Healing the trauma

One Day in the Life of a Veteran

VA needs a fundamental change in how it handles its PTSD paperwork.

Eric Shinseki, the newly appointed head of the Department of Veterans Affairs said this past Wednesday that the department needs a fundamental change in how it handles its paperwork. Shinseki then described a Sisyphean task for caseworkers trying to plow through the backlog of case files to make decisions on veterans' claims.

Members of the committee then peppered Shinseki with questions about the VA's handling of mental health issues. The secretary said that much progress has been made in understanding traumatic brain injuries (TBI) and post-traumatic stress disorders (PTSD) since he served in Vietnam, but there is plenty more to do. "I am now watching all of our efforts to understand PTSD, TBI, substance abuse amongst our veterans and have a better appreciation of what we put my comrades through when we came back" from Vietnam, he said. "None of these programs were available, in fact. None of these terms were in vogue then. We still don't understand enough. We are still learning."

The chairman of the committee, Rep. Bob Filner, D-California, expressed frustration that screenings for the disorders were actually being done through a self-evaluation process, rather than through a thorough medical examination, and he implored Shinseki to change that.
New online tool helps veterans determine eligibility In response to a proposed regulation to expand care to more veterans, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has created an on-line tool to help Veterans without service-connected disabilities determine if they are eligible for enrollment into the VA's health care system.

The enrollment calculator < http://www.va.gov/healtheligibility/apps/enrollmentcalculator/ > is a form where Veterans enter their household income information, number of dependents, and zip code in order to see if they qualify for VA health care currently or under an anticipated regulatory change that will allow VA to expand enrollment by raising current income thresholds by 10 percent. The proposed regulation, announced this month, is expected to take effect in June, although Veterans who apply for VA health care at any point in 2009 will have their applications reconsidered under the new law. Those who applied before 2009, but were rejected due to income, must now reapply.

The total apathy, arrogance, and incompetence found in this country

I was trying to write something more about this report I just read, but after these last eight previous years since 9/11 my rage keeps me from thinking straight in trying to add words to the total apathy, arrogance, and incompetence found in this country (the UK) and other elected representatives in the USA and Canada.

But I want you to meet Melissa Sterry, a Gulf War I National Guard Veteran, from New Haven Connecticut, and read the newspaper clips I have placed below. I also urge visiting the Hartford Advocate and read the rest of this story, not only about Ms. Sterry herself but as to the rest of the Veterans of Connecticut, and what the state representatives there have to say.

Cut and Run is clealy the slogan at stake. The Connecticut Governor, Ms. Jodi Rell's administration recently quietly killed a program to track the health of sick war veterans with PTSD.

Melissa Sterry's job was to clean them and ready them for storage. She'd climb inside the tanks and with a simple dust pan and broom, sweep out the Iraqi sand and the rubbish left behind by the tank operators.

Sterry was sweeping up something else too, something too small to see: dust from depleted uranium, a radioactive substance the military uses to make ammunition armor-piercing and bunker-busting. For months, Sterry cleaned these tanks without protective gear, kicking depleted uranium airborne and into her lungs.

Today, Sterry is a medical train wreck. The 46-year-old Gulf War veteran takes 11 kinds of medication — some daily and others as needed for pain — and suffers from chronic headaches, upper respiratory disease, bronchitis and a host of other ailments.

Like most Gulf War vets, the federal Veterans Administration refuses to test Ms. Sterry for exposure to depleted uranium or other chemical toxins she was exposed to in the Middle East.

So Ms. Sterry turned to the state government, and in 2005 helped Connecticut become the first state in the nation to craft a law to test returning combat troops for exposure to battlefield health hazards, including depleted uranium.

But the state has now turned its back on Sterry and the more than 30,000 Connecticut troops who have deployed to combat zones in the Middle East and the Balkans since 1990. The Advocate has learned that Gov. Jodi Rell, through her budget office, quietly killed funding for the veterans health registry without telling the lawmakers who sponsored the program, nor the veterans whom it would serve.

