PTSD no one sees it coming, till it's here

Spouse Calls: PTSD spouses should seek support

Shortly after my husband and I were married, he was deployed for his third tour of Iraq. We had been together going on ten years and had seen two tours, so I didn't expect this to be much different...Stars and Stripes - http://www.stripes.com/

This is one example out of hundreds of thousands. No one ever sees it coming, unless they know what they are looking for, but you never really know for sure if it will show up now, or years later. It comes when it comes. They know it, they feel it and they try to deal with it, hiding it from everyone. At least they think they are hiding it. If they come into contact with people who know what PTSD, great, the signs are noticed and help is a hand away. Yet if they don't know what it is, you just don't see what the changes mean.

Kerry, veterans blast current state of care

Kerry, veterans blast current state of care
By Jack Dew, Berkshire Eagle Staff
Article Last Updated: 10/27/2007 07:47:22 AM EDT
Saturday, October 27

PITTSFIELD — About 50 veterans — most of them formerly homeless, many of them recovering addicts — sat on folding chairs in a common room of the United Veterans of America facility on West Housatonic Street, waiting for a chance to tell U.S. Sen. John F. Kerry what they need and are not getting from their government.

In a dark blue suit and pastel tie and ringed by TV cameras and reporters, Kerry looked little like his fellow veterans. He told them that the fight for benefits and proper care of the men and women returning from war is a battle that has been waged since the end of Vietnam. There have been some victories, he said, and some defeats.

"Supporting the troops is not just supporting them when they are in another country and they are in harm's way. Supporting the troops means keeping faith with people who wore the uniform when they come home," Kerry said. "That means we have got to make these lessons we have learned mean something.
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http://www.berkshireeagle.com/headlines/ci_7296449

VA needs to treat PTSD with what works

VA agrees with study that some PTSD studies are bias

October 27th, 2007
by Richard Brassaw
A recent Institute of Medicine (IOM) exposed much of the studies for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as self-serving and biased. The report concluded that exposure-based therapy and cognitive processing therapy were the only proven treatments that were effective for PTSD. The report also concluded that pharmacotherapy requires additional research to prove its effectiveness.

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) agrees with the IOM findings that exposure-based therapies are effective treatments for PTSD. Prolonged exposure therapy utilizes techniques to promote confrontation with feared objects, situations, memories, and images. It involves use of psycho-education, breathing retraining, prolonged exposure to the memory of the trauma through imaginary reliving, and repeated exposure to safe situations being avoided because of traumatic fear.
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It's time to get this right! I can fight until I'm blue in the face to get them to go for help, but if the help is not working, if it is not the best and if it is not working, then what good will it do? What's the point of still doing what does not work?

If my husband received help when he came back from Vietnam, if he knew what it was in 1971, then all indications are he would have recovered and not turned chronic. Back then there was ignorance as the excuse of the military and of the veterans dealing with PTSD. It was the excuse of the family to not see the signs and expect them to just get over it. We no longer have that excuse. We haven't had that excuse since the 90's! With so many Vietnam veterans coming back from their tours and experience of research providing in detail what PTSD is, it is a disgrace this nation never mobilized to address it. I still can't figure out why they are still emailing me wondering what PTSD is after all these years.

The exposure this has been given by the media is wonderful and things will happen, but what took them so long to put the spotlight on this so that the government was forced to address it?

For a psychotherapist specializing in PTSD, that’s a good thing

Professionals working to destigmatize PTSD
By MARTIN J. KIDSTON - Independent Record - 10/27/07
When Carroll Jenkins looks back over the past six years, he can’t help but credit the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks for creating a broader understanding of post traumatic stress disorder.

For a psychotherapist specializing in PTSD, that’s a good thing.

“It seems like our society has to get hit right upside the head, pretty hard, to get it,” Jenkins said Friday. “I think we’ve got it this time. I’ve been battling this sucker for years. To see people sit around talking about PTSD the way they are now — we’re destigmatizing it.”

Jenkins was recently contracted by the Montana National Guard to help train therapists across the state in recognizing and dealing with PTSD.

