Special Segment: Listening for Stress
Monday, November 16, 2009
Ravi Baichwal
More: Bio, abc7chicago.com News Team
November 15, 2009 (CHICAGO) (WLS) -- Veterans returning from war have experienced things that many others can't even imagine.
Now, new technology might help to detect wounds that are deep beneath the surface.
"It happened so quickly," said Daniel Casara, whose first tour of duty in Iraq in 2005 only lasted three weeks because it was cut short by a bomb hidden in the road.
"The explosion itself, it's almost like a car accident that you don't see," Casara told ABC7 Chicago.
The blast flipped his vehicle, killing two of his fellow soldiers and crushing his legs. But Casara says some of his and his fellow soldiers' deepest wounds were hidden from view.
"These are images that you just can't get out of your head," he said.
Casara says he suffered from post traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. He also says he had trouble sleeping and was anxious and flustered after the attack.
read more here
http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?section=news/local&id=7120194
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Military experiment seeks to predict PTSD
Maybe they should try reading this blog?
Military experiment seeks to predict PTSD
Story Created: Nov 17, 2009 at 2:15 PM EST
TWENTYNINE PALMS, Calif. (AP) — Two days before shipping off to war, Marine Pfc. Jesse Sheets sat inside a trailer in the Mojave Desert, his gaze fixed on a computer that flashed a rhythmic pulse of contrasting images.
Smiling kids embracing a soldier. A dog sniffing blood oozing from a corpse. Movie star Cameron Diaz posing sideways in a midriff top. Troops cowering for safety during an ambush.
A doctor tracked his stress levels and counted the number of times he blinked. Electrode wires dangled from his left eye and right pinky finger.
Sheets is part of a military experiment to try to predict who's most at risk for post-traumatic stress disorder. Understanding underlying triggers might help reduce the burden of those who return psychologically wounded — if they can get early help.
PTSD is a crippling condition that can emerge after a terrifying event — car accident, sexual assault, terrorist attack or combat. It's thought to affect as many as one in five veterans returning from Afghanistan and Iraq.
Military doctors have been mystified as to why certain warfighters exposed to bombings and bloodshed develop paralyzing stress symptoms while others who witness the same trauma shake it off.
read more here
http://www.wsbt.com/health/70293817.html
Witnesses of limbs blown off and soldiers on fire need just as much attention as survivors
When you talk to veterans with substantial physical wounds, they talk about all the support and care they received. It would be pretty hard for medical providers to not understand there could be wounds not visible to the naked eye after losing limbs or suffering burns. This obvious need somehow never seems to penetrate the survivors who witnessed the limbs being blown off or the soldier on fire.
Witnesses of limbs blown off and soldiers on fire need just as much attention as survivors. If they feel the need to talk, listening is very important but it really depends on who is doing the listening and how much the talker trusts them.
Chaplains are deployed after traumatic events, trained in crisis intervention, among other things for a very specific reason. First, they are trusted. People see the insignia of a Chaplain and they know they are deeply spiritual people (no matter what faith the person has) and they will not judge the one needing to open up.
Chaplains are trusted also because they care. No one becomes a Chaplain unless they care about others deeply. The survivors of traumatic events also know they will not dismiss any of what they have to say by responding with "Get over it" or "It isn't so bad" or even worse when people can respond to pain by trivializing it and laughing.
We don't have all answers but when people are in crisis, the answers are not as important as hearing. Being able to talk to someone is sometimes all it takes to prevent what we are seeing with PTSD.
It's wonderful to have someone to talk to but if the person doing the listening does not know what to say, or when not to say anything at all, too often the friend we confide in will make us regret talking at all. We may struggle with our faith in that moment and have a well meaning friend dismiss our crisis while magnifying their own issues. They may answer a cell phone while we are trying to pour our hearts out so they can talk to their friend about plans for later or to hear gossip, or look at their watch wondering when we'll be finished taking up their time. A buddy may take us to a bar for a drink so we can calm down but has no interest in hearing what we have to say.
I grew up in a big Greek extended family surrounded by relatives I knew cared no matter what. No matter what crisis someone was going thru it was always talked out. When the one suffering was done, no matter how long it took to get there, then the subject was dropped, but not until the one in need was no longer in need. That helped immensely but as with most people they also had their own way of "helping" which was not very useful at all. Still with ever crisis I had, some of them life threatening, it was "talked to death" until I had nothing more to say.
