Local Veterans Talk About Experience With P.T.S.D.

With all the media attention on our veterans with PTSD, it's a wonderful thing. They are finally talking about it and understanding that it's a wound and nothing to be ashamed of at all. The question is, why are so many other veterans still ashamed that others have been wounded by this? Is it because they don't understand it? Is it because as the previous post, they think the rest of the country views them all as either having PTSD or psychotropic? My guess is that they don't understand it at all.

These are the same men and women they served with, fought next to, depended on for their lives and the same ones they knew they could count on to be there for them in the heat of battle. This they forget about. When their "brothers" end up wounded by PTSD, their battle is still going on but some butt heads decide they'd rather suddenly be ashamed to associate with them just in case someone else thinks "they're nuts too." One day they will understand that it is not the fact the media is reporting on PTSD that is the problem. The problem is them because they would rather walk away from a brother in need of help than help them. Pathetic.

PTSD is not a guaranteed anything. It is not guaranteed they will commit crimes any more than it's a guarantee they will be so destroyed by it they no longer want to live. If you ask the generals with the courage to admit they had PTSD and got help to heal, they will explain that one to you. It is not suddenly they are so dysfunctional they need to be institutionalized either. If they had a clue they would know that PTSD has all different kinds of levels and outcomes but the uniting factor is how much support they get to heal. We lost too many Vietnam veterans because they were not supported to talk about what was going on and felt they had to hide it. Had the media been interested or able to even get them to talk, we would be a lot further in getting the public to understand it, but it is what it is. For those with no understanding of what PTSD is and feel they are being looked at as if they had it, they need to either understand it or shut up about it and let the grownups deal with healing the wounded.

I marvel at the people joining in walks for breast cancer. Do we assume they all have it? No, we assume they have compassion for the women suffering from it.

NAMI, National Alliance on Mental Illness have walks as well. Do we assume they are all mentally ill? No, we assume they also have compassion.

Some people work in drug rehabs but we don't assume they were all drug addicts. Just as some people work with veterans but are not veterans. We just assume they have compassion for them and care about them. It's really time the dimwitted get out of the way and stop trying to get the rest of the country to stop taking PTSD seriously just because they managed to come home fine.

To the men and women veterans speaking out, you are courageous and marvelous. Because of you, many more will no longer be ashamed of being wounded or afraid to seek help. Because of you talking about this, more families will understand it and less will fall apart. Because of you, fewer and fewer will feel so hopeless to the point where they think suicide is the only way to end their own pain.

Local Veterans Talk About Experience With P.T.S.D.


Posted: 9:02 PM Apr 30, 2009
Last Updated: 9:10 PM Apr 30, 2009
Reporter: Christine Kennedy

It is the unseen battle wound, but one that can no less impact a veterans life for the rest of his or her life. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Sure, you've heard of it, but to really hear what it's like to live with it is something quite different.

From the Vietnam War, to Operation Desert Storm/Desert Shield, to Operation Iraqi Freedom men and women here in the east are suffering from P.T.S.D.... Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

Don Overton Heads up a local support group for vets suffering from the stress disorder. You could say he's got a double whammy. During the time he served in Desert Storm/Desert Shield he lost part of his hand and his vision, but he says the worst injury he received was the invisible battle wound also known as P.T.S.D.
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Local Veterans Talk About Experience With P.T.S.D.

Government injecting veterans with cocaine for drug addiction research?

Government injecting veterans with cocaine for drug addiction research
By: Bill Myers
Examiner Staff Writer
04/29/09 9:05 PM
Drug-addicted veterans are being injected with cocaine by researchers at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs in taxpayer-funded studies, The Examiner has learned.

The study subjects are being given the injections as part of a search for medicines that researchers hope will block cocaine absorption in the body, said Timothy O’Leary, the VA’s acting director of research and development.

All the subjects were recruited because they were addicted to cocaine, O’Leary said. About 40 volunteers — most of them veterans — are being given injections at VA labs in Kansas City and San Antonio, he added.