Now, nearly a month later, he’ll help the Montana Chapter of the National Association of Social Workers in a related conference to be held in Helena next month.

John Wilkinson, executive director of NASW-MT, said the organization will host what’s believed to be the largest conference ever held in the state dedicated entirely to post-combat stress and veteran care.
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Neglected by DIA and VA PTSD claims another life

Neglected by DIA and VA, defense employee suffered alone after stints in Iraq
By Erik Slavin, Stars and Stripes
Pacific edition, Sunday, October 28, 2007

EDITOR'S NOTE: This is the first in a three-day series about post-traumatic stress disorder. Today’s story looks at one man’s descent into a living hell with PTSD that his family says began as a civilian deployed to Iraq and ended in an Arizona cemetery. Monday’s story visits a group of South Korea-based troops who meet to deal with their issues. On Tuesday, Stripes explores the different types of care available to those suffering from the disorder across the Pacific.



In 2004, William Blair e-mailed his wife Noriko a picture of himself in an Iraqi jail cell.

Noriko knew he wasn’t a prisoner, but she knew little else about his job with the Defense Intelligence Agency.

When he returned from Iraq a year later after a second deployment, Noriko Blair realized that William wasn’t the same witty, calm, peaceful man she had married. But she did not know how badly he had been wounded.

After 38 years of serving his country as a retired active-duty soldier and a Defense Department civilian, Blair died in July 2006.

Death didn’t come from a bullet or a mortar round. It came from the anguish brought on by post-traumatic stress disorder and the heart attack that struck after alcohol abuse broke his body, his family said.

Blair’s death could have been prevented, said his son, his wife and a former colleague who served with him in some of the world’s toughest places.

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Seminar to Be Held to Help Veterans with PTSD

Prosser Soldier Speaks of His Personal Experience with PTSD
Seminar to Be Held to Help Veterans with PTSD



Friday, 10-26-07

Prosser -- The numbers of soldiers and Marines with post traumatic stress are rising. It is now believed that one in five returning from the mideast will be forever changed by PTSD.

Billy Petersen of Prosser is a former Army Medic who has been diagnosed with severe post traumatic stress disorder. This morning, Petersen detailed his experience since returning from his second tour in Iraq.

Petersen finds himself reacting strongly to sounds. When a car backfires, his first response is to duck, and hit the ground. He doesn't like to drive. And he also avoids traffic circles. Petersen says Iraq has hundreds of them, and that is where insurgents hide the bombs (IED, or improvised explosive devices). He said he shakes when he is traveling in a traffic circle.
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Pro-bono lawyers battle for wounded veterans with PTSD

Advocates for Vets


New York Lawyer
October 26, 2007

By Thomas Adcock
New York Law Journal

The City Bar Justice Center, the pro bono affiliate of the New York City Bar Association, launched the Veterans Legal Clinic this week in concert with attorneys from 10 Manhattan firms.

The new program will provide free counsel to low-income men and women returned home to the metropolitan area from wars in Afghanistan and Iraq - some of whom are homeless, and many suffering from severe physical and mental health problems.

One of a handful of such clinics around the country, the New York initiative was established in response to the anticipated needs of returnees from the "most sustained combat operations since the Vietnam era," as conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan were characterized in a joint statement by two New York state Assembly committees that held fact-finding public hearings in May.

The committees on mental health and veterans affairs said further in their statement that today's military personnel have especially high rates of post-traumatic stress disorder due to "lengthy and multiple tours of duty, decreased mortality rates and traumatic brain injuries."

Left untreated, post-traumatic stress disorder could lead to "devastating ramifications, including unemployment, substance abuse, homelessness or involvement with the criminal justice system," according to the statement.

On Wednesday afternoon, nearly 100 private firm volunteer lawyers gathered at city bar headquarters on West 44th Street for a three-hour training session in the fundamentals of Veterans Benefits Administration law and practical tips on filing for disability benefits.
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http://www.nylawyer.com/display.php/file=/probono/news/07/102607a

“Don't label yourself as crazy" after trauma

Emotional reactions normal, experts say
By R.J. Ignelzi
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER

October 26, 2007

You can't sleep. You scream at your kids. Your heart is racing. And you have no idea what day it is.

