "But they said, 'Yeah, you're only going to get 10 percent'... And I was pretty outraged."

When a service member is retired for medical reasons, the military's disability rating makes a difference. If Ngo had been rated 30 percent disabled or higher, he would have gotten a monthly disability check instead of a small severance check. He also would have stayed in the military's health-care system.

Instead, Ngo enrolled with the Department of Veterans Affairs. Typically, there's a waiting period for the VA.

In October, while he was uninsured, Ngo had a seizure, caused by his war injury. He remembers being outside and blacking out; he fell to the ground on the driveway.

"My girlfriend was freaking out because she didn't know what to do," Ngo says. "She didn't know if I was going to die because I had hit the wrong side of my head."

An ambulance took Ngo to the nearest emergency room for treatment. It cost him $10,000. Ngo says that today, the bills for the incident are still unresolved.

Shrinking Numbers

Since that day, Ngo has gotten health coverage through the VA. Earlier this month, the VA said it would pick up his leftover bills from the emergency room.

The VA has been more generous than the Army all around. It rated Ngo as 100 percent disabled compared with the Army's 10 percent rating.

The VA gives him a monthly disability check, which helps with his finances; his head injury and post-traumatic stress disorder have prevented Ngo from holding on to even a simple job since he returned home.

Ngo's mother, Hong Wyberg, says the Army gives soldiers such as her son low disability ratings to save money.

"I don't fully think they were prepared for the length of time this war is going to last," Wyberg says. "They had no idea of how many injuries or the type of injuries that were going to come out of this."

Michael Parker retired from the Army in October, and he thinks Wyberg's suspicion is correct.

"The more I looked into it, I realized that this system does not have the soldier's back at all," says Parker.

Parker was a lieutenant colonel when he retired last year. Today, he has a disabling condition similar to rheumatoid arthritis. Parker was able to get the Pentagon's lifelong health coverage for himself and his family; he had been in the military long enough — for at least 20 years.

But Parker saw that a lot of other soldiers weren't as lucky, and it inspired him to become an advocate.

"I started posting questions and concerns and opinions on various blogs," he says, "and it just kind of mushroomed from there."

Parker started digging through Pentagon data, and the numbers he found shocked him. He learned that the Pentagon is giving fewer veterans disability benefits today than it was before the Iraq war — despite the fact that thousands of soldiers are leaving the military with serious injuries.

"It went from 102,000 and change in 2001... and now it's down to 89,500," says Parker. "It's counterintuitive. Why are the number of disability retirees shrinking during wartime?"

A 'Cost-Saving Device'?

Retired Army Lt. Gen. James Terry Scott heads a commission, set up by Congress, to study veterans' disability benefits. At a Senate hearing last week, Scott said that his commission had compared the way the Pentagon and the VA rated the same soldiers.

"The Department of Defense records were matched with VA records on 2.6 million veterans receiving disability compensation," Scott said. "Those rated zero, 10 or 20 percent [disabled] by the Department of Defense were rated in the 30 to 100 percent range by VA more than half the time."

In other words, troops often get small disability checks and no military health care when rated by the Pentagon's disability boards. But when they go to a VA board — with the same injuries — they get much more.

Scott said one reason is that the military's ratings determine whether a person is fit for duty, whereas the VA looks at all conditions that create health problems for a veteran. So the VA ends up rating more disabilities per retired service member.

But Scott said another reason may be that the Pentagon wants to keep down its costs.

"It is also apparent that the Department of Defense has a strong incentive to rate less than 30 percent, so that only severance pay is awarded," Scott said.

These numbers yielded some tough questions for Pentagon officials at the Senate hearing, such as Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England.

"How do you respond to [the] assertion [that] the Department of Defense reduces disability ratings as a cost-savings device?" asked Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK).

"I can tell you... there's no incentive to do that, senator," England replied. "I mean, maybe that's read into that. But I can tell you, we try to treat people fairly and accurately. And so there's certainly no incentive."

Pentagon officials conceded that the disability system doesn't work as well as it should. They admitted it is too bureaucratic and too often adversarial. They said they would listen to suggestions for change.

Navigating the System

But change in the future will come too late for many soldiers.

April Croft was serving in Afghanistan when she was diagnosed with leukemia. She was treated for a year at Walter Reed. The cancer seemed to go into remission and she was sent home.