It is my greatest belief after all I've learned about veterans that this along with my faith, is the reason why I did not develop PTSD, especially considering I have a lot of the same characteristics they have. The leading one opening the door to PTSD is compassion. This is the most common with PTSD veterans.
We know it's vital they have someone to talk to and watch over them. What no one seems to be talking about is what kind of training the "buddy" has to address the crisis and help instead of making things worse accidentally. This is where having a support group with even minimal training will accomplish a great deal until the DOD and the VA have enough mental health providers to fill the need. Every expert has stated clearly the sooner PTSD is addressed the sooner it stops getting worse and begins to get better. Having someone to talk to until they can be seen will prevent it from taking control over the life of the survivor.
While there is no one dismissing the need to add trained psychologists and psychiatrists, as well as Chaplains, their job healing will be made easier when the trauma is not left alone to fester. This isn't rocket science. It's human science and mostly common sense.
Learning to listen the right way is just as important as caring in the first place. We can all learn to do it and then think of how far we will really go helping our troops heal. We can help keep them from killing themselves. We can help them from seeing their families fall apart. We can help them stay in the military and live a long happier life if we learn how to listen with our hearts and shut off our ego.
Witnesses of limbs blown off and soldiers on fire need just as much attention as survivors. If they feel the need to talk, listening is very important but it really depends on who is doing the listening and how much the talker trusts them.
Chaplains are deployed after traumatic events, trained in crisis intervention, among other things for a very specific reason. First, they are trusted. People see the insignia of a Chaplain and they know they are deeply spiritual people (no matter what faith the person has) and they will not judge the one needing to open up.
Chaplains are trusted also because they care. No one becomes a Chaplain unless they care about others deeply. The survivors of traumatic events also know they will not dismiss any of what they have to say by responding with "Get over it" or "It isn't so bad" or even worse when people can respond to pain by trivializing it and laughing.
We don't have all answers but when people are in crisis, the answers are not as important as hearing. Being able to talk to someone is sometimes all it takes to prevent what we are seeing with PTSD.
It's wonderful to have someone to talk to but if the person doing the listening does not know what to say, or when not to say anything at all, too often the friend we confide in will make us regret talking at all. We may struggle with our faith in that moment and have a well meaning friend dismiss our crisis while magnifying their own issues. They may answer a cell phone while we are trying to pour our hearts out so they can talk to their friend about plans for later or to hear gossip, or look at their watch wondering when we'll be finished taking up their time. A buddy may take us to a bar for a drink so we can calm down but has no interest in hearing what we have to say.
I grew up in a big Greek extended family surrounded by relatives I knew cared no matter what. No matter what crisis someone was going thru it was always talked out. When the one suffering was done, no matter how long it took to get there, then the subject was dropped, but not until the one in need was no longer in need. That helped immensely but as with most people they also had their own way of "helping" which was not very useful at all. Still with ever crisis I had, some of them life threatening, it was "talked to death" until I had nothing more to say.
It is my greatest belief after all I've learned about veterans that this along with my faith, is the reason why I did not develop PTSD, especially considering I have a lot of the same characteristics they have. The leading one opening the door to PTSD is compassion. This is the most common with PTSD veterans.
We know it's vital they have someone to talk to and watch over them. What no one seems to be talking about is what kind of training the "buddy" has to address the crisis and help instead of making things worse accidentally. This is where having a support group with even minimal training will accomplish a great deal until the DOD and the VA have enough mental health providers to fill the need. Every expert has stated clearly the sooner PTSD is addressed the sooner it stops getting worse and begins to get better. Having someone to talk to until they can be seen will prevent it from taking control over the life of the survivor.
While there is no one dismissing the need to add trained psychologists and psychiatrists, as well as Chaplains, their job healing will be made easier when the trauma is not left alone to fester. This isn't rocket science. It's human science and mostly common sense.
Learning to listen the right way is just as important as caring in the first place. We can all learn to do it and then think of how far we will really go helping our troops heal. We can help keep them from killing themselves. We can help them from seeing their families fall apart. We can help them stay in the military and live a long happier life if we learn how to listen with our hearts and shut off our ego.
