Wounded Times History in the Making 8th Anniversary

I missed my own anniversary. On August 10th Wounded Times turned 8 years old and I didn't even think about it. WOW! Sure I had a lot on my mind between having a tooth pulled Monday and my computer in for repairs, (which didn't happen and I had to buy a new one) plus feeling lousy the first day of my vacation from the company I get paid to work for, (since I do this for free) it was a rotten day. It didn't dawn on my until just now when I was looking up an old article on PTSD and the Moral Injury. I went back to the oldest post and saw the date.

There is so much that some folks are totally ignorant of, especially when it deals with veterans, simply because they have not paid attention all long. It is the job of the press to make them aware of the truth but they have forgotten truth also has a history. A history reported on by other reporters chronicling the suffering of millions of veterans from every generation.

Wounded Times' mission has been to put all these articles in one place so that no one could forget what happened and when it happened.

Chronicling

Variant of chronicle

a historical record or register of facts or events
arranged in the order in which they happened

a narrative; history

I was frustrated searching for reports, thinking the stories were far too important to be forgotten and hidden by territorial boundaries of local news reporters. How could someone in Florida read about another veteran going through the same thing in another part of the state? How could families across the country find support of other families after their veteran committed suicide? How could other veterans discover they are not alone? How could anyone change anything as long as members of Congress refused to honor them, tell the truth and do all they can for our veterans?

On August 9th I posted the story of a homeless veteran named Kevin on my old site. It came from the Boston Globe reporter Anna Badkhen.

NORTHAMPTON -- After Kevin returned from Iraq, he spent most nights lying awake in his Army barracks in Hawaii, clutching a 9mm handgun under his pillow, bracing for an attack that never came.

His fits of sleep brought nightmares of the wounded and dying troops whom Kevin, a combat medic, had treated over 16 months of suicide attacks and roadside bombings. He kept thinking about an attack that killed 13 of his comrades. He hated himself for having survived.

Soon he was drinking so heavily that the Army discharged him. He moved back in with his parents in Narragansett, R.I., and drank even more, until they asked him to leave. Less than two years after he returned, Kevin became one of a growing number of veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars who are now homeless.

"I lived in my car, at the Wal-Mart parking lot," said Kevin, who asked that his last name not be published because he is considering reenlisting. He has been staying at a homeless shelter in Northampton since early July.

Kevin's tailspin encapsulates a little-researched consequence of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. As more troops return from deployments, social workers and advocates expect the number of the homeless to increase, flooding the nation's veterans' shelters, which are already overwhelmed by homeless veterans from other wars.

I wrote this.

I really wonder what they think when they hear the words "support the troops" as they go to sleep in a car or in a shelter and no one supported them even enough to get help. Sad isn't it? NO! It's a disgrace! Supposedly they are in Iraq to give the people of Iraq a better life (well that was what they were told anyway) yet what kind of a life do they come home to? Supposedly they were in Afghanistan to defend this nation and take care of "homeland" security but you don't find it ironic they don't have a place to call home now because they went there?

There was something seriously wrong with this country when they came home from Vietnam, but at least a lot of good people wanted to make a difference and started the veterans homeless shelters across the country. At least they tried while the government turned deaf, dumb and blind to all of them. Now there is something seriously deplorable about this.

I kept tabs on what was happening in Massachusetts even though I moved to Florida years before this article came out.

There was an article on Medical Marijuana out of Oregon by Dr. Phil Leveque of Salem News in which he pointed out this study,

I was surprised to find the article, “Identifying and Treating VA Medical Care Patients with Undetected Sequelae of Psychological Trauma and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder” in NCP Clinical Quarterly, 6(4), Fall 1996, published by National Center for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Department of Veterans Affairs.

I wrote this part.

If you look back to historical accounts of ancient natural medicine you will find a lot of what we now regard as criminal. Self-medicating usually does involve marijuana with combat veterans because of the calming effect it has. Most the medicine we use today, comes from natural sources ancient people used all the time for health benefits. The research into the use of marijuana has provided much evidence that controlled use provides relief for a great deal of conditions. Heck there was even a time when cocaine was used legally to relieve pain. If ancient people used these natural medicines to address their health needs, why shouldn't we?

