Vietnam Veterans: Fighting For Care, part 1

"They (can) never take it away from you, and nobody will ever be able to say to you that you are less."

Anderson has serious health issues connected to exposure to Agent Orange. On Tuesday, the two-part series continues as veterans like Ken try to receive help from the local Reno VA, but are finding long wait times, denials and abrupt changes to disability claims.

Continue Learning>>>http://www.mynews4.com/news/story/Vietnam-Veterans-Fighting-For-Care-part-1/m-Pz37rQCkezVReoDD5WGA.cspx

Veterans welcome more support

FROM all theatres of conflict on land, air or sea, active and returned servicemen and women come home to a very different reality from scenes of stress and battle. Some local men who have been there, said all of them need recognition and support.

The Department of Veteran’s Affairs pledge of $5 million into research to avoid the legacy of forgotten soldiers that dogged Vietnam is not a bad investment according to Vietnam vet-erans and Inverell RSL sub-branch president Rob Schieb, pensions officer Brian McClellan and secretary Graeme Clinch. 

Continue Learning>>>http://www.inverelltimes.com.au/story/2371793/veterans-welcome-more-support/?cs=12

DoD report: Many troops who commit suicide have seen doctor

Nearly two-thirds of active-duty troops who died by suicide in 2012 were seen by a doctor within three months before taking their own lives, and one-third told someone of their plans, according to a Defense Department report released Friday.

Forty-two percent had at least one mental health diagnosis, and one in five were prescribed a psychiatric medication sometime in the 90 days before they died, according to the 2012 DoD Suicide Event Report.

Continue Learning>>>http://www.militarytimes.com/article/20140425/NEWS/304250048/DoD-report-Many-troops-who-commit-suicide-seen-doctor?org=403&lvl=100&ite=9209&lea=964&ctr=0&par=1

Lead the Change NOW...PTSD

Lead the Change Now - Transformation from Lead the Change Now on Vimeo.

Collateral damage: The mental health issues facing children of veterans

Asked what he tells his children when something happens, Aaron replied, "I usually say, 'Leave me alone.' I would never intentionally harm them." Facing his daughter Abigail, Barton said, "You're my life."

The stories of veterans' lives upended by PTSD are all too familiar to us -- the struggles of their children practically unknown.

"I would get so angry," said Abigail. "I would just think, 'This is what Iraq did to my father.' I'd start blaming it on America's military, you know? I would be like, 'You guys stole my father.'

Continue Learning:  http://www.cbsnews.com/news/collateral-damage-the-mental-health-issues-facing-children-of-veterans/

A daughter faces demons of father's war

Delmer Presley, Christal Presley's father, was drafted before his 19th birthday and served a year in Vietnam.

"Thirty Days With My Father" is a gritty memoir written by a woman haunted by what some psychologists describe as second-generation post-traumatic stress disorder.

The trauma began in Vietnam, affected Delmer and then Christal, says psychiatrist Frank Ochberg, a trauma expert who served on the committee that defined PTSD in the post-Vietnam era.

Christal, he says, suffered profound injury. And it stayed with her.

Continue Learning:  http://www.cnn.com/2012/11/04/us/veteran-daughter-ptsd/index.html

Suicide in the military: Army-NIH funded study points to risk and protective factors

"These studies provide knowledge on suicide risk and potentially protective factors in a military population that can also help us better understand how to prevent suicide in the public at large"” said National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) Director Thomas R. Insel, M.D. NIMH is part of the National Institutes of Health.

Although historically, the suicide death rates in the U.S. Army have been below the civilian rate, the suicide rate in the U.S. Army began climbing in the early 2000s, and by 2008, it exceeded the demographically matched civilian rate (20.2 suicide deaths per 100,000 vs. 19.2). Concerns about this increase led to a partnership between the Army and the NIMH to identify risks.

Continue Learning:  http://www.nih.gov/news/health/mar2014/nimh-03.htm

Vietnam Veteran Dusty Earl Trimmer's Passion Shines Through in Newly Released Book About War's Lasting Effects

"Condemned Property?" provides a stark portrait of day and night combat and its lingering effects on veterans, including the author. For instance, Trimmer changed jobs almost two dozen times because he couldn't find or keep a job with an employer willing to risk employing a "crazy" Vietnam veteran and he nearly killed himself in high-speed car accidents more than once. Many of his fellow survivors came back unable to work, becoming homeless and unable to care for themselves. From descriptions of combat maneuvers to accounts of everyday nuisances - such as bathing in Agent Orange run-off - and then the unforgettable hostile welcome home many Vietnam veterans had once they came home, Trimmer brings the war to life in vivid detail, as only someone who served there can do.

Continue Learning:  http://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/1773941

New Haven Vietnam veteran with PTSD, others, file class action lawsuit

The 65-year-old longtime New Haven resident is one of five Vietnam combat veterans and three organizations that have filed a class action suit in federal court seeking a review of all Vietnam era veterans diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, but who received less-than-honorable discharges.

Because of that discharge, he had not been able to get medical care at the Veterans Affairs medical center, obtain educational benefits or help with home loans available to other veterans.

The suit, if approved, would represent tens of thousands of veterans across the United States, according to Virginia McCalmont, a student at the Yale Law School working with in its Veterans Legal Services Clinic that brought the suit.

Continue Learning:  http://www.nhregister.com/general-news/20140303/new-haven-vietnam-veteran-with-ptsd-others-file-class-action-lawsuit

VA Concedes Whistleblower's Allegations Were True, Including That It Ignored Veterans' Suicidal Tendencies

A government whistleblower who suffered retaliation from his agency has been vindicated by a Department of Veterans Affairs admission that it failed to reach out to 2,000 veterans in a research study who said they had suicidal ideas, many of whom later committed suicide.