Hundreds of veterans have apparently been used as human subjects in the past decade, according to records and interviews with officials.

The VA has handed over several other abstracts from studies over the past decade, and O’Leary said his agency has been conducting such research for at least 25 years.

O’Leary said that the subjects’ safety was paramount. But documents of a decade-old study that tested morphine on veterans found nearly 800 “adverse events” from anorexia to heart tremors.
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Government injecting veterans with cocaine for drug addiction research

Training Afghans as Bullets Fly: A Young Marine’s Dream Job

While reading this article from Afghanistan I was troubled by what read.

“If you do what I do, then they think either you should have PTSD or you are some sort of psychopath.” PTSD is post-traumatic stress disorder.

Is that what some of them really think? Or is it what they think we think about them? Or maybe it's just tough talk? We don't know but we do know how a lot of them come home. No, not all with the wound of PTSD, but far too many. We don't understand it anymore than we understand why it is that some neighborhood kid has it within them to join the military and be able to "do what they do" and like it. We don't understand it anymore than we can understand what makes a cop become a cop or a firefighter decide he wants to run into burning buildings for a living. We can't understand them because we are not them, we need them, constantly depending on them to do what needs to be done and then somehow, we end up forgetting all about what they did for us when they end up needing us.

The comment made is a truthful one. They don't all end up as psychopath or wounded, but they all end up changed by what they go thru. Some are made differently than the rest of us and we should thank God they are.

Training Afghans as Bullets Fly: A Young Marine’s Dream Job

By C. J. CHIVERS
Published: April 30, 2009
FIREBASE VIMOTO, Afghanistan — Three stone houses and a cluster of sandbagged bunkers cling to a slope above the Korangal Valley, forming an oval perimeter roughly 75 yards long. The oval is reinforced with timber and ringed with concertina wire.

An Afghan flag flutters atop a tower where Afghan soldiers look out, ducking when rifle shots snap by.

This is Firebase Vimoto, named for Pfc. Timothy R. Vimoto, an American soldier killed in the valley two years ago. If all goes according to the Pentagon’s plan, this tiny perimeter — home to an Afghan platoon and two Marine Corps infantrymen — contains the future of Afghanistan. The Obama administration hopes that eventually the Afghan soldiers within will become self-sufficient, allowing the fight against the Taliban to be shifted to local hands.

He woke the next day before 4 a.m. for a patrol. As he slipped into his ammunition vest, he groused that back home, when conversations drift to the war, the infantry too often is misunderstood. “You know what I don’t like about America?” he said, in the chill beneath lingering stars. “If you do what I do, then they think either you should have PTSD or you are some sort of psychopath.” PTSD is post-traumatic stress disorder.

He exhaled cigarette smoke. “This is my job,” he said. “There’s nothing wrong with it.”

The war in Afghanistan defies generalization. Each province, each valley and each village can be its own universe, presenting its own problems and demanding its own solutions.
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Training Afghans as Bullets Fly: A Young Marine’s Dream Job

U.S. Sues New York City on Iraq Veteran’s Behalf

April 30, 2009, 6:16 pm
U.S. Sues City on Iraq Veteran’s Behalf
By Jennifer 8. Lee
The federal government sued New York City on Thursday on behalf of an Iraq war veteran who says he was denied a promotion in the city’s Department of Correction because he was on active duty when promotions were being considered.

The veteran, Emilio Pennes, is a lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserve, and has worked for the Correction Department since 1987. According to the complaint, he applied for a promotion to deputy warden shortly before he was activated for duty in 2007. He was unable to attend a promotion interview in person, and so was passed over for the promotion even though he had been ranked first in an internal selection memo, the complaint said.

On a previous tour of duty in 2004 and 2005, he served in Iraq, near Tikrit.
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U.S. Sues City on Iraq Veteran’s Behalf

New Wheelchair operates by power of thought

Wheelchair operates by power of thought
Published: April 30, 2009
ZARAGOZA, Spain, April 30 (UPI) -- Spanish university scientists have developed a wheelchair controlled by the power of thought, promising to transform life for people with severe disabilities.

