National Guardsman Iraq Veteran Didn't Want to Be Here

Part one: Iraq war veteran suffering from PTSD
KATC News
By Akeam Ashford
February 23, 2015

"I just felt as if it would be better because the struggles wouldn't continue," Thomas said. "I felt like if I was gone it would be better for my family."

Returning home from war is often when a veteran's real fight begins, and for one U.S. Army National Guardsman, the fight never really ended.

Between 10 percent and 18 percent of servicemen and women from Operation Enduring Freedom/Operation Iraqi Freedom are likely to have Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) after they return, according to research cited by the federal Veterans Affairs Office.

Estimates of depression in returning troops range from three percent to 25 percent. Veterans with PTSD are three times more likely to report hopelessness or suicidal ideation than those without PTSD, according to the VA.

Iraq war veteran Spc. Lance Thomas is one of those returning soldiers suffering from PTSD.
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Wisconsin VA "Breeding Drug Addicts" Instead of Healing Veterans?

You know it is really bad when the Wisconsin VA gets called "Candy Land" because of the drugs they have been handing out. This is from NBC News.

"I just feel that he didn't have a chance," Simcakoski's mother, Linda, told Farrow. "We trusted them and we expected them to know what to do...and it just seems like they just kept giving him more and more."

A Wisconsin VA hospital nicknamed "Candy Land" by some for an alarming surge in pain-killer prescriptions is under investigation — six months after a Marine Corps veteran died of an overdose in the psychiatric ward.

The amount of opiates doled out by the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs Medical Center in Tomah nearly quadrupled over eight years, under the leadership of the chief of staff, Dr. David Houlihan, as the non-profit Center for Investigative Reporting first revealed.

Prescriptions for just one of them, often-abused oxycodone, shot up ten-fold — from about 78,000 pills in 2005 to almost 712,000 in 2012, the center found.

Meanwhile, some staffers complained they were pressured to refill prescriptions early and to keep giving powerful narcotics to patients who may not have been taking the doses themselves.

"They're breeding drug addicts," Jason Bishop, an Air Force veteran who is a patient at the Tomah facility, told MSNBC's Ronan Farrow, who reported this story in collaboration with NBC Investigations.

The problem is, some member of Congress will jump on this story and write a bill with his name on it or some other veteran who tried to get help only to end up in the grave.

Why not? They've gotten away with it all these years. The reports go back to at least 2008 on what the VA has been doing with handing out drugs instead of therapy. Some find it all too easy to numb them instead of work with them. Others, well, they do the best they can but even the best VA doctors are overwhelmed by the number of veterans looking for help to heal.

If you are thinking that veterans would be better off outside the VA, think again. Years ago I work for a group of psychiatrists and they made a lot more money with med appointments than they did providing actual therapy sessions. These appointments were done in 15 minutes meaning they could see at least 4 patients an hour every hour they were in the office. When they needed time off, appointments had to be changed. I had to do the med appointments first and then squeeze everyone else in afterwards.

So why is it still this way after all these years of sad outcomes? Drugs aren't free and someone is making money off the veterans who fought to retain the freedom we still have. The other reason is that members of congress are "doing something" about all this without a clue as to what that something actually should be.

Calling Veterans Crisis Line Shouldn't Leave Life On Hold

Veterans describe runaround when calling crisis line; Texas man records 36 minutes on hold 
KJRH News
Amanda Kost, Scripps News
Isaac Wolf, Scripps News
Feb 23, 2015

WASHINGTON D.C. - On an evening last March, 42-year-old Dedra Hughes’ thoughts turned to suicide.

The Army veteran, who had been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder five years earlier, had split with her boyfriend days before. She was unemployed and had stopped taking classes. And she was convinced her two daughters would be better off without her. Sitting on the floor of her suburban Chicago living room, Hughes attempted to slash her wrist but didn’t draw blood, and says she passed out from anxiety. Her 12-year-old discovered her there on the floor with the knife beside her.

Hughes decided that night to turn to the national Veterans Crisis Line, a 24-hour, seven-day-a week service that promises an immediate, open line to professional help. But when Hughes phoned, she said, her call went straight to hold. After several minutes, she became frustrated and hung up. “I would never call the hotline again,” said Hughes. She said she needed to quickly get to someone that night who could give her help and reassurance.
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Older Veterans Will Need More Help Filling Claims

New VA Claims Process Called Detrimental to Older Veterans 
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
by Brian Bowling
Feb 23, 2015

While the new Department of Veterans Affairs claims process uses forms that are simpler than income tax return forms, they have similar names and designs. More importantly, they represent a shift that puts more of the burden on veterans for starting a claim and will end up hurting older veterans and those with traumatic brain injuries, spokesmen for the Veterans of Foreign Wars and Disabled American Veterans said. "In the end, the changes are being implemented for the convenience of the VA and not for the benefit of the veterans," said Gerald Manar, deputy director of the VFW's National Veterans Service.