How I predicted increase in PTSD in 2001
How I predicted increase in PTSD in 2001
by Chaplain Kathie
This is not so much about my ego as it is about those who taught me. Whatever I know came from learning from the experts and living with it long before September 11.
By 2000, this book was done and I was looking for a publisher. No one wanted it almost as if it was old news. It was not so much about the style of my writing since no publisher ever really read it.For the Love of Jack, His War-My Battle
The day we got married, I married my best friend. His problems after Vietnam were mild and most of what was happening to him I found no problem facing. We knew what PTSD was back then but what no one was warning about was it could get worse.
After all the years between coming home from Vietnam and the day we met, no one helped Jack. His idea was that he would get over it just like his WWII father got over the war he fought. Back then after growing up surrounded by veterans in my own family, I knew there was something very different about Jack, so I began to try to understand him. Clinical books with complicated language, nearly impossible to understand without a dictionary, and graphic news reports in library achieves helped me to understand, so I began to help others learn what I did.
I worked regular jobs as a regular wife, dealing with mild PTSD problems like nightmares and flashbacks, forgetting about going to movies and being picky with where to sit in our favorite restaurant. The times when he was having a bad day and didn't want to go places with me or wanted to leave a family event early. Life wasn't that bad at all. I didn't see the nightmare waiting take over our lives.
I wrote it because over the years there were just too many Vietnam veterans without a clue what was going on inside of them and more wives getting divorced. Wives I met were part of the serial brides Vietnam veterans tried to find peace with.
Living with Jack and helping other veteran families, I had made all the mistakes possible until I found what worked.
The book had already been reviewed by Dr. Jonathan Shay and this wonderful man took the time to try to help me get it published. He did this even though he was working on his second book plus treating veterans at the Boston VA. No one wanted it but I kept trying.
A few days after September 11th, I was on the phone with Dr. Shay. Both of us knew what was coming. I knew I had to get my book out in the public so they would be ready to address PTSD head on. Not just for the survivors but for the Vietnam veterans walking around the country with time bomb of untreated mild PTSD ready to explode. I went the self-published route in 2002. It is online now.
I tried really hard to publicize it but I was not very good at doing it. I didn't want to see another veteran's life fall apart and other wives wonder what just happened when the answers were know and help was available.
Then the troops were being sent into Afghanistan. I began to scream louder about the need to help prevent PTSD from getting worse. I knew we couldn't prevent all cases of PTSD but we could stop it from taking over, just like an infection stops getting worse when it is treated, PTSD stops getting worse as soon as it is addressed.
Then the troops were being sent into Iraq. No one was ready. News report after news report showed how Vietnam veterans were seeking help more and more but the VA was not being geared up for any of it. It was almost as if no one paid attention to after the troops came home. There were less doctors and nurses working for the VA at the time than after the Gulf War. This was a horrifying situation unfolding right in front of my eyes.
I knew none of the news reports I was tracking had to happen. The families just like mine didn't need to fall apart. Veterans like Jack didn't need to suffer without help. None of it had to happen but no one would listen. I had no power. I had no publicity. The wives like me with lasting marriages and stable kids never had a chance to be heard.
I kept helping veterans and their families, but it was, as it still is, private work. The work I do online is taken from news reports or in rare instances, from the veterans wanting their story told, not for sympathy, but to help other veterans.
The reporters want the bad stories. They don't want to know what works or hear about healing. Congress doesn't seem interested in hearing from people like me either.
All of these years we have been provided with everything necessary to address PTSD but too few looked for it. We don't have to see the increase in suicides and attempted suicides. We don't have to see so many families falling apart. We don't have to see military careers end any more than we have to see unemployed veterans due to PTSD. Had we addressed PTSD properly in the first place, as soon as possible, then most of these veteran would be like my Jack was when we met. He had a job and was my best friend. He became a total stranger without help but with it, he's living a life again. We need to stop just looking at what is bad, how much suffering there is out there and begin to see what is possible. If we don't then it will just keep getting worse.