If the registry isn't restored, hundreds of Connecticut-based troops could go undiagnosed and uncatalogued. The single state of Connecticut has actually sent 16,000 troops to war in the past 8 years since Sept. 11, 2001 and another 75 National Guardsmen and women shipped off to southwest Asia in the last week of January, 2009, their second deployment to the war zone.

"People really don't care about veterans," Ms. Sterry says. "They really don't give a shit about us. People want to trot out veterans on photo-ops. They want to go put wreaths on gravestones. But real human beings with real life problems? No, we don't care."

Who is Gov. Jodi Rell? According to Wikipedia, Mary Jodi Rell was born June 16, 1946, and is a Republican politician who became the 72nd Governor of the U.S. state of Connecticut on July 1, 2004. She had been the Lieutenant Governor of Connecticut until Governor John G. Rowland resigned during a corruption investigation. Ms. Jodi Rell is Connecticut's second female Governor, after Ella T. Grasso.

To Sterry, cutting help for vets to balance the books is just plain heartless.

"We understand care and maintenance of our military vehicles, but we don't understand we need to do the same for our troops," Sterry says. "Do you want to change the oil in the engine or do you want to replace the engine when it seizes up? These actions are just a reflection of, We'll just change the engine when it seizes up."

Rell's press office was asked to explain why they cut funds for the registry and to respond to reactions like those of Sterry that denying health screening to combat troops is cold-hearted. Despite four calls and one e-mail to the governor's press shop over three days, we received no response to our questions. The governor's chief spokesman, Christopher Cooper, referred us the Jeffrey Beckham, undersecretary for legislative affairs at OPM, who responded with this statement:

"That program was new and had not gotten started. The agency required some cooperation from the federal government to get it going and I understand that cooperation was somewhat lacking. Given that we were struggling to protect existing programs, we thought that not going forward with that new program was a reasonable call."

We asked Beckham in a follow-up e-mail to elaborate about the lack of federal cooperation and respond to the questions unanswered by the governor's staff, but did not receive a response by press time.

Now I'm assuming, and probably right, about the lack of federal cooperation, that they are talking about the previous Bush administration's control, as the present President has been on the job only since January 20th '09.

Another in an ever growing list of the Incompetence and Corrupt leadership we've been a party to for these last eight years in the federal government, including the years of control prior to in the congress, and coming also out of the state governments!

Now a certain political party can't be blamed for everything concerning Military and Veterans Care, but this political party are the ones Thumbing their Chests as to being True 'Americans', More 'Patriotic', Stronger on 'National Defense', and the only True 'Supporters of the Troops' and thus us Veterans, and are the ones who championed the Two Occupations and the creation of huge numbers of enemies towards our country and it's citizens!!

http://imagineaworldof.blogspot.com/2009/02/soldiers-get-shafted-agai...

"If ever forgetful of her past and present glory, she will cease to be the land of the free and the home of the brave."

Francis Scott Key 1874

Dr. Edward Tick, practicing psychotherapist.

Dr. Tick is a practicing psychotherapist who has worked with veterans with Post-traumatic Stress Disorder for more than 30 years. For Tick, the key to helping veterans heal lies in how we understand PTSD, which he defines as an identity disorder resulting from the deep trauma of war. Tick is the founder of Soldier’s heart (http://www.soldiersheart.net), a non-profit veterans’ advocacy and safe-return program. His clinical practice and his work with Soldier’s heart are the basis for his recent book, War and the Soul: Healing our Nation’s Veterans from Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (2005).

We have only touched on some of the struggles of being a soldier, however we have not dug deeply into the personal war that Operation Iraqi Freedom has caused for returning soldiers.

Donald Rumsfeld and President Bush did not want to reveal to the world that this war was a personal war. They wanted to run the war like a business, and thus they refused to show the personal sacrifices these brave soldiers and their families have made for this country.

My thoughts are to help understand what happens to a brave soldier when he/she comes home and the sacrifices they continue to make. This may be lengthy, it may be short; but no matter how long it is, just close your eyes and imagine a flag draped coffin.

Inside that coffin is the body of a man or woman who will never get to live their life to the fullest, yet they bore the total cost so that we could live free. Their soul is somewhere else and all we have is their memory which, over time, will be forgotten by other events of greater importance. The families of these soldiers have a hole in their hearts that will never be replaced, even though they have pictures and happy memories.

