Former Lejeune Marine receiving partial disability due to water contamination
October 29, 2009 1:10 AM
HOPE HODGE
A former Camp Lejeune Marine who received partial disability benefits because of exposure to contaminated water on base believes other veterans should go to their doctors to get their claims substantiated.
John Hartung of Waukesha, Wis., was awarded a 30-percent disability from the Veterans Benefits Administration last month after his doctor drafted and signed a “nexus letter” verifying his medical belief that Hartung’s ailments were more likely than not caused by exposure to toxic water.
Hartung was stationed at Lejeune for six months in 1977 and said he “got sick right away” after exposure to base water, which contained significant amounts of leaked solvents including TCE and PCE between the 1950s and the 1980s. Hartung said he developed large cysts on the back of his neck as well as chronic fatigue and was discharged from the Marine Corps in 1978 because of continuing medical problems.
read more here
http://www.jdnews.com/news/disability-69320-partial-veterans.html
Thursday, October 29, 2009
President Obama kept his promise on PTSD
When President Obama was running for the office, he made a trip to the Montana National Guard to take a look at the program they came up with to address suicides. Keep in mind that while I track this all day long everyday, then Senator Obama had a lot of other things to pay attention to. I knew this was one of the best programs out there, but so did Obama. That told me something right there. The man not only cared but was paying attention. He paid attention so much that he told the brother of Chris Dana, who committed suicide, that he would make sure this program went national if he ended up elected. President Obama just kept his promise with this.
Vet counseling programs national models
The Associated Press - The Associated Press
Posted : Thursday Oct 29, 2009 7:41:50 EDT
CONCORD, N.H. — Two veterans counseling measures based on New Hampshire programs have been signed into law.
The suicide prevention amendment was sponsored by Sen. Jeanne Shaheen and Congressman Paul Hodes. It requires that the Department of Defense establish a program to provide National Guard members and reservists, their families, and communities with training in suicide prevention and counseling in response to suicide.
The Yellow Ribbon Plus amendment, also sponsored by Shaheen, calls on the department to identify lessons learned from programs such as one in New Hampshire that identified the need for more personalized counseling and support services for National Guard and reservists and their families.
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/10/ap_veterans_counseling_102909/
Recalculating GPS
Last year I had to take a trip into Tiffin Ohio. I wear glasses to read, which is a problem when trying to drive and read directions. I cannot see distances with the glasses on so I stretched out my arm trying to read and watch the road at the same time. It was a huge problem on this trip because I ended up lost in corn fields. Miles and miles of corn fields with no one to ask for directions. I kept looking at the directions trying to figure out where I went wrong, what turn I was supposed to take and getting really anxious. I needed to be at an important meeting on time but getting there was becoming to look more and more impossible until I decided to take a road I had not been on, ending up at a small restaurant where I received the directions to get me back on the right road.
Since I travel a lot plus end up getting lost no matter where I go, my daughter gave me a GPS for Christmas last year. We played with the voices ending up picking Daniel with a British voice. Hearing his accent pronounce streets in Florida is hilarious but Daniel never allows me to become totally lost like that trip into Ohio. The GPS goes with me on planes and traveling around in Florida providing me with the confidence I need to get to where I am supposed to be.
Daniel watches over the road I'm on from a satellite, giving me instructions ahead of time, showing me every turn on the road ahead plus an arrow to tell me where they next turn will be. Whenever I mess up, Daniel tells me he is recalculating so that I get on the right road again. No matter how badly I mess up, he always gets me to where I'm going.
Our lives are much like my driving. We may know where we are supposed to end up but taking the best way there is often met with our will, ego and inability to read the signs. We get lost. When we have no clue what God's Plan is, that makes it even harder. We may have some indication of what we were intended for, but life's challenges get in the way as well. Bad advice can have us taking a totally wrong turn. The interference of others can cause detours but God somehow manages to get us back on the right road if we listen to His directions.
God's Plan Succeeds when we follow His lead but we cannot hear His voice. We forget He's watching over us much like Daniel's screen would be totally blank if I did not charge the battery. While Daniel still knows how to get me where I'm going, it does me no good if I allow the battery to die. It is the same way with God. If we allow what connects us to God, our faith, to run dry, it is as if it was not there at all. We're totally lost, alone and confused.