There was even a study on the benefits of Ecstasy in treating PTSD. Last I heard, this research was still being done. There was a woman who survived an extremely violent rape and suffered catastrophic PTSD. Nothing helped her. She was part of the study and was provided great relief when Ecstasy was used under controlled administration.

I was able to read it here in Florida even though it came out of Oregon.

On the 15th of August 2007 AP reported this,

Army Suicides Highest in 26 Years
By PAULINE JELINEK Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Army soldiers committed suicide last year at the highest rate in 26 years, and more than a quarter did so while serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to a new military report.

The report, obtained by The Associated Press ahead of its scheduled release Thursday, found there were 99 confirmed suicides among active duty soldiers during 2006, up from 88 the previous year and the highest since the 102 suicides in 1991 at the time of the Persian Gulf War.

The suicide rate for the Army has fluctuated over the past 26 years, from last year's high of 17.3 per 100,000 to a low of 9.1 per 100,000 in 2001.

Last year, "Iraq was the most common deployment location for both (suicides) and attempts," the report said.

The 99 suicides included 28 soldiers deployed to the two wars and 71 who weren't. About twice as many women serving in Iraq and Afghanistan committed suicide as did women not sent to war, the report said.

Yet when you read the news reports lately they make it seems as if all this is new. None of it is. It is reprehensible especially when you think about the number of suicides in 2007 being touted as the highest in 26 years but that 99 hit over 500 in 2012.

Then the military had to turn around and explain how there were more suicides after the war in Iraq ended and after over 900 prevention programs caped off with billions spent on saving lives.  Oops, I forgot, that was just a dream I had when reporters demanded accountability from someone. No one had to explain anything.

No one had to explain to families how their son, daughter, husband or wife was laid to rest after surviving combat but not being back home when they were supposed to be safe. No one was held accountable as family after family made the trip to Washington begging members of Congress to prevent another family from knowing the anguish they couldn't find the right words to come close to expressing.  No one in Congress was held to account for their failures. No one in the Pentagon was held accountable. No corporation was held accountable after receiving funding to produce the opposite results.  No researchers were held accountable.

No one had to pay for any of these failures other than veterans and their families and no one ever will be unless reporters decide to do the work like what came out of the Washington Post. (The link to the work is still up and worth reading every single word.

Soldiers Face Neglect, Frustration At Army's Top Medical Facility
The Washington Post
By Dana Priest and Anne Hull
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, February 18, 2007

While the hospital is a place of scrubbed-down order and daily miracles, with medical advances saving more soldiers than ever, the outpatients in the Other Walter Reed encounter a messy bureaucratic battlefield nearly as chaotic as the real battlefields they faced overseas.

On the worst days, soldiers say they feel like they are living a chapter of "Catch-22." The wounded manage other wounded. Soldiers dealing with psychological disorders of their own have been put in charge of others at risk of suicide.

Disengaged clerks, unqualified platoon sergeants and overworked case managers fumble with simple needs: feeding soldiers' families who are close to poverty, replacing a uniform ripped off by medics in the desert sand or helping a brain-damaged soldier remember his next appointment.

"We've done our duty. We fought the war. We came home wounded. Fine. But whoever the people are back here who are supposed to give us the easy transition should be doing it," said Marine Sgt. Ryan Groves, 26, an amputee who lived at Walter Reed for 16 months. "We don't know what to do. The people who are supposed to know don't have the answers. It's a nonstop process of stalling."

They ended up with a Pulitzer for this,

The 2008 Pulitzer Prize Winners Public Service Awarded to The Washington Post for the work of Dana Priest, Anne Hull and photographer Michel du Cille in exposing mistreatment of wounded veterans at Walter Reed Hospital, evoking a national outcry and producing reforms by federal officials.

You'd think things would change but they didn't. We saw that when the Dallas Morning News and NBC decided to report on Warrior Transition Units, Injured Heroes, Broken Promises last year. This was followed by Congressional Committee Orders Wide-Ranging Investigation of Army WTUs in 2015 but as we've seen, more talk, more money, more suffering and no one held accountable.

Until things really change for the better, Wounded Times will still be here collecting stories from all over the country along with several others because no one should ever feel alone like I did in 82 when I read the words Post Traumatic Stress Disorder for the first time. If you think you feel alone now, then think how I felt back then before any of us had computers to use to reach out to someone else going through the same thing. One more reason why Wounded Times is here, is that it all matters!