Some families will refuse to believe they are gone, but still their sons and daughters are the heros of a country that sent them to war. This war on terror has become a personal war for so many, yet the Bush Administration did not want journalists or even families to photograph the only thing that was left of our soldiers who have died. They do not want the people to remember that image of a flag draped coffin as the last memory this country will ever have of our fallen men and woman.

They say that Americans, Canadians and Britons will raise their voices and demand a stop to the war, but my question is why should we not show the results of war? For us as citizens of what appears to be a civilised country, we send these soldiers to war daily and we see their faces while they are alive. I say let their memories live on in every photo, even when they do come home in a flag draped coffin. Let their sacrifice be forever etched in the memory of Canada, Great Britain and America.

We owe their families this at the very least, surely!

Man's best friend is being recruited to heal PTSD.

After terrifying tours of duty in Kuwait, Iraq and Somalia, a retired Army Sergeant is recovering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder with the help of a four-legged therapist, reports CBS News correspondent Richard Schlesinger.

For two solid weeks, retired Sgt. Jim Mason and Yankee have been in intensive training.

Yankee is already a fully qualified service dog. It's Mason who is in training. He's learning to use Yankee to cope with what doctors have diagnosed as severe PTSD.

"I know I can say 'hello' to anyone with that dog and they'll smile and say 'hello' back," says Mason.

And that alone is a huge step for Mason, who still feels trapped in the real life nightmares he lived in both Gulf wars and in Somalia - especially Somalia - where his unit was ambushed while trying to provide humanitarian aid.

"I had to kill some people," Mason says as he chokes up.

Fifteen years later, he still can barely talk about it.

"You know, I mean they shot at us," he said. "We were ambushed. And if we didn't fight back they were gonna kill us. But in my heart, I didn't go there for that."

When he retired after 20 years in the military, he started noticing changes in himself. He couldn't sleep, he snapped at people, and he was afraid he'd become violent.

Now, he's got Yankee - a brand new solution for a problem as old as war. He can sense when Mason gets tense and help avoid panic attacks by staying close - a four-legged security blanket. He's also trained to keep an eye out behind Mason, and barks when he sees something or someone that Mason may consider a threat.

Yankee's used to watching and being watched. He was trained by inmates in a New York penitentiary, as part of a program called Puppies Behind Bars. And what Yankee learned in prison helps him free Mason from lingering terror.

The cliché is that a dog is man's best friend. The reality is, Yankee's a lot more to Jim Mason. He's indispensable.

Our Kids as Mercenaries?

The Pentagon doesn't talk much about it, but over half of America's presence in Iraq today is made up of mercenaries.

That's how we keep down the number of actual troops. We now hire civilians to do for the soldiers many of the things they used to do for themselves. Everyone knows about Halliburton and Blackwater, and many have heard tell of scores of other companies that, at exorbitant rates, feed, house and supply our fighting men and women. There is even occasional note of the regiments of Bangladeshis slipped in to do the army's scut work.

But what about our heroic troops themselves? Surely, THEY'RE not in it for the money. Surely, they're not abandoned at the end of their tours like so many paid contractors. Surely, we nurture them for the rest of their lives like the heroes that they are. Sure we do.

I recently found a National Guard recruiting flier taped to a utility pole. It touted, "100% Tuition Free College," "Up to $20,000 Enlistment Bonus," and "$200/month of school G.I. Bill Kicker." Along the bottom were the usual tear-off strips with the recruiting sergeant's phone number, reiterating the $20,000 bonus. Forget "Uncle Sam Needs You!" At our annual local Oyster Festival, the Guard augments these enticements with T-shirts, caps, push-up contests, vehicle displays and a party atmosphere. No amputees on hand.

For 18-year-olds with no career focus, all this hype can convey much allure. Smartly paid ex-generals flood the airways intoning about duty, service, foreign evils, and victory. Meanwhile war skeptics and recorders of suffering, such as Iraq Veterans Against the War, are
systematically excluded from mainstream programming. Thus despite the well-known harsh realities of warfare and occupation, other realities like money, recession and propaganda help to keep filling our relentless recruiting quotas.