"They told her that she was only eligible for a 10 percent rating with the illness of leukemia," says her husband, Mark Croft. "She was livid. She's actually contested that situation about three times already."

The Army never increased its 10 percent rating, but the VA rated her 100 percent disabled.

Croft spoke from his wife's room in a VA hospital in Seattle, where she recently underwent a bone-marrow transplant.

"The VA originally gave her 50 percent and upped it to 100 percent once... she got sicker," Mark Croft explains.

The VA provided the life-saving operation April Croft needed, but the low rating from the Army still mattered: The VA only covers veterans, not their families. It is the military health-care system that will insure an entire family — but only if the vet has a disability rating of 30 percent or more. April Croft has two young children, who are living with their grandparents in California.

Her kids eventually did get military health care — but only recently, after their mother married Mark, who is still in the Army. Mark and April wed in Reno in March. Afterward, he was given leave from the Army. Instead of taking off for a honeymoon, the newlywed couple drove to Seattle and checked into the hospital.

It's the kind of complicated arrangement that many veterans must make to navigate the military's complicated disability system.

Read the rest of Tim's story here

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89213921

More on Military Medical Care:
April 11, 2007Pentagon Neglected Walter Reed, Panel Says
March 20, 2007The Healing Waters Project
March 6, 2007Military Mental Health Care Under Scrutiny
March 6, 2007VA and Walter Reed Are Two Separate Systems
March 6, 2007Committee Says Scandal Goes Beyond Walter Reed
Feb. 24, 2007A Veteran's View of Conditions at Walter Reed
Feb. 22, 2007Army Probes Reports of Neglect at Walter Reed

You need to read the rest of his story and how things change in families. It isn't easy on them to recover and it sure isn't easy on the family.

Houston prepares for flood of PTSD and TBI veterans

March 30, 2008, 11:30PM
A healthier homecoming
Houston needs to prepare for flood of veterans with mental and brain disabilities


Copyright 2008 Houston Chronicle


The converted Holiday Inn at 4640 Main Street is packed, but fulfilling its purpose. The nonprofit facility now houses 280 veterans with head injuries, mental illness or other combat-related wounds.

The only hitch: Most are Vietnam veterans. Houston so far has barely glimpsed the psychological harm suffered by thousands of soldiers soon to come home from Afghanistan and Iraq.

It's a certainty, though, that they will need services far beyond what Houston currently can give.

"We're basically busting at the seams, to tell you the truth, " said Tom Mitchell, director of the Main Street facility. "And it may be three, or four, or five years before (new) veterans start hitting the streets" because post-traumatic stress disorder or traumatic brain injuries unglued their lives.

In some ways, these newer veterans will benefit from lessons of the Vietnam War and, more recently, scandalous mistreatment at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

Doctors today are more familiar with PTSD. Its symptoms include anxiety, insomnia, substance abuse and depression. And the Walter Reed revelations goaded Congress into studying veterans' physical and psychological needs and better coordinating the Veterans Administration and Defense Department so wounded veterans can get treatment more easily.

Even so, both national and local mental health experts say programs aren't in place to handle the flood of homecoming soldiers who will be suffering PTSD and traumatic brain injury. It's estimated that 17 percent to 30 percent of soldiers will come home with PTSD alone.

Harris County, with its gross deficit in mental health care services for civilians, could be particularly hard hit. Already, about 70 percent of Houston's 10,000 homeless people suffer serious mental illness. Some 30 percent of those homeless are veterans, mostly from Vietnam.

The returning soldiers from Iraq and Afghanistan could have even more severe problems. The new phenomenon of repeated, prolonged combat — two, three, even four tours of duty — intensifies traumatic stress disorders.

Houston will see a large number of these patients. One in 11 soldiers who are wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan is a Texan. And 25 percent of the state population is from the Houston-Galveston area.
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http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/editorial/5660366.html

Phishing scam turns out to be an inside Army job

Phishing scam turns out to be an inside job

By Karen Jowers - Staff writer
Posted : Tuesday Apr 1, 2008 13:31:21 EDT

An Army “phishing” test backfired the day before April Fool’s Day after an Army command was discovered phishing amongst its own.

The Army Family and Morale, Welfare and Recreation Command issued a press release at 4:12 p.m. Monday warning about a phishing e-mail scam.

The e-mail, which sported the Army’s official MWR logo, appeared to be an attempt to obtain personal information from soldiers by offering promises of free or discounted tickets to theme parks and attractions.

