Vietnam Veteran's Widow Lost Husband to Suicide and May Lose Home

Boulder Creek widow of U.S. veteran suicide struggles to carry on
Santa Cruz Sentinel
By Ryan Masters,
POSTED: 03/17/17

Hutchinson detailed the horrors of the experience in a written account submitted to the VA before his death. He described the sights and sounds, the constant fear — how it felt to carry armloads of body parts; to x-ray badly-wounded men; to treat crippled and maimed Vietnamese children; to helplessly sit through mortar attacks; to watch men die.

Bernetta Hutchinson lost her U.S. veteran husband when he killed himself in 2014. Now she may also lose their Boulder Creek-area home. (Dan Coyro -- Santa Cruz Sentinel) Bernetta Hutchinson lost her U.S. veteran husband when he killed himself in 2014. Now she may also lose their Boulder Creek-area home. (Dan Coyro -- Santa Cruz Sentinel) 

BOULDER CREEK  On the morning of Oct. 24, 2014, Bernetta Hutchinson woke up in the Forest Springs neighborhood home she shared with her husband Terry. Wandering sleepily out to the living room, she found a note on the table. It began, “Bernetta, I am sorry. Call the VA.”

As she finished the short note, she went to their grown daughter’s bedroom, fell to her knees and prayed she was misinterpreting the suicide note; that somehow her husband was still alive.

And then, Hutchinson said, God guided her out the door and 50 yards into the redwood forest behind their home where she found her husband of 29 years, 7 months seated against a tree with his head bowed.

The 67-year-old Vietnam Veteran had shot and killed himself with a Glock handgun, becoming another casualty of the United States’ ongoing inability to heal its warriors after they return from the battlefield.

Kathie Dicesare, who runs the Wounded Times web blog and has been working on PTSD since 1982, said the VA reported 20 veteran suicides a day in 1999 — the exact same number of veteran suicides a day in 2016.

“In the 2000 Census, there were 26.4 million veterans; in 2014, there were 21,369,602. That’s the same number of reported suicides despite 5 million less veterans,” said Dicesare.
read more here

(Yes, that is me quoted.)

"On the Outside I was Perfectly Fine" Veteran Battles PTSD

Former Army captain Lisa Keevash on mental struggle: On the outside I was perfectly fine
The Express UK
By DANNY BUCKLAND
PUBLISHED: Sun, Mar 19, 2017

“I didn’t know who I was. I started to get dark moods and would become really anxious and jealous. I didn’t want to go out and was inflexible. I became argumentative and snappy and people were treading on eggshells around me. My boyfriend at the time bore the brunt of it."

EX-Army captain Lisa Keevash opens up about her mental battle scars.

After a decorated military career, former Army captain Lisa Keevash slipped easily into corporate life with a high-powered job and enviable lifestyle. She was successful and she was fit, but deep inside she was in dark turmoil.

The suppressed feelings from dealing with battlefield casualties and seeing a close officer friend die after an improvised explosive device (IED) blast were twisting her soul and threatening to wreck her life.

If we can make it normal to talk about our struggles then we can stop a lot of these problems getting to a point where they do real damage Lisa Keevash

"On the outside, I was perfectly fine. I had a great job, a new relationship. I was fit, healthy and everyone thought I had made it,” says Lisa, 34, from Edinburgh. “But I was existing in a haze – there in body but not mind."

"I was not enjoying anything, I lost confidence and had anxiety about everything in my life. I was really lost."

“I became snappy, argumentative and generally not a nice person to be around at times. It got very dark.”
read more here

Do you really want your life defined by suicide?

Would You Save the Life of Someone Like You?
Combat PTSD Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
March 19, 2017

Do you really want your life defined by suicide? The lives you saved, the risks you took for the lives of others will become secondary to the fact you gave up on your own life.

You've thought of the reasons you have to end it all. You thought about how you'd do it. There is a question you seem to have forgotten to get the answer to. Would you save the life of someone like you? Isn't that the next question you should ask? 

How much do you value life? After all, you dedicated your life to putting others first. You wouldn't be suffering right now if you did not do your job in combat, as a police officer, as a firefighter or other first responder profession. Saving lives was your job. Saving your own life is your job too. Dragging around the tombstone, waiting to fill in the dash between the date you were born and the date you chose death is deciding life really doesn't matter that much after all.

If no one told you that you choosing to leave behind people who care about you instead of fighting to heal is a bad idea, here are two stories that should get you to think twice about how you want your life defined.


Increasing suicide rates among first responders spark concern
TribLive
WES VENTEICHER
Sunday, March 19, 2017

"My son is a classic case of 'I'm never going to tell anybody; if I tell them, they'll think I'm weak.' "

Paramedic George Redner III started to grow angry and distant after he failed to revive a 2-year-old who had drowned.