With some luck we may end up with directions from someone but we can never really be sure they are putting us on the right road or not. How could we be when we are no longer sure of where we are supposed to go?
When we are living out our days, we are traveling on a path that will affect our future. Each day we take what came before and we use the knowledge of successes and failures hoping we learn from both. Sometimes our past includes traumatic events and sometimes those events end up getting us on the wrong path, causing us to stop dead in our tracks or totally turning us around so that we never really get to where we are supposed to go.
Civilians will experience at least one traumatic event in their lives. The death of someone they love is always traumatic but especially traumatic when it is from an accident, fire, natural disaster or crime. Some of us will be involved with traumatic events in our own lives or we may witness them. These events leave all of us changed.
Some of us enter into law enforcement or emergency services like the fire department. They will experience more trauma than the average citizen as they fulfill their duties. They are changed with each one.
Some of us enter into the military and in times of war, the traumatic experiences occur more often than most individuals are prepared to recover from easily. When the person is a compassionate individual, those events end up cutting into them. Some end up with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, an anxiety disorder, caused by events and not by the person. PTSD can only come after trauma. The word "trauma" is Greek for "wound" leaving this a very telling term to use. It literally means "after trauma" fully explaining why people change after events out of their control.
This is where a GPS would come in very handy. There would be a calm voice while we are afraid telling us where to go for help. That the wrong choices we made in our lives were due to detours others put before us and there was a way to no longer be lost because we were being watched over. We were not traveling on this road by ourselves and had someone showing us the way.
We actually have all we need to recover but most of us have let that connection die. Everything we need to heal in within us and around us but it takes plugging into the sources and recharging the power.
We need to connect to the knowledge of what PTSD is accumulated over the last 30 years. We need to connect to the faith that we had so that we can heal the wound within our minds and reclaim our hope.
It is all there. We have a GPS showing the way to healing so that we can get back to where we are supposed to go.
What can happen when you heal is that you help others heal by watching over them and making them feel sure they are not alone.
Since I travel a lot plus end up getting lost no matter where I go, my daughter gave me a GPS for Christmas last year. We played with the voices ending up picking Daniel with a British voice. Hearing his accent pronounce streets in Florida is hilarious but Daniel never allows me to become totally lost like that trip into Ohio. The GPS goes with me on planes and traveling around in Florida providing me with the confidence I need to get to where I am supposed to be.
Daniel watches over the road I'm on from a satellite, giving me instructions ahead of time, showing me every turn on the road ahead plus an arrow to tell me where they next turn will be. Whenever I mess up, Daniel tells me he is recalculating so that I get on the right road again. No matter how badly I mess up, he always gets me to where I'm going.
Our lives are much like my driving. We may know where we are supposed to end up but taking the best way there is often met with our will, ego and inability to read the signs. We get lost. When we have no clue what God's Plan is, that makes it even harder. We may have some indication of what we were intended for, but life's challenges get in the way as well. Bad advice can have us taking a totally wrong turn. The interference of others can cause detours but God somehow manages to get us back on the right road if we listen to His directions.
God's Plan Succeeds when we follow His lead but we cannot hear His voice. We forget He's watching over us much like Daniel's screen would be totally blank if I did not charge the battery. While Daniel still knows how to get me where I'm going, it does me no good if I allow the battery to die. It is the same way with God. If we allow what connects us to God, our faith, to run dry, it is as if it was not there at all. We're totally lost, alone and confused.
With some luck we may end up with directions from someone but we can never really be sure they are putting us on the right road or not. How could we be when we are no longer sure of where we are supposed to go?
When we are living out our days, we are traveling on a path that will affect our future. Each day we take what came before and we use the knowledge of successes and failures hoping we learn from both. Sometimes our past includes traumatic events and sometimes those events end up getting us on the wrong path, causing us to stop dead in our tracks or totally turning us around so that we never really get to where we are supposed to go.