The press release said the Family and MWR Command was trying to find the owners of the Web site and the host of the domain.

Less than an hour later, the command issued another statement saying the phishers had been found — the Army’s own Network Enterprise Technology Command.

That command had notified MWR officials that it had been conducting a test of how soldiers respond to phishing scams — without letting anyone in the MWR command know about it.

Army MWR officials sent out a retraction 54 minutes after their phishing warning went out, saying they were “furious” that such a test had been conducted, using the MWR logo, without their knowledge or consent, and apologizing “for any inconvenience this might have caused.”

The phishing scam e-mail listed a Web link with an online registration form asking for a name, e-mail address, phone, city, state and ZIP code. The e-mail apparently went out across the service to soldiers’ Army e-mail accounts and to MWR professionals.

“I don’t think they were doing anything malicious,” said Laurie Pugh, spokeswoman for the Army Family and MWR Command. “They were just testing the system to protect our soldiers. We wish we had known in advance. But we know our system worked. We got the word out quickly.”
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http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/04/military_phishingscam_040108w/

Richard Hernandez, Marine, Vietnam Vet just wanted to sleep

Vietnam vet looks back to battlefields

BY JAMES GILBERT
SUN STAFF WRITER



Some veterans who served in Vietnam wanted to put the war behind them as soon as they returned home from the fighting.

That's what Foothills resident Richard Hernandez, who served in the U.S. Marine Corps, said he did for nearly four decades.

But in the course of getting records to document his claim for greater disability benefits, he decided he wanted to know more about how his actions on the battlefield fit into the bigger picture of that war.

"I wanted to know what all I did while I was there. It was important to me," Hernandez said of the armed conflict he experienced. "It was a lot of muscle, sweat and blood. But you got used to it after awhile."

Hernandez, 59, grew up in Gonzalez, Calif., and joined the U.S. Marine Corps on March 6, 1968, at the age of 18. He did so, he said, so he could be more like his older brother, who had already enlisted and was wounded while serving in Vietnam.
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http://www.vawatchdog.org/08/nf08/nfAPR08/nf040108-2.htm

He went to the VA so that he could sleep. That's all he wanted. Imagine a lifetime of service, deaing with PTSD and that's all he wanted!

Wales:PTSD, TBI, AWOL trooper charged and discharged

Wales
Trooper Craig diagnosed with post-traumatic strees
Mar 31 2008 by Hywel Trewyn, Daily Post

TROOPER Craig Roberts was already suffering from the stresses of war before the bomb exploded.

He had first gone to Iraq with the First Queen’s Dragoon Guards in April 2006.

In September of that year, after serving five months, he went home on leave to Porthmadog.

He became distressed and begged his mum to help him – saying he did not want to go back.

Wendy called Army welfare officers who promised Craig would be assessed in the battalion’s base in Germany. In fact, he was flown back to Iraq.

A fortnight later, Craig was serving as a gunner on an armoured vehicle when the roadside bomb went off.

After treatment at a Birmingham hospital, Craig was advised to go to Hedley Court, London, which specialises in head injuries, but was never referred there by his regiment.

Instead he returned to Porthmadog where he developed behavioural problems and his heavy drinking landed him in trouble with the police.

He smashed up his mum’s home, including every photograph of himself in Iraq, and was verbally abusive towards his family.

Wendy said: “He couldn’t cope with what he’d gone through. He was virtually dumped in Porthmadog by the Army and didn’t get the help he needed.”

After drinking continuously for days Craig ended up owing over £1,000 in fines mainly for being drunk and disorderly.

Last year, while on leave, a local doctor who had cared for Craig after his accident in Iraq wrote him a sick note covering him until March 5 which was faxed through to his regiment but the Army refused to recognise it.

Craig was arrested for being Awol on March 3, 2007 and was escorted on to a plane at Manchester airport.

In Germany Craig had his Awol hearing and was sentenced to eight days jail and an administrative discharge.

The day after he had an appointment regarding his head injuries and his right for compensation.

Last year an Ysbyty Gwynedd psychiatrist found Craig had post traumatic stress disorder.
click post title for link

Does any nation get this right? Is any nation able to learn what justice is when it comes to those who serve their nation? They take a human, send them into the abnormal traumatic world of combat and then expect them to come away the same way they went in. Shame! Shame on them and shame on all the nations allowing this kind of treatment to those who serve in the military. For heaven's sake, they have history books a lot older than the US does. Do they ever read them? Do they ever read the stories of wars and what it did to the people who fought them?