The policy, which will take effect March 24, eliminates the informal claim process that allowed veterans to start a claim simply by making a written request. Under the existing policy, the veteran then had one year to file a completed claim. Any benefits awarded would be backdated to the day of the request.

The new policy requires veterans to fill out a standardized form to start the claims process. "They're not going to do anything until they receive the correct form, completed correctly," said Jim Marszalek, the DAV's National Service Director. Consequently, veterans could lose months of benefits while waiting for the VA to notify them that they need to send in the correct form, and some are likely to simply give up, he said. "There's nothing (in the regulation) to specify how long the VA has to respond to someone who doesn't use a standard form," Marszalek said.
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VA Secretary McDonald Told Homeless Veteran He Was Special Forces Too?

VA Secretary Robert McDonald Apologizes for Misstating Military Record 
NBC News
February 24, 2015

WASHINGTON — Veterans Affairs Secretary Robert McDonald apologized Monday for misstating that he served in the military's special forces. In a statement released Monday by the VA, McDonald said: "While I was in Los Angeles, engaging a homeless individual to determine his veteran status, I asked the man where he had served in the military. He responded that he had served in special forces.

I incorrectly stated that I had been in special forces. That was inaccurate and I apologize to anyone that was offended by my misstatement." The VA website says McDonald is an Army veteran who served with the 82nd Airborne Division.
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WWII Navy Nurse Veteran Had Life From Hell After VA Lobotomy

Lobotomy

Dorothy Ludden, Survivor of VA Lobotomy Program, Dies
One of the 2,000 World War II veterans who received the procedure
Wall Street Journal
By MICHAEL M. PHILLIPS
Feb. 23, 2015

Mrs. Ludden married after her brain surgery and raised three sons. Her volatile temper, odd behavior and limited emotional range left scars on her family that lasted decades.

Dorothy Ludden, one of the last survivors of a government program that lobotomized mentally-ill World War II veterans, died on Monday. She was 94.

During the war, Mrs. Ludden served as a Navy nurse in stateside military hospitals. She was hospitalized for psychiatric reasons soon after her discharge from active duty in 1946. Diagnosed with schizophrenia, she underwent a lobotomy at the Veterans Administration hospital in Tuscaloosa, Ala.

The Tuscaloosa facility was one of 50 VA hospitals that performed the controversial brain surgery to treat intractable mental illness among veterans. Some 2,000 veterans were lobotomized by the government before the first antipsychotic drug, Thorazine, came on the market in the mid-1950s.
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The U.S. government lobotomized roughly 2,000 mentally ill veterans — and likely hundreds more — during and after World War II, according to a cache of forgotten memos, letters and government reports unearthed by The Wall Street Journal.

“They got the notion they were going to come to give me a lobotomy,” Roman Tritz, a World War II bomber pilot, told the newspaper in a report published Wednesday. “To hell with them.”

Tritz said the orderlies at the veterans hospital pinned him to the floor, and he initially fought them off. A few weeks later, just before his 30th birthday, he was lobotomized.

Besieged by psychologically damaged troops returning from the battlefields of North Africa, Europe and the Pacific, the Veterans Administration performed the brain-altering operation on former servicemen it diagnosed as depressives, psychotics and schizophrenics, and occasionally on people identified as homosexuals, according to the report.

Tritz was one of roughly 2,000 World War II veterans lobotomized during and after the war, a recent Wall Street Journal investigation discovered. The procedure, once lauded as a "miracle cure" for nearly all types of mental illness, has since fallen so far out of favor in the medical community that it's rarely even discussed, said Mario DeSanctis, medical director at the Tomah VA. Vet one of thousands lobotomized by government after WWII, La Crosse Tribune, Wis., By Allison Geyer Published: February 8, 2014

Veteran Vision Project Photo Collection is a Revelation

Sharing vets' unabashed joy, and unrelenting pain
CBS News
February 23, 2015

Minutes before Mitchell took the image of McLaren, he asked him how he was feeling and what he wanted to say in the image. Soon, McLaren unleashed pure anguish at how hard it is to not be that number.

"I just want to kill myself every day, and the only reason I don't do it is because of my kids," McLaren said.

For anyone curious about the lives of veterans once they return home, the Veteran Vision Project photo collection is a revelation.

Behind the uniform
No one is speaking in a still photo, but they're still sending signals, reports CBS News correspondent Wyatt Andrews. In this collection, one photographer has asked dozens of veterans to send messages or tell stories about themselves while posing in front of a mirror.

There are more than 130 photos so far of veterans and active duty service members, and they are projecting who they are. or what's hiding behind the uniform, with all of it revealed through the looking glass.

What viewers get to see is unabashed joy and unrelenting pain. There is pride, diversity, and there are Americans free to be whatever. And while the photos are very different, the format is the same. On one side of the mirror the veteran is in uniform, on the other is an image the veterans choose themselves.

