Young Iraq War veteran ineligible for burial in North Carolina state cemetery KMBZ 98.1 FM JUNE 09, 2018
"At this point, [Amanda] would like her husband to rest in peace, so she is moving forward with Arlington, because she can't handle the process," Lacey said. "She doesn't have the strength to fight it, or keep living."
(NEW YORK) -- The mother-in-law of an Iraq war veteran is pleading for change in North Carolina after her daughter’s late husband was denied burial in a state cemetery.
Capt. James Christian Gallagher, a third-generation member of the United States armed forces, described by his family as having love for his country that "never wavered," is being held in a morgue, waiting to be interred.
"How can the state of North Carolina turn their back on this. The rejection of allowing CPT Gallagher to be buried in North Carolina State Veterans cemetery," Gallagher’s mother-in-law Wendy Lacey wrote on Facebook.
The post, shared more than 100 times on Facebook, condemns North Carolina for its “unconscionable” decision.
Gallagher, a 2008 West Point graduate, was stationed in Fort Lee, Virginia, with his wife and three daughters, when two weeks ago he suddenly passed away at the age of 31.
Amanda, Gallagher’s wife, decided to move to North Carolina, to be near her family in a time of need.
"When my daughter decided that she needed help, it was the right fit to have her husband buried here," Lacey told ABC News.
Initially, Amanda was told her husband could be buried at the North Carolina state veterans, Sandhill Cemetery, but the funeral home denied the family a plot, citing ineligibility.
A free burial plot is provided at a North Carolina State Veterans Cemetery for state veterans; however, they must meet certain residency requirements. Among those requirements is that the veteran has at the time of death been a legal resident of North Carolina for at least 10 years, according to the North Carolina State Veterans Cemetery Program. read more here
Is Your Power Source Changed or Charged PTSD Patrol Kathie Costos June 10, 2018
Last week I had to bring my car into KIA for maintenance. Since the only way I could get shots of under my car for PTSD Patrol, I bought my camera. Standing under it, seeing everything that is hidden, but always there, I started to think about how the same thing goes on with all of us. We can see a lot on the surface. There are things we see but there is so much more going on than what we can see within us. We have histories in our lives. Bad times when it all turned to crap and times when things were so good, we ended up thinking we did not deserve it. Funny how that works. Bad shit happens and we tend to think we didn't deserve it, then good stuff happens and we don't think we deserve that either. We are charged by both. Negative things happen, as well as positive just like our car batteries. The battery feeds the rest of the vehicle through cables. Sometimes those cables get corroded and the energy cannot feed the power. read more here
PTSD Patrol Changing the Conversation PTSD Patrol and Combat PTSD Wounded Times Kathie Costos June 9, 2018 We have got to change the conversation from Suicide Awareness to Healing Awareness! Suicides increase in Florida, country but we have failed at wondering what the hell we got wrong. Considering there has been this massive "effort" to change the outcome, no one seems to thinking about changing the FUBAR attempt of "raising awareness" that people were committing suicide.
I've spent almost my entire life fighting against oblivious fools because I was also one of those who lost hope to the point where death seemed better than one more day on this earth. No, I didn't try to commit suicide. I prayed I would get out the hospital bed in a body bag. Yes, I was that lost that I wanted the infection trying to kill me, to actually win. I know what trauma is. I've been facing it since the age of 5, when a doctor not only told my parents I could have died, but used the word "should" have died. He was talking about how two things that happened, should have killed me. There was no earthly reason for surviving the push from the slide that caused me to fall onto the earth...on my head, and no earthly reason the first doctor missing the crack in my scull and the concussion. She told my Mom to take me home to get a good nights sleep. One thing after another and every time should have caused PTSD in me, but it didn't for a very earthly reason. Nothing was left for me to "get over" on my own. My family had a habit of talking everything to death. It brought me out of the abnormality of what could have killed me, the normality of a safer existence. They never treated me like a victim. They comforted me for a while and then it was full swing into survivor mode. I got into all this because of my Vietnam veteran husband in 1982 and have not stopped because while I do not know what combat did to him, I know what trauma did to me. I also know what it did not do and why it didn't. It is one of the reasons I spent years training in Crisis Intervention and becoming a Chaplain. Taking back my life from "it" was a challenge I was not about to lose and I am not about to let anyone else suffer in silence and fall into hopelessness without one hell of a fight! I'm trying my best to get