War Veterans face ongoing battle with PTSD

Anthony Torres, 26, a Marine who served tours of duty in Iraq and in Africa, says coming home was more difficult than he expected.

Appearing weak or ill is an image Iraq veteran Rick Brannan combats every day. Brannan, 55, was deployed with a Navy customs team to Operation Iraqi Freedom in June of 2005. There he provided armed escorts to troops headed home. Brannan also was assigned the task of inspecting coffins for contraband, a memory that still grieves him.

SPECIAL REPORT: The front lines shift ... Military veterans face varying battles
Alysa Landry The Daily Times
Article Launched: 03/31/2008 12:00:00 AM MDT
Editor's note: Today's story is the second of a three-part series that began Sunday and ends Tuesday.

FARMINGTON — Anthony Torres was looking forward to life as a civilian. The 26-year-old Marine spent seven months atop a Humvee manning an anti-tank missile in wartorn Iraq, and he was anxious to be home.

When he returned, however, he found a life so chaotic it rivaled his experiences overseas. Torres served in a security convoy during the 2004 U.S. assault on Fallujah, and he relives some of that terror every day.

A smell, a sound or a simple argument can send Torres back to Iraq.

"During my third week of the assault, the engineers assigned to clean up all the dead people hadn't come through yet," he said. "I remember that smell. It's like barbecuing with diesel."

A similar odor permeates the local oil fields, Torres said, and a whiff of that rewinds the clock.

"It sets me off and brings back memories," he said. "I have to logically figure out what's causing the smell and bring myself back to reality.



Coming Tuesday: The search for solutions.
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http://origin.daily-times.com/news/ci_8752708

PTSD: Symptoms are varied, complex
By Alysa Landry The Daily Times
Article Launched: 04/01/2008 12:00:00 AM MDT


Flashbacks, nightmares and exaggerated startle responses all are typical symptoms of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, but the condition is more complex.
Seventeen symptoms are used to diagnose the disorder, and a person must meet the minimum criteria for a positive diagnosis. The following are guidelines to understand the disorder. Only a trained psychologist can make a diagnosis.

Source: Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.

The person must have been exposed to a traumatic event in which both of the following were present:


Actual or threatened death, serious injury, or threat to physical integrity.

Response to the event involved intense fear, helplessness or horror.
The traumatic event is re-experienced persistently in at least one of the following ways:


Recurrent and intrusive thoughts about the event.

Recurrent distressing dreams of the event.

Flashbacks or hallucinations.

Intense distress at exposure to triggers that symbolize the event.


Physiological reactivity to triggers, such as pounding heart or sweaty palms.

The person must persistently avoid stimuli associated with trauma in at least three of the following ways:


Avoiding thoughts, feelings or conversations about the event.

Avoiding activities, people or places that remind a person about the event.

Inability to recall an important aspect of the event.

Diminished interest or participation in significant activities.

Feeling of detachment or estrangement from others.

Restricted range of emotions.

Sense of foreshortened future, such as loss of expectation of having a career, marriage, children or normal life span.

The person must experience persistent symptoms of arousal in at least two of the following ways:


Difficulty falling or staying asleep.

Irritability or outbursts of anger.

Difficulty concentrating.

Hyper-vigilance.

Exaggerated startle response.

Symptoms must last for at least one month.


Disturbance causes significant distress or impairment in social, occupational or other important areas of functioning.
http://www.daily-times.com/news/ci_8764475

Chaplain gives vital support to returning veterans

For God and Country

Once soldiers and their families accept that the feelings, flashbacks and emotions are normal, healing and recovery can begin. "There are some soldiers that will need some extra help, and my advice is to get help early rather than later," Gibson said. It is so important, he said, to put the problem in perspective. "People forget that after World War II, we had 800,000 psychological casualties."

Chaplain gives vital support to returning veterans
By Sharon Kiley Mack
Saturday, March 15, 2008 - Bangor Daily News


PITTSFIELD, Maine - Andrew Gibson sits comfortably in his Army National Guard fatigues, every inch a soldier from the leather boots to the black beret and the short haircut.

But the patch on his desert-tan shirt gives away his special mission: chaplain.