Civilians will experience at least one traumatic event in their lives. The death of someone they love is always traumatic but especially traumatic when it is from an accident, fire, natural disaster or crime. Some of us will be involved with traumatic events in our own lives or we may witness them. These events leave all of us changed.
Some of us enter into law enforcement or emergency services like the fire department. They will experience more trauma than the average citizen as they fulfill their duties. They are changed with each one.
Some of us enter into the military and in times of war, the traumatic experiences occur more often than most individuals are prepared to recover from easily. When the person is a compassionate individual, those events end up cutting into them. Some end up with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, an anxiety disorder, caused by events and not by the person. PTSD can only come after trauma. The word "trauma" is Greek for "wound" leaving this a very telling term to use. It literally means "after trauma" fully explaining why people change after events out of their control.
This is where a GPS would come in very handy. There would be a calm voice while we are afraid telling us where to go for help. That the wrong choices we made in our lives were due to detours others put before us and there was a way to no longer be lost because we were being watched over. We were not traveling on this road by ourselves and had someone showing us the way.
We actually have all we need to recover but most of us have let that connection die. Everything we need to heal in within us and around us but it takes plugging into the sources and recharging the power.
We need to connect to the knowledge of what PTSD is accumulated over the last 30 years. We need to connect to the faith that we had so that we can heal the wound within our minds and reclaim our hope.
It is all there. We have a GPS showing the way to healing so that we can get back to where we are supposed to go.
Posted to Great Americans by NamGuardianAngel on September 10, 2009
What can happen when you heal is that you help others heal by watching over them and making them feel sure they are not alone.
President Obama attends return of fallen troops from Afghanistan
As sad as it is to lose so many on one day, we must think of the families. We must also acknowledge that the men and women these service members served with will grieve as well.
It's so easy to pray for them when we send them, that God watches over them. The risk is obvious to all of us. It is easy to pray for them when they are risking their lives facing dangers all day, every day. We say a prayer of thanks when they come home. Too many of us then believe our obligation to them ends, no more need for prayers or to do anything for them. We must keep them in our hearts and our prayers even then because the need to find peace, the need to heal and to feel God's love is just as strong as the day they left. That is because no one returns from war the same way. All are touched by what they witnessed. They do their duty even with their pain and far too many need help to heal. Be ever watchful over them and remember just because they're back, that does not mean the risk to their lives is over. We lose 18 veterans a day by suicide and over 10,000 a year try to commit suicide. Families fall apart in a time when they need to support each other the most.
Never forget the sacrifice they all make for the sake of this nation they serve.
It's so easy to pray for them when we send them, that God watches over them. The risk is obvious to all of us. It is easy to pray for them when they are risking their lives facing dangers all day, every day. We say a prayer of thanks when they come home. Too many of us then believe our obligation to them ends, no more need for prayers or to do anything for them. We must keep them in our hearts and our prayers even then because the need to find peace, the need to heal and to feel God's love is just as strong as the day they left. That is because no one returns from war the same way. All are touched by what they witnessed. They do their duty even with their pain and far too many need help to heal. Be ever watchful over them and remember just because they're back, that does not mean the risk to their lives is over. We lose 18 veterans a day by suicide and over 10,000 a year try to commit suicide. Families fall apart in a time when they need to support each other the most.
Never forget the sacrifice they all make for the sake of this nation they serve.
Obama attends return of fallen troops from Afghanistan
October 29, 2009 8:46 a.m. EDT
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
President Obama was on hand as bodies of soldiers who died in Afghanistan returned home
DEA agents, U.S. troops were recently killed in helicopter crash
Eight U.S. soldiers also killed by roadside bomb in Afghanistan
(CNN) -- The flag-draped cases of 18 Americans killed in Afghanistan arrived at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware early Thursday, in a solemn event attended by President Obama.
Also in attendance for the transfer of the bodies were U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and Michele Leonhart, acting DEA administrator.
The bodies were of three Drug Enforcement Administration special agents and 15 U.S. troops who died in Afghanistan this week.