You're not losing your mind. You're stressed. And mental health professionals say these reactions are typical.


“Don't label yourself as crazy. You're going through a normal reaction to an abnormal event,” said Arpi Minassian, a psychologist at the University of California San Diego Burn Center.

Even as things calm down, people are bound to experience an array of emotions after the firestorms. And don't be surprised if your reactions are different from your neighbor's or your best friend's.

“Some people will be emotionally numb. Others will be angry or sad or irritable. It's important to know that all of these emotions are OK. It's normal,” said Jerry Gold, a psychologist who is director of Scripps Behavioral Health Services.

Other stress symptoms include anxiety and fear that the disaster will happen again, difficulty focusing and making decisions, hopelessness, spontaneous crying, increased or decreased eating, sleeplessness and nightmares.


Mental health tips
Mental health care professionals offer some coping strategies for the stress we're all feeling.

Talk about the event and your feelings with friends, relatives and colleagues.

Exercise to help relieve stress. Although a strenuous workout isn't recommended while the air quality is poor, try a passive indoor exercise such as meditation, yoga or stretching.

Turn off the television and the radio for a while.

Try to return to a normal schedule. Have meals and sleep at regular times.

Write it down.

Serve others.

Reach out to community groups, religious organizations or neighborhood gatherings for moral support.

Avoid overuse of alcohol or drugs.
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Hugs For Life raises suicide awareness

Event raises suicide awareness
Hugs for Life aims to get word out about an issue that 'affects everyone'
By Pomera M. Fronce
Close-Up Correspondent
Article Last Updated: 10/25/2007 11:29:53 AM MDT

Sheri Thomas will always remember the phone call.

The news she received was devastating - the kind of news no one should ever have to hear. Her 19-year-old nephew, Jonathan Hickam, had committed suicide.

"It was the worst feeling I have ever felt," Thomas recalls.

She remembers being in shock and adrenaline overdrive at the same time because she was trying to be strong for her sister.

Thomas wanted to turn back the hands of time, but realized she couldn't. Instead, she turned her grief into action and established a suicide prevention and awareness organization called Hugs for Life.

Members of the organization work tirelessly to get the word out that suicide is not an option. They believe that education and communication are key in reducing the number of suicides in Utah each year.

"First, we try to help people understand that suicide knows no boundaries," Thomas says. "It affects everyone regardless of race, religion, gender or economic status. Second, we encourage people to talk about suicide openly and honestly."

In the past, Thomas adds, it was almost deemed unacceptable for anyone to talk about feeling suicidal and to seek help. And when it was too late to intervene, family members may have talked in hushed tones about the suicide, but rarely outside of the home.
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http://www.sltrib.com/southvalley/ci_7278755

Claims of PTSD being "over-used" avoid reality

"Trauma survivors have a different outlook. There is a new sense of danger and vulnerability," he said. "But it doesn't mean you're not resilient."

Forum looks at storm victims, war veterans
Groups have much in common
By MEGHA SATYANARAYANA
megha@sunherald.com

War and a hurricane - when it comes to mental trauma, the two aren't so different.
This was one conclusion of a forum Thursday night featuring two mental-health professionals and a Sun Herald staff writer. The seminar was about post-traumatic stress syndrome, the recognized precursor of post-traumatic stress disorder.

Mental trauma after the storm fell into two categories, said Steve Barrilleaux, director of Outpatient Services at Gulf Coast Mental Health Center in Gulfport. There were those with no mental-health problems before Katrina, who afterward began feeling anxiety and depression for the first time. Then there were those with pre-existing issues, which the hurricane exacerbated.
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http://www.sunherald.com/201/story/172947.html

"But these symptoms alone are not enough for a PTSD diagnosis, which he said is overused." Barrilleaux went on to claim.

If anything, it is under diagnosed.
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
Navy Psychologist Warns of Mental Health Provider, PTSD Training Shortfalls

From USA Today:


From his distant vantage point treating Marines at a base in Iwakuni, Japan, [Navy Cmdr. Mark] Russell, 46, has been speaking out for three years that the U.S. military faces a mental health crisis in the treatment of its combat veterans.