In his role as the full-time support chaplain for the Maine Guard, Gibson has a unique perspective. Not only is he the father of an Iraq war veteran, he has served in Afghanistan and Bosnia himself. He has tended to young men killed or wounded by explosives, mourned soldiers who committed suicide, dealt with personal flashbacks, disorientation and the often difficult event of coming home. He has assisted with death notifications to Maine families.

Using those experiences as tools, Gibson is now responsible for reintegrating Maine’s soldiers and their families after service in Iraq. "I help them learn and accept the new normal," he said.

When asked what returning soldiers need the most, his answer is quick and precise: time.

"Time is the great and immediate need," he said. "Folks are anxious to get on with their life. We often throw parties [for returning soldiers], and this can be very disquieting to have a lot of people come up and hug and kiss you. You are so tired. It’s not uncommon for soldiers to come home and sleep for days."

Gibson recalled an incident about 10 days after he returned from service in Afghanistan when he awoke in his Pittsfield home, in his own bed, and struggled to remember where he was.

Soldiers can feel very detached and aloof and expend a lot of energy just trying to care, he said. They might have a heightened or inappropriate startle reflex. They can suffer from nightmares.

Gibson said the soldiers have spent a year carrying a weapon that saved them, wearing body armor that protected them and a uniform that allowed them to recognize comrade from foe.
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http://bangornews.com/news/t/penquis.aspx?articleid=161636&zoneid=184

There are times when I do not want to call myself a Veteran's Chaplain. After 25 years of dedicating my life toward caring for them, nothing I have done or ever will do, will come close to being one of them. I will always be on the outside looking in. I never held a rifle or had to witness a friend die in combat. I have never had to question God's judgment after seeing what combat can do to other humans. I am here to help those who go and those they come home to. It's the best I can offer, and humbly do. Andrew Gibson is one of the reasons I do not feel as if I come close to deserving to call myself a Veteran's Chaplain. I am not a veteran. I am just a Chaplain taking care of veterans. My husband is the veteran I cared for first. It's because of him I do what I do and because of him, I love all of them.

Phil Donahue, Body Of War

Phil Donahue unveils documentary on wounded GI
Film follows path of a ‘warrior turned anti-warrior,’ says ex-talk show host
By Mike Celizic
TODAYShow.com contributor
updated 39 minutes ago
In 2004, Phil Donahue stopped to visit his old friend Ralph Nader on a visit to Washington, D.C. Nader asked the talk show legend to come along on a visit to a wounded soldier in Walter Reed Hospital. So moved was Donahue by his meeting with Tomas Young, he decided to film a documentary about the young man’s journey from warrior to paralyzed veteran to spokesman and activist against America’s presence in Iraq.

Four years later, the film, “Body of War,” is debuting to reviews that make liberal use of such adjectives as “powerful,” “riveting,” “unforgettable” and “wrenching.” Richard Corliss of Time magazine called it, “A superb documentary ... almost unbearably moving.”

“The first time I saw him will be with me forever — paralyzed from the chest down — he had that morphine look, droopy eyed, sallow, sunken, lifeless,” Donahue writes in the director’s notes to his movie. “Body of War is a film provoked by my own questions as I stood on my functional legs at his bedside.”
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http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23884161/

view clip at bottom of this blog

The search for combat trauma solutions

SPECIAL REPORT: The search for combat trauma solutions
By Alysa Landry The Daily Times
Article Launched: 04/01/2008 12:00:00 AM MDT


Editor's note: Today's story is the final report in a three-part series.


FARMINGTON — The roar of machine guns echoing in the jungles of Vietnam was silent for more than 30 years before Dennis Vaughn stopped hearing it.

The Vietnam veteran was suffering from the symptoms of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, but he didn't know it.

"We just thought that's the way life was," he said. "For 30-plus years, that's just the way it was."

Vaughn, 60, joined the Army in 1968 and spent nine months in Vietnam behind an M-60 machine gun.

Thirty years and three marriages later, Vaughn came face to face with reality — in the form of a make-believe village. He was on his honeymoon in Disney World with his third wife, waiting in line for a safari ride.

The line went through a little bamboo forest and passed a miniature Montagnard village, just like the villages Vaughn had seen in Vietnam.

"Disney doesn't do anything halfway, so this was perfect," he said. "I was hyper-alert, looking for snipers, watching for ambush situations. My wife turned around and said, Are you all right?' She recognized right away that there was something wrong, and for the first time in over 30 years, I had to admit that I wasn't all right."