The DEA agents were killed Monday as they returned from a raid on a compound believed to be harboring insurgents tied to drug trafficking. Their helicopter with seven troops aboard went down in western Afghanistan.
go here for more and for video
http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/10/29/dover.bodies/index.html
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
PTSD:Your Gastrointestinal disorders could be part of PTSD
ACG: GI Disorders in Military, 9/11 Responders Studied
Active-duty military and World Trade Center responders may have higher disorder ratesPublish date: Oct 26, 2009
MONDAY, Oct. 26 (HealthDay News) -- Active-duty military personnel and World Trade Center (WTC) workers have an increased risk of gastrointestinal disorders, according to two studies presented this week at the American College of Gastroenterology Annual Scientific Meeting, held from Oct. 23 to 28 in San Diego.
In one study, Mark Riddle, M.D., of the Naval Medical Research Center in Silver Spring, Md., and colleagues analyzed data from the Defense Medical Surveillance System to identify 31,866 cases of functional gastrointestinal disorders and matched each case to four controls. They found a strong association between infectious gastroenteritis and all functional gastrointestinal disorders, observing the highest risk for functional diarrhea and irritable bowel syndrome (odds ratios, 6.28 and 3.72, respectively).
In a second study, Yvette Lam, M.D., of the Stony Brook University Medical Center in New York, and colleagues studied 697 World Trade Center responders. They found that 41 percent of subjects had gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), more than 20 percent higher than in the general population. In addition, participants with GERD had a higher prevalence of mental health disorders such as post-traumatic stress disorder and depression.
read more here
GI Disorders in Military, 9/11 Responders Studied
Active-duty military and World Trade Center responders may have higher disorder ratesPublish date: Oct 26, 2009
MONDAY, Oct. 26 (HealthDay News) -- Active-duty military personnel and World Trade Center (WTC) workers have an increased risk of gastrointestinal disorders, according to two studies presented this week at the American College of Gastroenterology Annual Scientific Meeting, held from Oct. 23 to 28 in San Diego.
In one study, Mark Riddle, M.D., of the Naval Medical Research Center in Silver Spring, Md., and colleagues analyzed data from the Defense Medical Surveillance System to identify 31,866 cases of functional gastrointestinal disorders and matched each case to four controls. They found a strong association between infectious gastroenteritis and all functional gastrointestinal disorders, observing the highest risk for functional diarrhea and irritable bowel syndrome (odds ratios, 6.28 and 3.72, respectively).
In a second study, Yvette Lam, M.D., of the Stony Brook University Medical Center in New York, and colleagues studied 697 World Trade Center responders. They found that 41 percent of subjects had gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), more than 20 percent higher than in the general population. In addition, participants with GERD had a higher prevalence of mental health disorders such as post-traumatic stress disorder and depression.
read more here
GI Disorders in Military, 9/11 Responders Studied
Veteran talks about stress disorder
Veteran talks about stress disorder
By Meghan Walsh, Staff Writer
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
“I didn’t have issues. There were just stupid people around me doing stupid things,” Eddie Black told about 50 people at Southwestern Oregon Community College on Tuesday night.
That’s how Black felt when he returned home from serving in Baghdad, Iraq, in 2005. Other soldiers from his company were getting divorced and drinking heavily. They couldn’t control their anger. But Black was “peachy keen.”
In reality, the U.S. Army Infantry and Marine Corps veteran was suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Like many veterans, however, his own perceptions of mental health and cultural stigmatisms prevented him from seeking help.
“I remember thinking to myself, ‘Is this what it’s like to be pregnant and have all those horBetween 2000 and 2006, 1,066 male Oregon veterans committed suicide. That averages about 3.7 deaths a week. Yet, PTSD only recently has been brought to the forefront of society’s consciousness.
go here for more
Maybe you can see better that PTSD is not new just because it's now news.
That's the bulk of the problem here. Wishing people like me were listened to that long ago will not bring back a single life lost, a son or daughter, a mother or father. Praying people like me are finally listened to may save lives in the future but what about today?
The poison lingers for some veterans
The poison lingers for some veterans
Veterans feeling effects
AGENT ORANGE STILL A SCOURGE
By Aaron Nicodemus TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF
Ask any Vietnam veteran if he was exposed to Agent Orange, and you'll likely get a shrug and a nod.