In 2006, the videos I created began to be noticed because there was nothing like them before. I knew I had to try something beyond the pretty bad website I had at the time and move past what I was doing online. None of what I knew was doing enough good if no one was able to find me, hear me and learn. The videos uploaded onto Google and YouTube were spreading knowledge so that none of this seemed impossible to understand.
Now here were are almost 4 years later, all the numbers are up with suicides, attempted suicides, divorce, homelessness and the numbers of families suffering when none of this had to happen.
The reason is simple. If I could figure all of this out years ago, we all need to be wondering why it is the government did not see it coming. How could they not? All they had to do was take the data from Vietnam veterans and begin with that. Me? I had no power then as I have no power now. I had no money then as I have no money now so the powerful will pay no attention to me. Someone I know passed along a very depressing question someone else asked. "If she's any good at what she does, then why does she need help getting the word out? Wouldn't she already have support?" And that's pretty much been the attitude I've run up against all along. The emails I received over the years support that I do know what I'm talking about. Considering the "professionals" using my work across the country, that proves they believe it too. But I am not considered successful my their measurements. They measure success by fame. I measure by the lives I've helped to heal and yes, too often saved. They measure success by the size of the bank account and ability to pay publicists. I measure it when I have a family now able to understand enough that they try to help their family member heal instead of walk away from them.
The veterans and their families needing help cannot afford to donate. They are lucky if they can put food on the table. The publicity I could receive would only come by violating the trust they have in me and my promise to them is that they would never read their stories on a blog unless that was what they wanted. This is why I need support financially and by people passing my work along to help as many people as possible. The powerful won't listen to me or anyone else like me out there before even I was.
If you need proof of this then consider someone as brilliant as Dr. Shay. Have you seen him during any of the interviews when they are talking about PTSD? No. Not only did Dr. Shay treat the veterans at the Boston VA, he wrote two books on it. He received a Genius Award for his work but you will not hear anyone asking him what he thinks. He saw all of this coming too but even he couldn't get anyone to listen. The chances of me getting the attention of anyone is pretty slim knowing this. Imagine what could have happened if people had listened before any of this happened. We couldn't have prevented all of it but there is no way in hell it had to have gotten this bad.
This all goes into why I became a Chaplain. The International Fellowship of Chaplains was willing to take my years of experience and spiritual gifts in place of a degree from a seminary. They only cared about my desire to help others. The training I received was in order to head off what I was seeing when traumatic events are allowed to take control over the person. I've seen too much suffering on the other side. None of what we've been seeing has to happen and the IFOC chaplains know this. I am a Senior Chaplain with the IFOC because their eyes are open wide. They support the work I do when few other organizations were interested in helping at all and others were more interested in using my work without offering any support to me at all. The IFOC knows that God calls us to do what we do just as I am sure God called me to help veterans the day I met my husband. Had I not met him, I would have been spending my time on my own life just like everyone else instead of knowing how much the veterans were suffering.
The numbers were in for the most part from the Vietnam war. By 1978 there were 500,000 PTSD Vietnam veterans but above that number came a warning the numbers would go higher and they did. The suicides, incarcerations, divorces and homelessness numbers were known by the time September 11th came. The condition of mild PTSD was known and it was also known a secondary stressor would kick mild PTSD into high gear. It was also known that as soon as veterans began to seek help for PTSD, it stopped getting worse for them. All we see today in prevention in the civilian population came as a result of the Vietnam veterans forcing research into PTSD.
None of what we are seeing needed to happen and could have been prevented if the military took the same steps ahead of time as the IFOC chaplains did. Addressing the need where the need is goes a long way in preventing PTSD from being allowed to eat away at the emotional/spiritual life of the survivors after traumatic events. PTSD is a wound that can infect the entire person. Intervention is the antibiotic.
So when you hear about the suffering of so many of our troops and veterans, know this, none of this was not predicted ahead of time. All they had to do was open their eyes to what was already known.
Fort Hood Carnage seared in her memory
FORT HOOD SHOOTINGS
Carnage seared in her memory
Fort Hood nurse helped supervise triage at shooting rampage.
By Marty Toohey
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Monday, November 16, 2009
FORT HOOD — Paulette Smith-Kimble stood, stunned, in the entryway of a large room where she had helped put many wounded soldiers on the path to healing.