Vaughn was diagnosed with Posttraumatic Stress Disorder in 2001, more than three decades after his military service ended.

"I can look back on the 30 years and pick up incidents almost on a daily basis," he said. "And that's a lot of days."

Vaughn's symptoms included nightmares, a sense of hyper-vigilance and difficulty with interpersonal relationships. He's one of about 25 million United States veterans to be diagnosed with combat PTSD. He's also one of a growing number of people to seek help for the condition that affects as many as 40 percent of combat veterans.

click post title for the rest

When my husband's claim with the VA was finally approved, I called to book a vacation to Disney. We hadn't been on a family vacation since we got married and I hadn't been to Disney in about 20 years. Our daughter was 11. I thought it would be a perfect way to get us all to reconnect again. I was right and we had a fantastic time. Jack's medication had him calm and enjoying himself. We had taken our niece as a companion so that she could stay in the same room with our daughter because Jack didn't sleep all night and often, there were nightmares.

Because we didn't include Sea World and Universal Studios in on the trip, we promised them we would take them back the following year.

The next summer, Jack was very different. He was sad most of the time and very jumpy. We would go to the parks and want to go back on some of the rides he really liked, but he waited outside while we went on the ride. I couldn't figure it out. I didn't understand what was so different about that trip that he was acting as if he didn't want to be with us at all. We ended up arguing a lot. By the time we got back to Massachusetts, I called his doctor. There was something not right about him. We went to the see the triage nurse. It was then that I discovered what was wrong. He stopped taking one of his medications. While I had passed off his behavior before hand as nervousness about flying again, it was the fact he was not taking his medication.

I was furious! It was the last time he tried to pull a stunt like that. Medication is necessary along with talk therapy. When they are on medication, at least when the medication has them stable once they find the right combination, nerves are calmed. They help but they are not a miracle. He still has dark days when we will go to the parks and I can feel him jump while holding his hand. One of the agreements we had when we moved to Florida was that we would have one day a week just for us. Friday is our play day unless something special comes up during the week and we have to switch days. At least once a week we get out together to just enjoy life. Most of the time money is tight but we usually use our tax refund to buy the season passes. It is part of our therapy as a couple.

He needs it because of PTSD and I need it because he has PTSD. I also need it because spending at least 12 hours a day doing this, I need to be reminded that there is a another side of life and feel "normal" again. (Actually it's more like being a 12 year old again.) It is very important that the couple living with PTSD spend time together, even if it's just going for a walk or out to dinner. Movies are usually not a good thing for a PTSD veteran. They don't like being in the dark with a bunch of strangers for a couple of hours. The most they can tolerate is a few minute on a ride because it's moving and it's over fast. In restaurants they don't like to be seated in the middle of the room and they usually need to sit in a booth. When you walk in, you will see their eyes searching for a safe place to sit. Chivalry needs to be forgotten in this situation because we have to let them pick the safest seat for them and let them sit first. Otherwise we are talking to them and they are not paying attention at all because they are too busy being on guard. Plus when we are sitting in the wrong place, my husband usually will snap at the waiter instead of being nice.

You learn what to avoid and what works as time goes on. The key is to make sure they are getting the help they need and you have to be totally committed to paying attention and remembering, they have PTSD and you have to live with it. Adapt and understand. It will help your marriage survive and help them live a better life.

SAVE Program targets veteran suicides

Program targets veteran suicides
Fledgling prevention effort relies on shared experience
By Anna Badkhen
Globe Staff / March 31, 2008
He knew exactly what it was like, Kevin Lambert told the Iraq war veteran at a Dunkin' Donuts shop north of Boston: the insomnia, the bouts of depression, the hyper-vigilance that makes you imagine roadside bombs hidden in street garbage. Like the veteran, Lambert was 24, had served in Iraq, and had been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

"I know how you feel," Lambert said. He listened attentively to the veteran's story before telling him where he could find counseling.

With suicide rates on the rise among military personnel, Massachusetts last month launched a one-of-a-kind program to prevent suicide among veterans of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The program's seven members -a woman whose husband has served in Afghanistan, five young combat veterans, including Lambert, and a mental health expert - say their personal experience helps them reach out to veterans who are considering suicide or who simply need help navigating the complicated and often confusing system of veterans' benefits and services.

"Being in combat and then trying to readjust to the civilian life - it's not easy. No one understands that because they haven't been there," said Lambert, who was deployed with the Army to Mosul and Baghdad in 2005 and 2006. "But we've been there. We can relate."