They also help to fill our Veterans Administration hospitals. Though even at that, painfully large squadrons of vets have yet to find solace with the VA. Especially those with emotional distress. Suicides among soldiers and returnees have now exceeded battle deaths in Iraq, and POST-TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDERS plague combatants and veterans alike in disturbing numbers. The Defense Department also admits, though it does not advertise, that an astonishing 25,000 of its members have deserted, many heading for Canada and the rest playing Hide-and-seek here at home.

But the largest body of troops just do their job and do eventually come home. Then they enter on a prolonged struggle to find a job, to reintegrate with their family, to increase their education, and to plead for government help with their mental and physical wounds. Unfortunately, there are still no good numbers for casualties from PTSD or on its destructive effect on home or work. Mostly it simply goes untreated. As does the recently recognized Gulf War Syndrome from our battles in Kuwait.

So too do other veterans' afflictions. Housing shortages and homelessness weigh heavily on former soldiers. Likewise the lack of rape treatment and counseling, or even any government admission that rape is a common military occurrence. And despite congressional inquiries and diligent investigative reporting, care for veterans remains spotty and unreliable. The White House and Pentagon hush it up, fearful that the truth might sour recruitment enthusiasm.

This unfortunately makes the whole war enterprise sound more and more like a mercenary world, which it is. Spend plenty of money on the front end with bonuses and improved salaries; scrimp on the back end when our warriors, patriots and heroes finally come home.

That's when they learn how expendable they are. And as a finishing touch of "fight for pay," Congress has now voted to speed up citizenship applications for those aliens who enlist.

Offering such a lure to foreigners makes plain just where the United States plans to find the cannon fodder for its military adventures of the future.

Published on Saturday, December 27, 2008 by the Citizen-Times (Asheville, N.C.)

Written by Columnist William A. Collins, a former state representative and a former mayor of Norwalk, Connecticut. This column was distributed by MinutemanMedia.org.

Copyright © 2008 Citizen-Times.com

Psychological support for UK Service personnel

Several British national newspapers claim that the number of current and former British Service personnel requiring medical attention for psychiatric disorders is set to dramatically increase within a few years.

Robust systems are supposedly in place to treat and prevent stress disorders. Counselling is available to British Service personnel and troops receive pre and post deployment briefings to help recognise the signs of stress disorders. The MOD claims to recognise that operational deployments can be stressful experiences, so they offer individuals briefing prior to returning to their home base. 'Decompression periods' at the home base or in places such as Cyprus are in place for personnel to unwind mentally and physically and talk to colleagues about their experiences in the theatre of war. The families of returning personnel are also offered presentations and leaflets about the possible after-affects of an operational deployment. Medical discharge from the UK Armed Forces due to psychological illness is low. Out of around 180,000 Regular Service personnel only about 150 - or less than 0.1% - are discharged annually for mental health reasons, whatever the cause. Of the less than 0.1%, around 20-25 each year meet the criteria to be diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

The numbers of UK Service personnel who presented to the MOD's out-patient mental health centres for the first time during the period July - September 2007 are low - 4.6 per 1000 strength or 0.46% - and for PTSD the rate is very low - rate of 0.2 per 1000 strength or 0.02%. It is too early to conclude whether this data represents a significant trend because the numbers involved are low. Robust systems are in place to treat and prevent instances of mental illness.

Combat Stress

Combat Stress was founded in 1919 to help WWI veterans recover mentally from shell-shock. Today, after growing concern over the lack of treatment available to today's veterans, Combat Stress is ramping up a public relations campaign to highlight the issue:

Combat Stress is alarmed at the huge increase in veterans from the Falklands, Sierra Leone, Northern Ireland, Iraq and Afghanistan, who come knocking on their door for help. A few are still turning up suffering long-term effects from the second world war and Korea. The oldest applicant for help recently was aged 100.