Blood covered the floor. Men and women writhed in pain. Some were past feeling pain.
Outside, the shooting suspect was down. Smith-Kimble, an experienced nurse, had verified that the medic had kept him alive. She had checked on a police officer who had returned fire. And she had helped coordinate the nursing students who had come flooding onto the scene from their graduation next door to help.
Inside, a downed soldier lay to her left. She was too far gone. Move on.
Smith-Kimble's eyes moved to another person. He wore civilian clothing, and he lay in a pool of blood.
She recognized him. They spoke often. She knew instantly: He was dead.
But some in the room were still alive.
read more here
Carnage seared in her memory
Carnage seared in her memory
Fort Hood nurse helped supervise triage at shooting rampage.
By Marty Toohey
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Monday, November 16, 2009
FORT HOOD — Paulette Smith-Kimble stood, stunned, in the entryway of a large room where she had helped put many wounded soldiers on the path to healing.
Blood covered the floor. Men and women writhed in pain. Some were past feeling pain.
Outside, the shooting suspect was down. Smith-Kimble, an experienced nurse, had verified that the medic had kept him alive. She had checked on a police officer who had returned fire. And she had helped coordinate the nursing students who had come flooding onto the scene from their graduation next door to help.
Inside, a downed soldier lay to her left. She was too far gone. Move on.
Smith-Kimble's eyes moved to another person. He wore civilian clothing, and he lay in a pool of blood.
She recognized him. They spoke often. She knew instantly: He was dead.
But some in the room were still alive.
read more here
Carnage seared in her memory
Monday, November 16, 2009
Ben Affleck: "Surely those who have sacrificed so much, deserve no less".
Jason Neilson was paralyzed by a sniper while stationed in Iraq. He discusses how Paralyzed Veterans of America helped him following his injury.
Vietnam vet on fraud charge
Vietnam vet on fraud charge
EMILY MACDONALD
November 16th, 2009
A SENIOR member of the Townsville Vietnam Veterans Association has been charged with defrauding the charity of almost $18,000.
The man allegedly spent seven months collecting the money, which was raised through raffles and market stalls, and putting it in his own pocket.
Volunteers at the organisation including president John Trewern are devastated by the revelations, which will force the charity to scale back the welfare they hand out over the festive season.
Townsville CIB officer-in-charge Detective Senior-Sergeant Chris Hicks confirmed the 65-year-old-man was being investigated for fraud.
''He was in a position within the organisation where he handled cash and he utilised that cash for his own purposes,'' Det Sen-Sgt Hicks said.
read more here
Vietnam vet on fraud charge
EMILY MACDONALD
November 16th, 2009
A SENIOR member of the Townsville Vietnam Veterans Association has been charged with defrauding the charity of almost $18,000.
The man allegedly spent seven months collecting the money, which was raised through raffles and market stalls, and putting it in his own pocket.
Volunteers at the organisation including president John Trewern are devastated by the revelations, which will force the charity to scale back the welfare they hand out over the festive season.
Townsville CIB officer-in-charge Detective Senior-Sergeant Chris Hicks confirmed the 65-year-old-man was being investigated for fraud.
''He was in a position within the organisation where he handled cash and he utilised that cash for his own purposes,'' Det Sen-Sgt Hicks said.
read more here
Vietnam vet on fraud charge
Powwow honors all veterans
Powwow honors all veterans
BY BECCY TANNER
The Wichita Eagle
For the past 21 years, Charlie Harjo has participated in every powwow hosted by the Wichita Kansas Intertribal Warrior Society.
Harjo, who is of Choctaw and Creek heritage, was a soldier in Vietnam.
On Sunday he was one of the veterans participating in the gourd dancing at the Veterans Day Powwow.
When Harjo was young, his father used to tell him that he hoped his son would never see what his eyes had seen.
"I never knew what he was talking about," said Harjo, 61, "until I saw it in Vietnam."
In Vietnam, Harjo said, he watched fellow soldiers die, including one named Sgt. Flowers.