Members of the program, which is run by the Department of Veterans Services, funded by the Department of Public Health, and known by its acronym, SAVE, hope that their approach will help veterans overcome the sense of alienation and frustration that, combined with mental trauma incurred during combat, can lead to suicide. They meet with veterans, take them out for meals, refer them to counselors and job fairs, escort them to agencies that provide services and benefits to veterans, and explain to their relatives why veterans often appear depressed or restless.
click post title for the rest

Vietnam Veteran Bill Landreth Point Man

Since 1984, when Seattle Police Officer and Vietnam Veteran Bill Landreth noticed he was arresting the same people each night, he discovered most were Vietnam vets like himself that just never seemed to have quite made it home. He began to meet with them in coffee shops and on a regular basis for fellowship and prayer. Soon, Point Man Ministries was conceived and became a staple of the Seattle area. Bills untimely death soon after put the future of Point Man in jeopardy.

However, Chuck Dean, publisher of a Veterans self help newspaper, Reveille, had a vision for the ministry and developed it into a system of small groups across the USA for the purpose of mutual support and fellowship. These groups are known as Outposts. Worldwide there are hundreds of Outposts and Homefront groups serving the families of veterans.

PMIM is run by veterans from all conflicts, nationalities and backgrounds. Although, the primary focus of Point Man has always been to offer spiritual healing from PTSD, Point Man today is involved in group meetings, publishing, hospital visits, conferences, supplying speakers for churches and veteran groups, welcome home projects and community support. Just about any where there are Vets there is a Point Man presence. All services offered by Point Man are free of charge.

Hotline: 1-800-877-VETS (8387)
Point Man Intl. Ministries
Po Box 267
Spring Brook, NY 14140
E -mail: dana@pmim.org

HQ Phone:1-716-675-5552

Point Man Intl. Ministries is a 501(c) 3 non-profit organization

http://www.pmim.org/

It isn't about who got a parade! When I came home from Vietnam, my cousin, a WWII Vet invited me to a VFW meeting and I was all but ignored because I was not in a "real" war and so how could I have any kind of problem? All these guys stuck to each other like glue and pretty much ignored the "new" Vets. And you all remember how it felt. I see the same "new guys" 35 years later with the same baloney coming out of their mouths. How in the world can you say you support the troops and then ignore them when they get home?

Seems to me that no matter how many are killed, the survivors have an obligation to each other and to our posterity to insure the "new guys" don't go through the same stuff our dads, grandfathers and ourselves had to endure...

So to all you "NEW GUYS", Welcome Home. Thank you for a job well done. Your sacrifice is deeply appreciated here. We support you regardless of when or where you served; we understand what you've been through and what you're dealing with now. Continue through the site and get connected!
Dana Morgan (President of PMIM)

Homefront groups are lead by Christian mothers, wives and friends of both active duty military and veterans. They provide an understanding ear and caring heart that only those left behind at home can understand. They have experienced the stress of dealing with deployments and the effects of a loved one returning home from war. If you have someone you love deployed or having issues readjusting since coming home get connected with a local group or contact HQ for assistance.

http://www.pmim.org/index.html

Man admits killing Staff Sgt. Adam Sheda, Iraq Vet

Man admits killing Iraq war vet

The Associated Press
Posted : Monday Mar 31, 2008 20:19:53 EDT

DULUTH, Minn. — A 26-year-old Duluth man has pleaded guilty to killing a soldier who had just returned from Iraq.

Luis Mark Hogan admitted Monday that he fought with Iraq war vet Staff Sgt. Adam Sheda last June and used the soldier’s own pistol to shoot him.

Hogan pleaded guilty to unintentional second-degree murder and agreed to serve a 12 1/2-year prison sentence. Sentencing is scheduled for May 19.

Hogan was crying in St. Louis County District Court as he recounted the June night when he killed the 26-year-old Sheda.

According to the criminal complaint, Sheda showed up uninvited in Hogan’s backyard and tried to get into a party; the two began fighting. The complaint says that later on, Sheda pulled a gun that was turned against him.
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/03/ap_vetkilled_033008/

PTSD coming to Stardust radio

My Massachusetts accent will be heard live on Wednesday night in case anyone is interested. We'll be discussing PTSD and offering insight as well as support for the families living with it. Most of my readers know our story very well. I tend to get on a soap box about it when I still see it happening to our newer generation of warriors. People tell me I'm passionate about them but they don't know the half of it. I eat most meals at my PC using the time of chewing so that I can read between posts. Half the time my daughter or husband have to remind me to eat because I'll forget. I do it because I know what it feels like.