What's their reasoning for this alarm? Eight years ago 300 veterans sought help from Combat Stress; during the last fiscal year the number jumped to 1,000. The number of Falklands War vets who've committed suicide has risen to 300—more than the 256 British soldiers who were killed in the war itself. Of particular note is how many view the Iraq war's unpopularity in the UK as exacerbating vets' mental health issues. From the Guardian:

The problems of veterans today are compounded by the widespread recognition through much of the army that the Iraq campaign is unpopular, nasty, unpredictable and brutal—and, in the views of a significant minority of soldiers and officers in private conversation, a pretty unnecessary conflict at that. In the first and second world wars, the plight of service personnel was shared by almost everyone in the land. More than 1 million soldiers served in Northern Ireland over 30 or so years, so that became part of the national experience.

But combat in Iraq and Afghanistan is not a national experience, and the services are worried that they appear in the minds of many now to be detached from most of British national life. Though more American soldiers have been involved—more than 3,000 killed and nearly 50,000 injured, physically or mentally—Iraq is not a shared experience nationally for Americans in the way that Vietnam was.

What on earth are we doing to our troops?

What on earth are our troops still doing in Afghanistan and Iraq? What is the strategy? What is the end game?

We clearly do not have sufficient combat troops on the ground to defeat or contain the Taliban and many of our so called NATO allies will only send cooks or drivers into safe areas. The actual fighting and dying is being largely left to the Americans, British, Canadians and Australians. Furthermore the extended and largely unprotected border between Afghanistan and Pakistan allows the Taliban to enter and leave the country at will. They fight and run away, only to return to fight another day. There is no military solution to these countries' problems. Troop casualties will continue to rise in this war of attrition until someone sees sense in the White House and in 10 Downing Street.

I for one am not holding my breath.

A Soldier's Personal War!

One of our readers asked for more information about the Iraq veterans we are seeing. I don't know how many we are seeing. Except during the Point-In-Time Survey, we never asked people why they were homeless, or any other personal questions. The first Iraq veteran we saw, a year or two ago, was very young and extremely angry. He didn't attack anyone, but he did take his guitar off his backpack and pound it on the sidewalk.

I've never seen him again and don't know what happened to him. Another young Iraq veteran was homeless because his family had taken out a restraining order against him, because he was doing them violence.

Domestic violence by veterans with severe PTSD is one cause of homelessness among returning soldiers. This young man took full responsibility for what he had done. He knew he couldn't go home until he had gotten treatment. He did take every opportunity to work and gather money for his children though. He also bought a bicycle at a garage sale and fixed it up for his son's 12th birthday. And he donated money and other bicycles to the Home Van. He has moved on now, to seek better employment opportunities elsewhere.

Julie is a young woman veteran from Iraq. While she was over there, her father, her only surviving parent, died. She came home from Iraq with severe PTSD and nowhere to go. She is living in a tent with two other veterans, both older and with worse medical problems. She takes care of them and brings them food. She is on various waiting lists to get help for herself. The last time she was here she noticed I had a small electric piano. She said, "Oh, please can I play it! I have been dreaming about being able to play a piano again! Please!" She went over to my little piano and started playing classical music, beautifully, and then segued into a beautiful improvisation she created herself, one that included a mysterious, ominous, relentless beating of drums.

I think it was Ghandi who said, "Be the change you want to see in the world." What better advice is there, for these dark times?
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Thanks man. Im trying to get out of my service contract but they want to rehab me and send me back. I'll probably end up in Afghanistan when they say Im okay to go.

I know about 50 guys who are doing tour even thought they got wounded. One of our top kicks killed himself last month after his wife left him. He was already on meds and he overdosed on the meds they gave him for depression.

My bro told me all about it because he's with HHC and had to pack all the stuff up and ship it home.

Here is an article Jay Shaft helped a guy get printed.

Try this one out about Spc. Doug Barber: PTSD - A Soldier's Personal War!

Dated: Thursday, 12 January 2006, 10:59 am

Opinion: Guest Opinion

PTSD - Every Soldier's Personal WAR! By Spc. Doug Barber Dated 1/10/05

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0601/S00079.htm

Published By Coalition For Free Thought In Media

In the last month I have been working with Jay Shaft, the editor of Coalition For Free Thought in media regarding my experiences in Iraq and since coming home from the war. We have only touched on some of the struggles of being a soldier, however we have not dug deeply into the personal war that Operation Iraqi Freedom has caused for returning soldiers.

