Rain did not stop Wreaths Across America in Florida
Combat PTSD Wounded Times Kathie Costos December 15, 2018 This morning in Casselberry Florida, a large group gathered together to make sure the veterans buried at All Faiths Memorial Park were not forgotten. It did not matter that it was raining.
Sgt. Dave Matthews of Never Forgotten Memorials was the MC.
Exclusive: Internal documents detail VA police altercation with veteran who later died
USA Today Donovan Slack Dec. 14, 2018
Kansas City Star reporter Andy Marso confirmed the veteran who died was Dale Farhner of Kingston, Missouri. But the VA refused to say what happened, so the reporter filed a records request under the Freedom of Information Act.
WASHINGTON – A 66-year-old veteran was found severely injured and nearly unconscious following a traffic stop by a Veterans Affairs police officer in May, and he died two days later, according to an internal report obtained by USA TODAY.
The VA has repeatedly refused, even seven months later, to disclose any details about what happened, citing an ongoing investigation.
But the internal report provides an account of a tragic altercation between the veteran and officer outside the VA medical center in Kansas City, Missouri.
“After being pulled over, the patient began making inappropriate gestures and physically threatening motions with his arm,” the report says.
The officer also noticed a “large ‘bulge’” by the driver’s abdomen “(later found to be due to recent hernia surgery).” He decided to detain him. The man “struggled.” So the officer “brought the patient to the ground.” He then completed the “handcuffing process.”
During the incident, the patient’s son approached “from behind.” The officer directed him to stay back, and he called for backup.
But something was awry.
“While being brought to the ground, the patient seemed to suffer some injuries,” the report says. So he was taken inside the hospital to be checked out.
“Upon arrival to the Emergency Department the patient was non-verbal, moaning with a decreased level of consciousness,” the report says.
Medical workers found he had a gash in his scalp and “multiple” cuts and bruises on his face. A CT scan of his head showed areas of bleeding around his brain, one on the left frontal lobe and another on the right.
read more here
Turning heartache into action requires more than love
Combat PTSD Wounded Times Kathie Costos December 15, 2018 When you suffer a loss of someone you love, the pain can be so great, the only way to relieve it, is to find something else to fill the void left behind. While it is totally understandable to want to do something, doing the right thing requires so much more than the desire.
After more than half my life has been dedicated to defeating PTSD, it began because of the pain I was introduced to when I fell in love. I knew what was attached to the stigma preventing veterans from seeking help. What I did not know was how to get it out of the way. It required a couple of years of research before I began to write about it. About ten years later, personal computers connected people just like me across the country, and we learned more. We shared more and then we began to change the conversation. To say it is heartbreakingly frustrating to see the outcome today, is far from adequate. Putting my fist through my computer is closer to how I feel every time I read about someone starting a charity because they are hurting. How many more do we need before people finally wake up and take all of this as seriously as it deserves to be taken? I was reading a report about a firefighter's Mom in the process of starting a charity because her son committed suicide. It has not even started yet, but managed to get the attention of the Chronicle Herald. It has a lot of claims in it that have been proven to have already failed, but that is not even mentioned. The Mom knows what pain she feels, but did not know the pain her son was carrying, and lacked the knowledge to know what his job was doing to him. But this Mom decided that experience should be turned into yet another effort, based on what failed so she can share it?
(The Mom) highly praised the assistance (her son) received from Halifax Regional Fire services.“I can’t even begin to tell you how supportive they were,” she said. “Within the resources they have and the skills and tools they had, they over-performed by 500 per cent.”
She praised it after her son was failed by it? Then she talked about how there are things in place that work? We have got to stop being silent when so much of what works is not worth them mentioning!
Here in the US, we have far too many just like her, and that is our biggest problem. Wanting to do something and knowing how to do it are two very different things.
Preventing suicides requires a serious effort, but we have not seen as much dedication toward discovering what is already available and what has been proven to have failed. Resilience training failed with catastrophic results. The DOD began that "effort" over a decade ago, yet ever since 2012, we have seen more service members commit suicide, than those killed in two wars every year.
This "effort" actually hinders them from seeking help because they are told they can "train their brains" to be mentally tough. Since they do not actually understand what PTSD, they end up believing they are mentally weak, instead of knowing PTSD hit their core because of the strength within them. How long do we allow all of this to go on because we do not want to hurt someone who has suffered a loss? How long do we let people, with good intentions, spread what failed, because we feel sorry for them? The number of known suicides has gone up because we have simply allowed grief stricken people to do whatever they wanted to do, blindly supported them in their "efforts" because we did not want to inflict more pain? Seriously? We managed to allow the pain to spread out so that more families knew exactly what the provider had been through the hard way. It happened to them! If we keep failing to get serious about all this, we will continue to see more and more take their own lives because we failed to show them the way to take control of their healing. Too many never even knew they could! #TakeBackYourLife
We recognize December 13th as the birthday of the National Guard. On this date in 1636, the first militia regiments in North America were organized in Massachusetts. Based upon an order of the Massachusetts Bay Colony's General Court, the colony's militia was organized into three permanent regiments to better defend the colony. Today, the descendants of these first regiments - the 181st Infantry, the 182nd Infantry, the 101st Field Artillery, and the 101st Engineer Battalion of the Massachusetts Army National Guard – share the distinction of being the oldest units in the U.S. military. December 13, 1636, thus marks the beginning of the organized militia, and the birth of the National Guard's oldest organized units is symbolic of the founding of all the state, territory, and District of Columbia militias that collectively make up today's National Guard.
Belated Happy Birthday to all the members of the National Guard for what you do for us everyday!!! The wish may be delivered late, but you guys are never late!
Kathy Shott works with Survivors of Suicide Loss, counseling families who have dealt with suicide.
She is a retired Air Force officer. Her son, Tony, was deployed to Iraq in 2010. He killed himself on Christmas Day in 2013.
Shott said she knew her son was having trouble. He was living halfway across the country. He had had a messy divorce. He was in the middle of a custody battle over his young son and it wasn’t going well.
“I know I talked to Tony all the time, but I didn’t hear the pain at that time,” she said. She said he had just gone into the VA two days before Christmas.
She is a retired military officer and she still has to grieve for her son. Want to explain it to her? This part is also important because it shows that they do not really know how many veterans are committing suicide in California...yet.
As part of the regulations, California will require listing the deceased veteran status on death certificates.
“The bill requires that the status be completed by whoever fills out the death certificate, which will mostly be the funeral home and the family. And the second part of that bill is the state will then give that info to the VA,” Campman said.
So, for all the people out there "raising" awareness, maybe now you will finally open your eyes, swallow your pride and admit your awareness was based on crap! You shared something that was not true, but worse, you shared what failed. Did you really think any of what you did would end the stigma that was killing more of them?