I post whatever I find that can make a difference in someone's life. I post reports when I find them because I figure the more it's reported, the more it's talked about, the sooner the stigma ends. They say "misery loves company" for a reason. No one wants to feel alone in any crisis. If they know there are others going through it, they take away some comfort. The other reason is that the more bloggers post about the reports coming out, paying attention to them, getting hits because of them, the reporters will be more inclined to do some more reporting on it.

Call in the show and ask questions. Learn from the years I've walked in the shoes and pick my brain. There is a lot even I still don't know, but if you come away from the show with hope, I will feel as if we've accomplished what we set out to do. Don't forget my book can be opened right here on the blog on the right side. It opens in Adobe and lets you in on 18 years of our life as PTSD went from mild to sending my husband over the edge and then into healing. We've been married since 1984. If he can live again after all the years he had no help at all, there is hope anyone can. He'll never be free of PTSD but he is living a life again thanks to some great doctors back at Bedford VA who wouldn't give up on him and some great ones down here in Florida. OK, I had something to do with it to, but I thank God everyday that He held my hand all the way through it.

This is the main Stardust Radio Network site:

http://www.stardustent.com/
You will see the various shows on the left. Choose SVR Broadcast. That will take you to this link:

http://www.stardustent.com/svr.htm

To listen to the shows simply click on the "Listen Live" button up in the upper left hand corner. The show is from 6:30 - 8:00 PM Eastern Time.

Severed Soul, a woman's journey through PTSD

Amazon.com Books Hot New Releases: The bestselling new & fut...
Severed Soul: One Woman's Journey Through Post Traumatic Stress · Severed Soul: One Woman's Journey Through Post Traumatic Stress by J. L. Vallee
Severed Soul: One Woman's Journey Through Post Traumatic Stress (Paperback)
by J. L. Vallee (Author)

List Price: $14.95
Price: $14.95 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details

Honest and insightful..., March 11, 2008
By P. Turner - See all my reviews

Author J.L. Vallee writes from the heart. Even if you haven't been a victim of domestic abuse, I'm sure everyone will recognize the main character as someone they know. I've already bought a copy for women I know who may find comfort in recognizing the symptoms of post traumatic stress and discovering where they may be able to find help. Writing this book took insight, bravery, courage, and faith. I credit the author with successfully producing a work that should inspire those who might not have had the strength before to finally determine that enough is enough.

Courageous and touching, March 11, 2008
By R. Matthews "reader In Ma" (Leominster, Ma) - See all my reviews


Excellent read! An incredible story of a woman who has been through alot and conquered it all. She gives a new insight on Post Tramatic Stress and shows how it affects people in many ways. Women who have been through a terrible relationship would truly understand they are not alone in life. A very courageous and heartfelt story.

Faithbase DV groups, March 31, 2008
By Facilitator "Faithbase DV Groups" (Gardner, MA USA) - See all my reviews

This is a great example of how difficult a toxic relationship can be while experiencing PTSD. I would recommend to those who have a faithbase background to read. How shocking to know while the author is a church goer, she lived like this in her home. It takes tremendous strength and courage to stand strong, that Only God could give. Thank you for telling your story. For any man who is being called by God to help stop violence...this book is a must.

There are many joys in doing what I do. One of them is when people will send me books or links they want to share with me. I love going to the UPS box and see a surprise! Friday was one of those days. This book was in it. I had been writing back and forth with JL for a while as she was writing the book and wanting to learn more about PTSD. Even living with it, she knew there was a lot more to learn. I remembered the days of writing my own book and while it was healing to do it, it was also some very dark times to remember. JL tells of some of the darkest days of her life and does it bravely.

The reason why people do something like this is simple. They know there are so many other hurting people out there who need so much more than cold, clinical books or case studies written from someone who really couldn't care less about the people involved in the stories they tell, but works that offer hope. JL offers hope because she came shining through and shares her story so that others can believe that they too can overcome and survive. Not just survive but live a life again. JL also stands as an example that when you do come through you can reach back and help someone else make it too.

Over the years I've read a lot of personal accounts and this I highly recommend.