Donald Rumsfeld and President Bush do not want to reveal to the American people that this war is a personal war. They want to run the war like a business, and thus they refuse to show the personal sacrifices the soldiers and their families have made for this country.

My thought today is to help you the reader understand what happens to a soldier when they come home and the sacrifice we continue to make. This may be lengthy, it may be short; but no matter how long it is, just close your eyes and imagine a flag draped coffin.

Inside that coffin is the body of a man or woman who will never get to live their life to the fullest, yet they bore the total cost so that we could live free. Their soul is somewhere else and all we have is their memory which over time will be forgotten by other events of greater importance. The families of these soldiers have a hole in their hearts that will never be replaced, even though they have pictures and happy memories.

All is not okay or right for those of us who return home alive and supposedly well. What looks like normalcy and readjustment is only an illusion to be revealed by time and torment. Some soldiers come home missing limbs and other parts of their bodies. Still others will live with permanent scars from horrific events that no one other than those who served will ever understand.

We come home from war trying to put our lives back together but some cannot stand the memories and decide that death is better. They kill themselves because they are so haunted by seeing children killed and whole families wiped out.

They ask themselves how you put a price tag on someone else's life?

The question goes unanswered as they become another casualty of the war. Hero's become another statistic to America and they are another little article relegated to the back of a newspaper.

Still others come home to nothing, families have abandoned them: husbands and wives have left these soldiers, and so have parents as well. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder has become the norm amongst these soldiers because they don't know how to cope with returning to a society that will never understand what they have had to endure to liberate another country.

PTSD comes in many forms not understood by many: but yet if a soldier has it, America thinks the soldiers are crazy. PTSD comes in the form of depression, anger, regret, being confrontational, anxiety, chronic pain, compulsion, delusions, grief, guilt, dependence, loneliness, sleep disorders, suspiciousness/paranoia, low self-esteem and so many other things.

We are easily startled with a loud bang or noise and can be found ducking for cover when we get panicked. This is a result of artillery rounds going off in a combat zone, or an IED blowing up.

I myself have trouble coping with an everyday routine that deals with other people that often causes me to have a short fuse. A lot of soldiers lose multiple jobs just because they are trained to be killers and they have lived in an environment that is conducive to that. We are always on guard for our safety and that of our comrades. When you go to bed at night you wonder will you be sent home in a flag draped coffin because a mortar round went off on your sleeping area.

Soldiers live in deplorable conditions where burning your own feces is the order of the day. Where going days on end with no shower and the uniform you wear gets so crusty it sometimes sticks to your body becomes a common occurrence. We also deal with rationing water or even food for that matter. So when a soldier comes home to what they left they are unsure of what to do being in a civilized world again.

This is what PTSD comes in the shape of--soldiers can not often handle coming back to the same world they left behind. It is something that drives soldiers over the edge and causes them to withdraw from society. As Americans we turn our nose down at them wondering why they act the way they do. Who cares about them, why should we help them?

Talk show hosts like Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, Rush Limbaugh and so many others act like they know all about war; then they refuse to give any credence to soldiers like me who have been to war and seen the brutality of war. These guys are nothing but WEAK SPINELESS COWARDS hiding behind microphones while soldiers come home and are losing everything they have.

I ask every American who reads this e-mail to stand up for the soldier who has given their everything for this country to stand up to these guys in the media; ask them why they don't pick up a weapon and follow in the steps of a soldier. Send this e-mail to as many people on your e-mail lists and ask them to do the same.

There needs to be a National awareness for every Veteran who has ever served in any war. Send e-mails to the Big Mouths on TV and ask them to have soldiers like me on their programs. I am asking you as Americans to BOYCOTT every TV show or host/journalist that refuses to tell the real truth.

THIS IS A PERSONAL CHALLENGE TO BILL,SEAN AND RUSH TO HAVE ME ON YOUR PROGRAM TO SET THE RECORD STRAIGHT.