But not even his parents saw how deeply his work affected him until he took his life seven years later.

"My son was a classic case of 'I'm never going to tell anybody; if I tell them, they'll think I'm weak,'" said Redner's mother, Jacqui Redner, 48, of Levittown, outside Philadelphia.

Like many first responders dedicated to saving lives, Redner, who was 27, never talked about his struggles, she said.

Her son, who went by "Georgie," threw himself in front of an Amtrak Acela train the morning of Aug. 1, 2015, at a station near the family's home.

Suicides among first responders, often driven by emotional strain in a culture that long has discouraged showing weakness, are too common, according to organizations that track the deaths.

First-responder suicides are sometimes compared to those among military veterans, many of whom have been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. Military veterans deployed from 2001 to 2007 had a 41 percent higher suicide risk than the general population, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs.
read more here

Donald Wendt came home as a double duty hero. He was a two tour combat veteran and he was a firefighter. It seems he was born to save lives, that is, other than his own because he was brainwashed into thinking asking for help meant he was weak.

Think about that for a second. Weak if he needed help? How could anyone get that notion into their heads after all the times he faced dying because someone else needed his help?


Bradenton firefighter shot and killed by police, was also a veteran

Wendt joined the Bradenton Fire Department in December 2003 after volunteering with Cedar Hammock-Southern Manatee while working at Ten-8 Fire Equipment.

A year later, he spent 13 months in Iraq with the United States Army Reserve. Wendt received a Bronze Star Medal for his efforts.

On May 13, 2005, as a recovery section sergeant with HHC Platoon, 1st Battalion, 103rd Armor and Task Force Liberty, Wendt “went to the aid of a fellow soldier who was injured and trapped under a burning vehicle during a Vehicle Born Improvised Explosives Device attack,” according to the U.S. War Office. He used tow chains to move the burning vehicle away from the injured soldier.

“It seems like every day you read about this, but when it hits home, it's different,” Gallo said.

I am posting this with an extremely heavy heart. This morning I woke up to news of this from his Mom. My prayers for my friend and his entire family as well as the firefighters and police officers involved with this tragedy.

He was a firefighter and volunteered to serve this country in combat.

When will we ever get to the point where being back home is less dangerous than combat for those we send?

His life was remembered in 2014. 

The military makes it harder for them to seek help especially when a General came out and said, Some of it is just personal make-up. Intestinal fortitude. Mental toughness that ensures that people are able to deal with stressful situations.

And then went on to say it had to do with not having a supportive family. I saw his supportive family yesterday and they included about 100 firefighters. I heard how much intestinal fortitude he had and he showed it in Bradenton as well as Iraq.

PTSD comes from the life you live and the risks you took to save others.

How about you choose to live long enough to prove all the idiots wrong about PTSD and why you have it? How about you face the fact that tomorrow is defined by you and you can fight for others to extend the dash on their own tombstones? Put down the tombstone. You got healing to do.

Australian Veteran's Life Saved After 5th Suicide Attempt by Daughter

'They train you to go to war, not come home'
Daily Mail
By Anneta Konstantinides For Daily Mail Australia
PUBLISHED:18 March 2017

Doctors missed mother-of-four army veteran's post traumatic stress for a decade despite FIVE suicide attempts... and how her daughter saved her life

Andrea Josephs, 43, enlisted in 1991 and served during East Timorese Crisis
Was medically discharged in 2004 following a sexual assault and court hearing
Took doctors 10 years to diagnose PTSD; mistook for postnatal depression
Andrea's final suicide attempt came in 2015 as she struggled with symptoms
Her daughter then made a tribute video to show she was proud of mum's service
Inspired idea behind Matilda Poppy, which will raise awareness for veterans

Andrea (pictured centre with her four daughters) said some of her PTSD symptoms were derived from the fear that she could not protect her girls

It was after her fifth suicide attempt that Andrea Josephs decided to choose life.

The Australian Army veteran had been battling PTSD, a diagnosis doctors failed to make for 10 years, when a film made by her daughter proved to be a turning point.

It was a tribute video that honoured not only the mother-of-four, but the soldiers, sailors and airmen and women who had put their life on the line for Australia.

The gesture was pivotal for Andrea, who had felt like she lost her identity ever since she was medically discharged from service in 2004.
read more here

Vietnam Veteran Faces End of Lifeline With Meals on Wheels Cut

Veteran Fears for Future of 'Meals on Wheels' Program
NBC 4 News
By Angie Crouch and Kate Guarino
March 16, 2017

For now, Nakashima said he’ll enjoy what he can. On the menu for his latest meal: pork, peas, sweet potato and good conversation with Clark, a fellow veteran.