The wheelchair, developed at the University of Zaragoza, has a laser sensor and a screen that displays a real-time, three-dimensional virtual reconstruction of the wheelchair's surroundings. To steer the chair, a user concentrates on the part of the display where he or she wants to go, and electrodes in a skullcap detect the user's brain activity and work out the destination, the researchers said.
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Wheelchair operates by power of thought

Walter Reed Hospital touts 100 years of military health

Walter Reed touts 100 years of military health

By Kamala Lane - The Associated Press
Posted : Thursday Apr 30, 2009 16:43:13 EDT

WASHINGTON — At a time when many hospitals operated with few resources and in unsanitary conditions, the Walter Reed Army Medical Center was a state-of the-art facility — boasting electricity, indoor plumbing and an elevator.

Since it opened its doors in 1909, the facility has treated six U.S. presidents and thousands of injured people from conflicts dating back to World War I. But the hospital also has come under criticism recently for its deteriorating service and facilities.

On Friday, the hospital will reflect on the legacy of its namesake and its history as it marks its centennial anniversary.

The institution’s involvement in medical development is “profoundly important,” said Dale C. Smith, a medical historian and professor at Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Md.

“Throughout 100 years when American medicine and military medicine are making important changes, the name of Walter Reed is in the story,” Smith said.

The hospital has been hosting tours of its buildings this week and sponsored a symposium of its history on Wednesday. It plans to hold a formal ceremony and ball Friday to wrap-up the celebration.

The northwest Washington facility was named for Maj. Walter Reed, a Virginia native who earned two medical degrees by the age of 21, and served for 27 years in the Army. He is best known for leading a research team that uncovered new breakthroughs that led to the treatment of yellow fever in the early 1900s.
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Walter Reed touts 100 years of military health

Many Holocaust survivors live with PTSD

Many Holocaust survivors live with PTSD

By DONNA KOEHN

The Tampa Tribune

Published: April 30, 2009

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TAMPA - The final years are supposed to be a time of reflection, of pride in one's children and grandchildren, of looking back with satisfaction on accomplishments of a life well-lived.

To survivors of the Holocaust and combat soldiers of World War II, they instead can bring nightmares, terrifying flashbacks and a rekindling of trauma submerged but never really put to rest.

Maya Lazarus sees it in those who attend Holocaust survivor support groups through Gulf Coast Jewish Family Services in Hillsborough and Pinellas counties.

"They are reliving it for the second time," she says. "For them, it is happening all over again."

They shun psychotherapy, but almost all take sleeping pills to help fend off nightmares, she says. Jewish nursing homes now renovate showers to look more homey and less like the dreaded gas chambers.

"All of them are hoarding bread like crazy," Lazarus says. "Food is always an issue because they were once starving."

Eric Gentry of Compassion Unlimited of Sarasota is an expert in the treatment of late-onset Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

People who survived the Holocaust, as well as combat veterans of World War II, are especially vulnerable to the effects of PTSD in later years because no one realized at the time how devastating such experiences could be in the long term, he says.

PTSD — afflicting those who suffer a traumatic event and subsequently experience anxiety and a variety of debilitating symptoms — became widely studied after the Vietnam War.
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Many Holocaust survivors live with PTSD

New ad from IAVA does nothing for me

Paul Rieckhoff, Iraq Veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA) has been a great advocate for Iraq and Afghanistan veterans. I enjoyed hearing him on his many TV appearances and appreciated his candor when addressing the needs of our veterans. He has learned a lot over the years but with this ad following the other ad, he shows he has a lot more to learn. Maybe I'm just too old to appreciate this latest ad? While I really wish they had public service ads when Vietnam veterans came home, it's clear that this kind of ad wouldn't have done them much good.

If they really want to put together a ad worthy of the service of our veterans they need to do a better job.