Otherwise you are nothing but dirt under every soldier's boots!

SPC. Douglas Barber

To all crooked government officials that are reading my e-mail, I hope you are enjoying yourself and maybe one day your eyes will be opened to the master who enslaves you. I know how to fight warfare and am prepared to fight it as well.

LET THIS BE A WARNING!!

I am watching and I know you are watching me but I don't care.

LET FREEDOM BE HEARD.

===========

Read the whole thing in this Blog below. You will see what I mean.

Veterans turned away from military hospital commits suicide

US: Veteran turned away from military hospital commits suicide

By Naomi Spencer Dated 28 July 2008

On July 7, 2008 a Navy veteran suffering from psychological problems hanged himself after being turned away from the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Spokane, Washington. A July 20 report by the Spokesman-Review notes that the death of Lucas Senescall was the sixth suicide this year of veterans under care of the Spokane Veterans Administration (VA).

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/jul2008/vets-j28.shtml

US: Emails suggest Veterans Administration cover-up of suicide rate

By Naomi Spencer Dated 26 April 2008

Internal emails from the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) turned over to a federal district court in San Francisco this week reveal that the agency’s mental health unit saw a staggering 1,000 suicide attempts every month among veterans receiving government care last year. emails also indicated that among all US veterans, the VA was aware of a suicide rate of 6,570 per year, or 18 suicides every day on average.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/apr2008/vets-a26.shtml

US veteran population: a mounting social catastrophe

By Naomi Spencer Dated 20 November 2007

As thousands of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan return to the US, the dimensions of the social burden of war are beginning to take shape. A number of recent reports highlight the toll colonial occupation has taken on the physical and mental health of military personnel, as well as the lack of US government medical and financial assistance awaiting them on their return.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2007/nov2007/vets-n20.shtml

Nate Self and his Two Wars

It is especially tough to be a soldier at war. The separation from family, the fear, the unexpected. And, many times, when a soldier survives his or her tour of duty they return to a new war. The war in the mind. The war called Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, or PTSD.

American veterans face a high incidence of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Self, in his book Two Wars, will detail his personal struggles with PTSD, as well as detailing the heroic efforts of his men at war in Afghanistan.

This book is an important read for any veteran, or any person presently serving America in the armed forces. Veterans and their families alike will benefit from the insight into the way a soldier thinks. In addition, Nate Self will inspire them in their faith in God and in their fellow soldier. Two Wars is entertaining, inspirational and educational; a must-read for the military professional.

PTSD- Post Traumatic Stress Disorder - is no longer a rare event.

PTSD - Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder has been found to cause early death from heart disease

Vietnam veterans who experienced post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) were twice as likely to die from heart disease as veterans without PTSD, a new Geisinger study finds.

In a study published in the July 2008 issue of Psychosomatic Medicine, Geisinger Senior Investigator Joseph Boscarino, PhD, MPH examined the prevalence of heart disease, PTSD and other problems in more than 4,000 Vietnam veterans.

The more severe the PTSD diagnosis, the greater the likelihood of death from heart disease, the study showed.

Vietnam veterans with PTSD--like chronic smokers-are at higher risk of early death from heart disease, Dr. Boscarino concluded. Boscarino equated PTSD to smoking two to three packs of cigarettes per day for more than 20 years.

PTSD causes the body to release stress hormones, which leads to the inflammation and damage to the arteries and cardiovascular system damage. Stress hormones also tend to reduce the amount of inflammation-reducing cortisol in the body-though researchers aren't sure why.

"Increased levels of stress hormones and less cortisol from PTSD are a bad combination," Dr. Boscarino explained. "Basically, PTSD just cooks your arteries in this situation."

Dr. Boscarino previously found that people with PTSD had dramatically higher rates of chronic health problems such as psoriasis, arthritis and other inflammatory diseases.

"The science is conclusively showing that if you suffer psychological trauma, it's going to take a toll on your physical health," Dr. Boscarino said. "Getting counseling today is critical to avoiding a related problem tomorrow."

This study excluded patients with a prior history of heart disease and included a national sample of veterans, which is different from prior studies on the topic, Boscarino said.