Bruce Nakashima looks forward to visits from Chris Clark. Clark brings a hot meal and the paper. The gentlemen chat about sports.

"That’s my only contact with people outside of TV or newspaper or seeing the landlord," Nakashima said.

The 73-year-old Vietnam veteran and Purple Heart recipient lives alone with his cat in Santa Monica and suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder. He is one of 400 West Los Angeles residents who rely on Meals on Wheels as their main source of food. But the future of the program is uncertain.

President Donald Trump's proposed budget, released Wednesday, eliminates all federal funds — about three billion dollars — for the Community Development Block Grant Program. Government officials say the program has not demonstrated results. The elimination of the program is part of a 13 percent decrease in funding for the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
read more here

Homeless Veteran Rescued Swimmer in Arizona

Homeless veteran rescues distressed swimmer from Phoenix canal
The Republic
April Morganroth
March 17, 2017

A man who identified himself as a homeless veteran jumped into a canal to rescue a swimmer in distress Friday morning in Phoenix.

(Photo: April Morganroth/The Republic)

"I don't think any of us really thought about the dangers of helping him," said Richard McNeil, 41. "Where I came from, you just helped people — doesn't make a difference if I'm homeless or not, I still help people when I can."

McNeil said as he waited for a bus on 16th Street near Indian School Road at about 8 a.m. he heard splashing and a man crying for help.
read more here

Marine vet barred from restaurant because of neck tattoo?

Marine vet barred from restaurant because of neck tattoo
East Valley Tribune
By Jim Walsh, Tribune Staff Writer
21 hrs ago

Andrus served two tours of duty, a total of 14 months, in Iraq during 2004 and 2005. He said he has a 30 percent disability from the Veteran’s Administration for post-traumatic stress syndrome.

A U.S. Marine Corps veteran of two tours of duty in Iraq said he was humiliated Wednesday night when he was denied admittance into Gilbert’s new Dierks Bentley Whiskey Row restaurant because of his neck tattoo.

Brandon Andrus, the Iraq veteran, said he was not allowed to have a drink with family members because he has the number “22” tattooed on his neck as a suicide awareness statement. Military organizations say an average of 22 veterans commit suicide each day across the nation.

“I have been to a lot of different places and never once had an issue with anyone,” Andrus said. “They wouldn’t speak man to man. It was, ‘Sorry, sir, it’s a policy.’ They just thought I was going to cause trouble.”
read more here

Vietnam Blue Water Veterans Fight for Justice

Target 8: Navy Vietnam veterans in Port Richey fight for benefits taken away
WFLA 8 News
Steve Andrews
March 17, 2017

“These veterans were promised that they would be cared for.” Susie Belanger

PORT RICHEY, Fla. (WFLA) – More than 231 members of Congress are backing efforts to reinstate benefits that the V.A. stripped from sailors who served in the waters off Vietnam.

With the stroke of a V.A. pen, Agent Orange presumptive disease benefits that Congress and President George W. Bush granted to those veterans vanished.

Susie Belanger, Special Projects Director for the Blue Water Navy Association, isn’t having that.

“Why are you discriminating against this whole class of veterans?” she asks.

From a motor coach in Port Richey, she is working Congress.

Those 231 members of the House of Representatives are now co-sponsoring a bill, HR-299, to restore the benefits.

According to Belanger, Vietnam veterans are running out of time. They’re not in their 20s and 30s anymore. She thinks it’s time America honors its commitment to them.
read more here

Vietnam Veteran Sidney Randall Skeeter Laid to Rest With Honor

Vietnam veteran with no immediate family honored by fellow servicemen 
WJLA ABC 7 News 
by Elizabeth Tyree and Chris Hoffman 
Friday, March 17th 2017

Skeeter was born in 1949 in Nelson County and served in the Vietnam War where he received several awards including a Purple Heart.

LYNCHBURG, Va. (WSET) -- A Vietnam veteran was honored one last time in Lynchburg on Friday. When Tharp Funeral Home learned he had no immediate family, they worked with extended family and fellow veterans to help pay tribute to him. Sidney Randall Skeeter died Saturday.

"That means he was a real honorable patriot, and he deserves all the honor that we can give him," said Gary Witt, a local veteran. "We need to respect him and we need to give him the honor that he deserves, I feel proud that we are able to be here just to show respect to him [Friday]." read more here

OMG! Maj. General Pittard Credited for Suicide Prevention!

I do believe I have gone crazy or I am sleep reading. This cannot be true! A fabulous article on a General actually trying to do something about suicidal soldiers. All hopes dashed when I discovered the article was about Maj. General Dana Pittard! 