"He was wounded and lying there and looked over at me and said, 'Don't forget me, Chief.' Back then, they called every Indian 'Chief.' "
When Harjo came back to the United States in 1969, he said, he tried to forget Sgt. Flowers.
read more here
http://www.kansas.com/news/local/story/1057281.html
BY BECCY TANNER
The Wichita Eagle
For the past 21 years, Charlie Harjo has participated in every powwow hosted by the Wichita Kansas Intertribal Warrior Society.
Harjo, who is of Choctaw and Creek heritage, was a soldier in Vietnam.
On Sunday he was one of the veterans participating in the gourd dancing at the Veterans Day Powwow.
When Harjo was young, his father used to tell him that he hoped his son would never see what his eyes had seen.
"I never knew what he was talking about," said Harjo, 61, "until I saw it in Vietnam."
In Vietnam, Harjo said, he watched fellow soldiers die, including one named Sgt. Flowers.
"He was wounded and lying there and looked over at me and said, 'Don't forget me, Chief.' Back then, they called every Indian 'Chief.' "
When Harjo came back to the United States in 1969, he said, he tried to forget Sgt. Flowers.
read more here
http://www.kansas.com/news/local/story/1057281.html
The Vietnam vet who thinks MTV can make the world a better place
The Vietnam vet who thinks MTV can make the world a better place
Bill Roedy runs MTV in 162 countries and hopes to unite people through music, with help from Fidel and Bono. Ian Burrell reports
Bill Roedy is the international statesman who never got voted out of office. To step into his London office is to enter a museum filled with artefacts featuring the global leaders, world-changing events, natural disasters and cultural icons that have characterised the past two decades. Every photograph, painting and ornament relates to the media career of this tough-looking Vietnam veteran, the chairman and chief executive of MTV Networks International.
"That's Shanghai, Sarajevo, there's Bono, that's our trip to Cuba where we had a couple of meetings with Fidel," he says pointing to a large photo of the Cuban leader with Ernest Hemingway, actually autographed by Castro. "I've met Shimon Peres a few times over the years. There are the Rolling Stones. Warren Buffett, who gave me poker tips. There's the Dalai Lama..."
Roedy, who oversees MTV's output in 162 countries and 33 languages, resists the suggestion that he has the role of a globe-trotting ambassador – "I don't know if I would take it that seriously" – but then says: "I have met over 30 heads of state and seven or eight Nobel prize winners."
Another photograph shows him on a recent trip to Afghanistan, holding aloft his BlackBerry alongside an Afghan solider posing with an AK47. Trained at the elite West Point military academy, Roedy is a former airborne Ranger who later specialised in deactivating nuclear missile bases. The soldier's life is behind him now, but he still has battles on his hands.
read more here
The Vietnam vet who thinks MTV can make the world a better place Independent
Web site helps veterans reconnect after combat
Web site helps veterans reconnect after combat
Posted: Nov 16, 2009 6:15 PM EST
Posted by Sarah Harlan - email
(NBC) - A new web site is helping veterans re-connect after combat.
It's also helping servicemen and women recover from post traumatic stress disorder.
Retired Marine Matthew Brown will never forget the moment he was shot by a sniper while fighting in Fallujah.
"They weren't really sure where I was shot because there was blood everywhere," Brown said. "Sorry, little difficult to talk about sometimes."
There were operations, there were months of rehab.
He learned to walk again but there was something else that wasn't right.
Brown had post traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD.
"What we know is that a third of vets returning from Iraq and Afghanistan are suffering from some type of combat-stress injury," Tom Tarantino with Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America said.
read more here
http://www.14wfie.com/Global/story.asp?S=11516476
Posted: Nov 16, 2009 6:15 PM EST
Posted by Sarah Harlan - email
(NBC) - A new web site is helping veterans re-connect after combat.
It's also helping servicemen and women recover from post traumatic stress disorder.
Retired Marine Matthew Brown will never forget the moment he was shot by a sniper while fighting in Fallujah.
"They weren't really sure where I was shot because there was blood everywhere," Brown said. "Sorry, little difficult to talk about sometimes."
There were operations, there were months of rehab.
He learned to walk again but there was something else that wasn't right.
Brown had post traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD.
"What we know is that a third of vets returning from Iraq and Afghanistan are suffering from some type of combat-stress injury," Tom Tarantino with Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America said.
read more here
http://www.14wfie.com/Global/story.asp?S=11516476
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