“The stuff was everywhere,” said Gary P. Swenson of Oxford, a Worcester native and U.S. Army Vietnam veteran. “They never told anyone where they were spraying, or what they were spraying.”
Vietnam veteran James C. Savage III of Worcester said of Agent Orange, “It was a pretty hard thing to figure out where it was not.”
Agent Orange, named for the orange-colored barrels it came in, was a defoliant used to burn back thick brush and jungle in Vietnam from 1961 to 1970. It contained dioxin, a chemical now classified as a carcinogen. As many as 2.6 million U.S. soldiers were exposed to the chemical, which has been linked to birth defects and cancer deaths in thousands of Vietnamese and Cambodians.
They're all still suffering health effects 40 years later.
go here for more
http://www.telegram.com/article/20091028/NEWS/910280441/1003/NEWS03
Veterans feeling effects
AGENT ORANGE STILL A SCOURGE
By Aaron Nicodemus TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF
Ask any Vietnam veteran if he was exposed to Agent Orange, and you'll likely get a shrug and a nod.
“The stuff was everywhere,” said Gary P. Swenson of Oxford, a Worcester native and U.S. Army Vietnam veteran. “They never told anyone where they were spraying, or what they were spraying.”
Vietnam veteran James C. Savage III of Worcester said of Agent Orange, “It was a pretty hard thing to figure out where it was not.”
Agent Orange, named for the orange-colored barrels it came in, was a defoliant used to burn back thick brush and jungle in Vietnam from 1961 to 1970. It contained dioxin, a chemical now classified as a carcinogen. As many as 2.6 million U.S. soldiers were exposed to the chemical, which has been linked to birth defects and cancer deaths in thousands of Vietnamese and Cambodians.
They're all still suffering health effects 40 years later.
go here for more
http://www.telegram.com/article/20091028/NEWS/910280441/1003/NEWS03
Jury awards at least $750,000 to former soldier
Jury awards at least $750,000 to former soldier
The Associated Press
Posted : Wednesday Oct 28, 2009 9:04:35 EDT
GREENSBORO, N.C. — A former Army sergeant wounded during a military training exercise was awarded at least $750,000 in his lawsuit against the Moore County Sheriff’s Office and the former deputy who shot him.
The Fayetteville Observer reported that the federal jury in Greensboro awarded the money to former Army Sgt. Stephen Phelps, who was injured in the February 2002 shooting that killed another soldier. He had sued the sheriff’s office and former Deputy Randall Butler.
“I was happy that the truth finally came out,” Phelps said after the verdict was read Tuesday night.
The jury awarded $650,000 in compensatory damages and $100,000 or $200,000 in punitive damages Tuesday night. Phelps’ lawyer, Carlos Mahoney, had sought $1.2 million.
read more here
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/10/ap_soldier_lawsuit_102809/
The Associated Press
Posted : Wednesday Oct 28, 2009 9:04:35 EDT
GREENSBORO, N.C. — A former Army sergeant wounded during a military training exercise was awarded at least $750,000 in his lawsuit against the Moore County Sheriff’s Office and the former deputy who shot him.
The Fayetteville Observer reported that the federal jury in Greensboro awarded the money to former Army Sgt. Stephen Phelps, who was injured in the February 2002 shooting that killed another soldier. He had sued the sheriff’s office and former Deputy Randall Butler.
“I was happy that the truth finally came out,” Phelps said after the verdict was read Tuesday night.
The jury awarded $650,000 in compensatory damages and $100,000 or $200,000 in punitive damages Tuesday night. Phelps’ lawyer, Carlos Mahoney, had sought $1.2 million.
read more here
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/10/ap_soldier_lawsuit_102809/
Police and PTSD:There's more than one victim in Bethel fatal shooting
There's more than one victim in Bethel fatal shooting
Updated: 10/27/2009 10:38:43 PM EDT
Gary Bush has never met Michael Libertini, the Bethel police sergeant who shot and killed 56-year-old Joseph DellaVentura on Saturday, after DellaVentura allegedly pointed a gun at him.
But the bond Bush and Libertini share is unquestionable.
It's also unwanted.