Personally, separating Iraq and Afghanistan veterans from other veterans is not the right way to go, but this is an organization just for IAVA, so I understand that part. What they could do, since a lot of the Iraq and Afghanistan veterans are also children of Vietnam veterans is to show a father and son, wearing baseball hats, one Vietnam and one with Iraq or Afghanistan veteran on it, and then have a simple message of, "I know where you've been and I'm here for you" without them even having to say a word. A quick, meaningful message that will touch every Vietnam veteran along with the newer generation of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans sharing the same emotional price and the wounds within the walls of their souls. If anyone is going to offer any help or guidance to the new veterans, it's the Vietnam veterans simply because had it not been for them PTSD wouldn't even be acknowledge as a wound.

The Ad Council needs to do a lot more homework before they put together another ad.

This part they got right;

Friends and family play a crucial role in supporting their men and women in uniform, and now it's our turn to support them.

So why not show what families can do and have been doing across the country as a role model? I fully understand that some will take this the wrong way and I'll get slammed, but as most of you know I cannot keep my thoughts to myself when it comes to our veterans. Had I remained silent on this and just posted it, then I would be a hypocrite because of how often I slam the VA and the DOD for what they do. Not that the IAVA would ever consider what I have to say now when they haven't in the past either.

"What was it like? Were you scared? Are you OK?"
For anyone who has welcomed someone home from Iraq or Afghanistan, these questions may sound familiar.
After spending months, or years, apart, being reunited at the end of a deployment is a welcome relief. It means the end of waiting for phone calls and worrying about a loved one's safety. But millions of families and friends of veterans are finding that coming home isn't always easy.
For them, we have one message: we can help you start the conversation.
Today, we're launching a massive new effort, in partnership with the Ad Council, to empower the friends and family members of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, and to offer support and guidance after a deployment.
Click here to watch our new television ad at SupportYourVet.org. Then please forward it your friends and family, and help us reach our goal of 100,000 views by Mother's Day, May 10th.
Starting today, the ad will be on TV, as well as radio, online and in magazines and newspapers. Hundreds of media companies, from local television stations to national magazines, are offering to run them free of charge, by donating ad space. Because of their generosity, we'll be able to reach friends and family members of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans in every corner of the country.
Click here to watch the television ad, and learn more about this effort at SupportYourVet.org.
With the drawdown in Iraq and a new wave of troops heading to Afghanistan, these ads are launching at a critical time. Friends and family play a crucial role in supporting their men and women in uniform, and now it's our turn to support them.
Please take a minute to watch the ad now.

Nevada senate OKs veterans court

Nevada senate OKs veterans court
Associated Press • April 30, 2009

The state Senate voted unanimously Wednesday for a plan that would allow for specialized courts for military veterans charged with nonviolent crimes while struggling to readjust to civilian life.

Assembly Bill 187 was approved earlier in the Assembly but must return there for approval of Senate amendments before it can be sent to Gov. Jim Gibbons.

Advocates of AB 187, proposed by Assembly Speaker Barbara Buckley, D-Las Vegas, said it would help veterans charged with crimes and who suffer from mental or substance abuse problems stemming from their service.
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Nevada senate OKs veterans court

6-year-old boy accepts dad’s Silver Star

Army via AP First Lt. Jonathan Brostrom was killed July 13 in Afghanistan, one of nine soldiers killed when Taliban guerrillas ambushed an Army outpost.

6-year-old boy accepts dad’s Silver Star
The Associated Press
Posted : Thursday Apr 30, 2009 13:09:20 EDT

WEST HAVEN, Utah — A 6-year-old Plain City boy has been presented with the Silver Star awarded posthumously to his father, who died in a firefight in Afghanistan.
The medal for valor was presented to Jase Spargur on Wednesday during an assembly at Kanesville Elementary School in West Haven. Utah National Guard Maj. Gen. Brian Tarbet gave the medal to Jase. His father, 1st Lt. Jonathan Brostrom, was killed July 13 in Afghanistan.
Brostrom was one of nine soldiers killed when Taliban guerrillas ambushed an Army outpost. Brostrom died carrying medical supplies and ammunition to other soldiers.
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6-year-old boy accepts dad’s Silver Star