The photographer is Devin Mitchell, an amateur photographer and a sociology student at Arizona State University. He started the project to bolster his application to go to grad school.
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Baldwin Sat on Report Others Pretended They Didn't Know Years Ago

"Sen. Baldwin had Tomah VA report for months" was the headline on the use of opiates as if it was anything new. None of this is new but it seems as if some bloggers have just discovered this issue. The story was linked on a report Town Hall.com had up Sunday but as you can see, it is far from new and it appears that there have been many politicians just sitting on what they knew, since nothing was done about any of it.

"In September, the Center for Investigative Reporting revealed that VA prescriptions for four opiates - hydrocodone, oxycodone, methadone and morphine - surged 270 percent from 2001 to 2012. That far outpaced the increase in the number of VA patients and contributed to a fatal overdose rate that the agency's researchers put at nearly double the national average."

That was reported in 2013 by Aaron Glantz, Center for Investigative Reporting. The kicker was that also in the same report was the stunning admission of doctors writing prescriptions for these drugs without seeing the patient. Glantz followed that report up with another testimony told this part of what was going on.

"There are multiple instances when I have been coerced or even ordered to write for Schedule II narcotics when it was against my medical judgment," said Dr. Pamela Gray, a physician who formerly worked at the VA hospital in Hampton, Va. Primary care doctors who don't want to prescribe large amounts of opiates may resign, do as they are told or be terminated, Gray said. Gray was fired.

Dr. Robert Jesse gave testimony to the House Veterans Affairs Committee

Hearing on 10/10/2013: Between Peril and Promise: Facing the Dangers of VA’s Skyrocketing Use of Prescription Painkillers to Treat Veterans

"We also know that the long-term use of opioids is associated with significant risks, particularly in vulnerable individuals, such as Veterans with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), depression, Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) and family stress – all common in Veterans returning from the battlefield, and in Veterans with addiction disorders. Chronic pain in Veterans is often accompanied by co-morbid mental health conditions (up to 50 percent in some cohorts) caused by the psychological trauma of war, as well as neurological disorders, such as TBI caused by blast and concussion injuries. In fact, one study documented that more that 40 percent of Veterans admitted to a polytrauma unit in VHA suffered all three conditions together – chronic pain, PTSD, and post-concussive syndrome."

But as bad as all this is, the reports of troops being medicated while still in the military have been going on longer.

Investigation needed Ambien and military use

Links to medications suspected with non-combat deaths

Reservist's Suicide Hits Tampa Hard

Tampa reservist’s suicide brings home tragedy
Tampa Bay Online
By Howard Altman
Published: February 22, 2015

TAMPA — Why?

The story of Brunette’s life speaks volumes about the difficulty of dealing with veteran suicides, say her family and friends.

That’s the question the family and friends of Air Force Reserve Capt. Jamie Brunette are struggling to answer.

At 30, Brunette seemingly had it all. A vivacious and attractive athlete and scholar, she had been lauded by the Air Force for her work in Afghanistan, was a partner in a fitness center about to open in Largo and was known by her family and friends as being the strong one always ready to help others.

But for some reason, Brunette, who left active duty after 11 years last June and joined the Air Force Reserve, couldn’t help herself.

On Feb. 9, Tampa police found her slumped over in the back of her locked Chrysler 200 sedan outside a Harbour Island cafe near her apartment. Police say it appears she killed herself with her Smith and Wesson .380 handgun, which she purchased about six months earlier.

Now family and friends are trying to come to grips with the pain behind Brunette’s effervescent smile that caused her to become one of the 22 veterans a day who take their own lives, according to a 2012 Department of Veterans Affairs study. It’s a problem that’s vexing both the military and the VA, which are struggling to find ways to prevent suicides.

According to a study published this month in the medical journal Annals of Epidemiology, the nearly 1.3 million veterans of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq between 2001 and 2007 had a 41 percent to 61 percent higher risk of suicide than the general population, with 1,868 committing suicide during that time period. And while female veterans were far less likely than men to commit suicide, when compared to those who never served, female veterans were more likely to commit suicide than male veterans.
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Air Force Reserve Captain Found Dead in Tampa

Air Force Reserve captain whose family believe she was sexually assaulted in Afghanistan 'killed herself with her handgun' 
Air Force Reserve Capt. Jamie Brunette was found dead on February 9 by Tampa police in the back of her locked car near her apartment in Florida
Police say it appears she killed herself with her handgun
Sister believes something traumatic happened to her in Afghanistan
Her family do not have any evidence of a sexual assault
Daily Mail
By JILL REILLY FOR MAILONLINE
22 February 2015

Air Force Reserve Capt. Jamie Brunette was found dead on February 9 by Tampa police in the back of her locked Chrysler 200 sedan near her apartment

An Air Force Reserve captain whose family believe she was sexually assaulted in Afghanistan killed herself using her handgun. Jamie Brunette, from Tampa, Florida, was found dead on February 9 by Tampa police in the back of her locked sedan near her apartment. It appears the 30-year-old killed herself with her Smith and Wesson .380 handgun, which she purchased about six months earlier according to police, reports the Tampa Tribune. read more here