Bush, a former police officer in Charleston, W.Va., knows just how Libertini feels.
On Dec. 23, 1994, at 10:41 p.m. -- exactly 25 hours and 19 minutes before Christmas, he'll tell you -- Bush shot and killed a man named Franklin Knuckles.
Bush said Knuckles was drunk that night when police entered the garage apartment where he was holed up.
In similar fashion to what Bethel police say DellaVentura did, Knuckles ignored commands to drop his weapon. Instead, Bush said, Knuckles pointed a rifle at him and Bush fired one round in response.
Just like that, two lives changed forever.
"My shooting took place in this little 10-by-6 room. It might as well have been a firefight in a walk-in closet," said the 48-year-old Bush, who now lives in Cincinnati.
"Even after all this time, I look back and ask, 'Why did this happen?' You can't explain it because it doesn't make sense," Bush reflected. "In my case, I ended up retiring a little over a year after the shooting."
Almost 15 years later, Bush still attends therapy. He still takes medication for depression. He still battles post-traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD) and its demons, nightmares and flashbacks.
read more here
http://www.newstimes.com/ci_13655294
Updated: 10/27/2009 10:38:43 PM EDT
Gary Bush has never met Michael Libertini, the Bethel police sergeant who shot and killed 56-year-old Joseph DellaVentura on Saturday, after DellaVentura allegedly pointed a gun at him.
But the bond Bush and Libertini share is unquestionable.
It's also unwanted.
Bush, a former police officer in Charleston, W.Va., knows just how Libertini feels.
On Dec. 23, 1994, at 10:41 p.m. -- exactly 25 hours and 19 minutes before Christmas, he'll tell you -- Bush shot and killed a man named Franklin Knuckles.
Bush said Knuckles was drunk that night when police entered the garage apartment where he was holed up.
In similar fashion to what Bethel police say DellaVentura did, Knuckles ignored commands to drop his weapon. Instead, Bush said, Knuckles pointed a rifle at him and Bush fired one round in response.
Just like that, two lives changed forever.
"My shooting took place in this little 10-by-6 room. It might as well have been a firefight in a walk-in closet," said the 48-year-old Bush, who now lives in Cincinnati.
"Even after all this time, I look back and ask, 'Why did this happen?' You can't explain it because it doesn't make sense," Bush reflected. "In my case, I ended up retiring a little over a year after the shooting."
Almost 15 years later, Bush still attends therapy. He still takes medication for depression. He still battles post-traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD) and its demons, nightmares and flashbacks.
read more here
http://www.newstimes.com/ci_13655294
Core Construction gets $6.5M VA contract in Viera Florida
Core gets $6.5M VA contract in Viera
Orlando Business Journal
Core Engineering & Construction Inc. received a $6.5 million task order to build a 30,000-square-foot addition to a Veterans Administration facility in Viera.
Winter Park-based Core, which got the contract in September, will build a single-story addition of a VA outpatient clinic onto the existing 1.2 million square-foot medical complex. adding 80 rooms to the existing 130, said Paul Goldsmith, president of Core.
Site work began earlier this month and the project is expected to be completed in December 2010.
The contract is part of a larger, $50 million prime contract Core received last year from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers mobile district. Core also is handling construction services for the renovation of a dental clinic and replacing the Orlando VA Lakemont campus, said a news release.
http://orlando.bizjournals.com/orlando/stories/2009/10/26/daily14.html
Orlando Business Journal
Core Engineering & Construction Inc. received a $6.5 million task order to build a 30,000-square-foot addition to a Veterans Administration facility in Viera.
Winter Park-based Core, which got the contract in September, will build a single-story addition of a VA outpatient clinic onto the existing 1.2 million square-foot medical complex. adding 80 rooms to the existing 130, said Paul Goldsmith, president of Core.
Site work began earlier this month and the project is expected to be completed in December 2010.
The contract is part of a larger, $50 million prime contract Core received last year from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers mobile district. Core also is handling construction services for the renovation of a dental clinic and replacing the Orlando VA Lakemont campus, said a news release.
http://orlando.bizjournals.com/orlando/stories/2009/10/26/daily14.html
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