He has fired off memos to higher command and has gone public with his views, an unusual step for many in the military. Russell discussed his concerns in phone and Internet interviews. "We cannot provide the standard of care to treat PTSD via psychotherapy when we can barely keep up with new referrals and have to manage crises while filling in for the staffing gaps and vacancies due to deployment, attrition or no billeting," Russell says. "This is why I have been so outspoken."
http://ptsdcombat.blogspot.com/2007/01/navy-psychologist-warns-of-mental.html

From NAMI
How common is PTSD?
Studies suggest that anywhere between 2 percent and 9 percent of the population has had some degree of PTSD. However, the likelihood of developing the disorder is greater when someone is exposed to multiple traumas or traumatic events early in life (or both), especially if the trauma is long term or repeated. More cases of this disorder are found among inner-city youths and people who have recently emigrated from troubled countries. And women seem to develop PTSD more often than men.

Veterans are perhaps the people most often associated with PTSD, or what was once referred to as "shell shock" or "battle fatigue." The Anxiety Disorders Association of America notes that an estimated 15 percent to 30 percent of the 3.5 million men and women who served in Vietnam have suffered from PTSD.

What are the symptoms of PTSD?Although the symptoms for individuals with PTSD can vary considerably, they generally fall into three categories:

Re-experience - Individuals with PTSD often experience recurrent and intrusive recollections of and/or nightmares about the stressful event. Some may experience flashbacks, hallucinations, or other vivid feelings of the event happening again. Others experience great psychological or physiological distress when certain things (objects, situations, etc.) remind them of the event.
Avoidance - Many with PTSD will persistently avoid things that remind them of the traumatic event. This can result in avoiding everything from thoughts, feelings, or conversations associated with the incident to activities, places, or people that cause them to recall the event. In others there may be a general lack of responsiveness signaled by an inability to recall aspects of the trauma, a decreased interest in formerly important activities, a feeling of detachment from others, a limited range of emotion, and/or feelings of hopelessness about the future.

Increased arousal - Symptoms in this area may include difficulty falling or staying asleep, irritability or outbursts of anger, difficulty concentrating, becoming very alert or watchful, and/or jumpiness or being easily startled.

It is important to note that those with PTSD often use alcohol or other drugs in an attempt to self-medicate. Individuals with this disorder may also be at an increased risk for suicide.
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http://www.nami.org/Template.cfm?Section=
By_Illness&template=/ContentManagement/
ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=10095

Dr. Sanjay Gupta, and the CNN Medical Unit

It's no surprise that most people who endure a traumatic event suffer from some symptoms of PTSD, but the effects will often subside. According to the US Department of Health and Human Services, about 8 percent of men and 20 percent of women go on to develop PTSD and roughly 20 percent of those people develop a chronic lifelong form of it. The condition is associated with other ailments such as increased risk of heart disease in men.

In terms of children, Stanford researchers found that severe stress can damage a child's brain. They looked at children suffering from PTSD as result of severe abuse and found that they often suffered a decrease in the size of the hippocampus - a part of the brain involved in memory processing and emotion. What's even more startling is that this effect on the brain may make it even harder for them to process normal stress for the rest of their lives. These days, more and more money and attention is being directed towards PTSD research, due in great part to the war. As troops come home from Iraq and Afghanistan, as many as 13 percent are found to have PTSD. There can be thousands more whose conditions go undiagnosed.

http://www.cnn.com/HEALTH/blogs/paging.dr.gupta
/2007/08/back-to-va-tech-ptsd-concerns.html

Anyone can claim whatever they want if they have a title after their name but if they have no, or little, background dealing with PTSD, they will make claims that are not educated ones. I've read what they've had to say for 25 years. The professionals who write what is lived with and through are the ones I trust. If they come out with claims that PTSD is over used, I don't trust them.

There have been too many cases of someone having PTSD and not being diagnosed with it. Over 22,000 veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan were given "personality disorder" markers instead of PTSD. Max Cleland, triple amputee, ex-senator, ex-head of the VA, was diagnosed with depression and treated for that since Vietnam, but it turned out, he too had PTSD.