people to understand that their lives can get better. After over 29,000 post on this site, hundreds of videos, books and...you get the idea, I started PTSD Patrol because while I have seen the worst outcome too many times, I am a living example of the best outcome of all! I took back my life from the thing that tried to kill me. Everything on PTSD Patrol is tied to driving. Yes, driving. Everyone can understand how we control where we go, how we get there but few understand how their vehicle works. This ends up with it breaking down! We are in our own vehicles! We are not our bodies but we are in them. The goal is simple and that is to make something as complicated as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder into something that if we do not know how to fix it, we go to a mechanic for our minds instead of our vehicles. If you want to change the outcome, change the conversation! We do not want your money! I've done this work for over 3 decades and lose money every year because it does not cost much to talk or make people aware they can heal. Plus I have a regular job that covers the expenses. We want your time so if you want to be part of the Road Crew, contact me. On Facebook, I am scoutpreacher and by email woundedtimes@aol.com. For videos on YouTube PTSD Patrol Sunday Morning Empowerment Zone
Kathie Costos DiCesare Published on Feb 25, 2018 Starting today, we're going to be changing the conversation from suicide to empowerment. The only way to change the outcome, is to help veterans find hope again. They need to know what PTSD is, why they have it, but more than that, they need to know they can take back control of their lives. Lot better than taking their live isn't it? Check back on Sunday mornings for more. If you have one of those groups "raising awareness" then please stop talking about what veterans already know how to do and start helping them learn what they need to know, how to #TakeBackYourLife
Families of Suicide Victims Say Pain Gets Transferred to Loved Ones Erie News Now by Eva Mastromatteo Updated: Friday, June 8th 2018
The families of suicide victims are faced with a different way of living, after the loss of a loved one. They may have many questions, along with a host of other issues. Venus Azevedo-Laboda, the founder of a group called Boots on the Ground
The families of suicide victims are faced with a different way of living, after the loss of a loved one. They may have many questions, along with a host of other issues.
Venus Azevedo-Laboda, the founder of a group called Boots on the Ground, in Erie County, knows that well. Her brother, who was in the U.S. Navy, committed suicide, after he returned home from overseas.
The non-profit veterans outreach program was created to support and help veterans dealing with PTSD, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and suicide.
Venus Azevedo-Laboda says, "Unfortunatley what suicide does is just transfer that persons pain onto the whole family, and as families, we say, shoulda, coulda, woulda. I have PTSD from my brothers traumatic suicide so now I have anxiety, I never had anxiety before. Anxiety and depression." read more here
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One more group not being included in the numbers you hear all the time about suicides tied to the military, is when they are still in the military. The Department of Defense releases a quarterly report showing that an average of about 500 servicemembers commit suicide each year.
Keep in mind that while they were willing to lay down their lives to save someone else, they could not save themselves.
Husband of wife who survived attack: 'She was the hero that night' Good4Utah By: Marcos Ortiz Posted: Jun 08, 2018
PROVO, Utah (ABC4 Utah) - Hayley Peterson fought to stay alive. She didn’t want her children to be motherless.
Peterson spoke publicly for the first time after surviving a brutal attack during a home invasion at their Orem home last year. Her 4-year-old daughter was also physically attacked that night.
Rodolfo Villalobos pleaded guilty to the crime and Friday was sentenced to prison.
Prior to sentencing, Peterson addressed the court, telling the judge that she and her daughter are suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder from the events that night.
“I am grateful to be alive,” she told the judge. “While he was attacking me I thought I was going to be murdered. I fought like hell for my life. I had to live to protect my children.”
Her children were in the home but their father was not. He was on duty. Steve Peterson is an officer with Unified Police Department. He said it was the hardest call he ever had to take. His neighbor called him with the news.
“She was hysterical,” Peterson said. “I didn’t even recognize who she was.”
He eventually learned his wife and daughter were brutally attacked in their Orem home.
Afterward, Steve Peterson who also requested the maximum sentence said his family did achieve justice. But he also walked away knowing that his wife still regrets not being able to protect her children.
“It was extremely heartbreaking to hear that,” Peterson said. “That was probably the hardest thing today is to hear that. But by no means did she fail to protect anybody. She was truly the hero that night." read more here