The General Who Went to War On Suicide
A commander with a history of depression created a unique way to keep his soldiers from killing themselves. The Army had other ideas.
POLITICO
By BEN HATTEM
March 17, 2017

On the evening of July 19, 2010, Major General Dana Pittard, the new commander of Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas, got a call from the base’s 24-hour duty officer. A SWAT team had been sent to the house of a young sergeant named Robert Nichols. Nichols was inside with a gun, threatening to kill himself.

Pittard arrived at the soldier’s home just in time to see the soldier step out of the house, put the gun to his chest and fire. Neighbors and police crowded the street, but Pittard was the only officer from the Army base at the scene. He went home, where his boxes were still packed from his move 10 days before, feeling disturbed and helpless.

Nichols was the first of Pittard’s soldiers who died under his command at Fort Bliss. Others followed. A soldier from Fort Bliss’ 11th Air Defense Artillery brigade, which had recently returned from a tour in the Middle East, committed suicide. Another from the same brigade soon overdosed on prescription drugs.

The rash of deaths caught Pittard off guard. He knew that suicide was a growing concern for the military, which had spent millions of dollars to tackle the crisis and had issued dozens of reports—including a 350-page study that called suicides and deaths linked to high-risk behavior an “Army-wide problem.” But going in Pittard hadn’t planned to focus on the issue. That changed quickly. With suicides mounting at his base—a sprawling complex of 30,000 personnel, larger than Rhode Island—he realized he wanted to make stopping what he saw as preventable deaths a top priority.

Yep that guy!
Two years after that "first" suicide he was caught writing this while working out in the gym.

A General's Blog Post Undermines Army Suicide-Prevention Efforts

The Atlantic 

YOCHI J. DREAZEN

MAY 22, 2012

Maj. Gen. Dana Pittard commands Fort Bliss, one the nation's largest Army bases, so his blunt comments about suicide has raised eyebrows throughout the military.

"I have now come to the conclusion that suicide is an absolutely selfish act," he wrote on his official blog recently. "I am personally fed up with soldiers who are choosing to take their own lives so that others can clean up their mess. Be an adult, act like an adult, and deal with your real-life problems like the rest of us."

The posting was subsequently scrubbed from the Fort Bliss website, but the comments are adding new fuel to a contentious debate about whether the record numbers of troops who are taking their own lives are acting out of weakness and selfishness or because of legitimate cases of depression and other psychological traumas.

"Soldiers who are thinking about suicide can't do what the general says: They can't suck it up, they can't let it go, they can't just move on," said Barbara Van Dahlen, the founder of Give an Hour, an organization that matches troops with civilian mental-health providers. "They're not acting out of selfishness; they're acting because they believe they've become a burden to their loved ones and can only relieve that burden by taking their own lives."

read more here

I guess Politico didn't bother doing much of a Google search on him because this was on the second page of the search. 

Then again they could have searched Combat PTSD Wounded Times for even more reports like these.

New Records Show Injured Soldiers Describe Mistreatment Nationwide From Commanders at Army Warrior Transition Units (WTUs) North Carolina’s Fort Bragg records the most complaints, Texas not far behindNBCBy Scott FriedmanApr 7, 2015
New Army records uncovered by NBC 5 Investigates show injured soldiers have filed more than 1,100 complaints about mistreatment, abuse and lack of care from their commanders at more than two dozen Warrior Transition Units (WTUs) nationwide, many of those in Texas.
Those are just complaints made over five years to the U.S. Army ombudsman program, one of many places soldiers can complain.
Last fall, NBC 5 Investigates and The Dallas Morning News first revealed hundreds of complaints from ill and injured active duty soldiers in Texas.
Those Texas soldiers said WTU commanders harassed, belittled them and ordered them to do things that made their conditions worse at three Army posts in Texas: Fort Hood, Fort Bliss and Fort Sam Houston.

Major General Dana Pittard leaving after 3 officers committed suicide

Darren Hunt of KCIA News reported on Monday, All three suicides at Fort Bliss this year were officers

"The Pentagon says nearly 350 U.S. Military service members committed suicide last year.

Among those were five Army soldiers at Fort Bliss.

This year, three more suicides, all with something in common -- they were non-commissioned officers.

Sunday night on ABC-7 Xtra, Fort Bliss' outgoing commanding general confirmed the latest suicide happened just last week.

Anthony Fusco last Monday at his Northeast El Paso home -- a day after buying a gun at the PX -- has Pittard talking about refocusing the program.

But if the reporter cannot pay attention all along, the least effort that can be made is to actually get informed about what has been going on. After the fantastic reporting done by the Dallas Morning News series "Injured Soldiers Broken Promises" of the real facts of what our soldiers were going through after asking for help, it should have been important enough to pay attention to.