The agency's admission, which has not been previously publicized, resulted from a congressional inquiry into the allegations of Dr. Steven Coughlin, a former epidemiologist at the Department of Veterans Affairs Office of Public Health, who disclosed that the VA was guilty of shocking ethical lapses.

Continue Learning:  http://www.ibtimes.com/va-concedes-whistleblowers-allegations-were-true-including-it-ignored-veterans-suicidal-tendencies

Sharing war experience helps Vietnam veteran cope

"I tell you, it broke my heart. It’s hard to explain but it just broke my heart. He was one of the best friends I had in my life,” he said, showing a photo of the two sitting together on a mountain of sandbags."“

I realized I wasn’t the same person after that,” said Sprinkel.

Continue Learning:  http://www.mydesert.com/article/20140208/NEWS13/302080051/Sharing-war-experience-helps-Vietnam-veteran-cope?nclick_check=1

Veteran Shines Light on Lasting Effects of Vietnam War in New Book

Image by The NAM

This new book by Dusty Earl Trimmer, himself a Vietnam veteran, shares his experiences and what it’s like to live as a survivor of a very unpopular war that continues for those who served in that tropical country.

"Condemned Property?" provides a stark portrait of combat and its lingering effects on veterans, including the author. For instance, Trimmer changed jobs almost two dozen times because he couldn't find or keep a job with few employers wanting to risk employing a “crazy” Vietnam veteran, and he nearly killed himself in a high-speed sports car accident.

Many of his fellow survivors came back unable to work, becoming homeless and unable to care for themselves. From descriptions of combat maneuvers to accounts of everyday nuisances – such as leeches and bathing in Agent Orange run-off and refuse-filled rivers – and the hostile welcome veterans had once they came home, Trimmer brings the war to life in vivid detail, as only someone who served there can do.

Continue Learning:  http://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/1692708

Study links traumatic brain injury and PTSD

The findings add to a growing body of research on the long-term psychological and physical consequences of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan where improvised explosive devices have often been the enemy’s weapon of choice, and head trauma — as well as psychological struggles afterdeployment — has proliferated. Past studies have shown the symptoms of TBI and PTSD overlap, and the research by the VA-funded Marine Resiliency Study made public this week adds evidence of a causal connection.

Continue Learning:  http://www.stripes.com/news/study-links-traumatic-brain-injury-and-ptsd-1.257017

Veterans Dying Waiting On Disability Benefits

Veterans are dying and leaving their spouses or even children to continue their fight.

"I wanted to take the pain. Just a little of it. I just wanted to releave him a little bit but there was no way"” said Mrs. Lundy. Back then doctors had a hard time diagnosing Judge Lundy’s illness. His military discharge files said he had a heart condition.

Lundy filed his first claim with the Veterans Administration asking for disability benefits in 1979. It was denied.

Captain Nick Lundy had more than 40 surgeries, including a liver transplant.

Sadly, he passed away in 1991. During that whole time he appealed his benefits case; claiming his injuries were a direct result of Agent Orange exposure.

The common myth that a veteran’s benefits claim dies with them isn’t true, according to Attig.

VA Appeals Backlog Info

LIfe Cycle of VA Appeal by Agent Orange Legacy

Continue Learning:  http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2013/11/22/veterans-dying-waiting-on-disability-benefits/

PTSD: Vietnam veterans experiencing return of nightmares late in life

But experts say his experience is not uncommon. As Vietnam veterans age, many discover they have more time to contemplate their lives. The time for reflection — as well as retirement, reunions with war buddies and the deaths of loved ones — can stir memories from a long-ago war.

Anniversary dates and holidays such as Veterans Day may begin to bother people. But even when a veteran seeks treatment late in life, experts say, in many cases the post-traumatic stress disorder had been there all along.

Continue Learning:  http://www.columbian.com/news/2013/nov/17/vietnam-veterans-experiencing-return-of-nightmares/

"I JUST FELT LIKE I HAVE TO GIVE BACK" said former Army Sergeant and Vietnam veteran Tom Hall: Retired Mesa veteran helping those in need

Every ounce of Hall's energy is devoted to honoring those who have worn the uniform, even though he's fighting his own battles.

Hall was exposed to Agent Orange in Vietnam. He suffers from diabetes and PTSD and he also has memory and speech problems.

When he left the Army, he remembers it being difficult to re acclimate to society.

"I couldn't find a job, I couldn't find a place to live and they (family) helped me through and I just felt like I have to give back," said Hall. "It's just something I feel like I have to do."

Continue Learning:  http://www.kpho.com/story/23981238/retired-mesa-veteran

VA's opiate overload feeds veterans' addictions, overdose deaths

Since the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the agency charged with helping veterans recover from war instead masks their pain with potent drugs, feeding addictions and contributing to a fatal overdose rate among VA patients that is nearly double the national average.

Prescriptions for four opiates – hydrocodone, oxycodone, methadone and morphine – have surged by 270 percent in the past 12 years, according to data CIR obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. CIR’s analysis for the first time exposes the full scope of that increase, which far outpaced the growth in VA patients and varied dramatically across the nation.

Continue Learning:  http://www.wbez.org/news/vas-opiate-overload-feeds-veterans-addictions-overdose-deaths-108792

Vietnam veteran still fighting, this time for VA's PTSD support group

Alexander Nogales still fights the Vietnam War, not with his Marine buddies along the border with Laos but in Southern Nevada where he’s battling the Department of Veterans Affairs over its plan to cancel his support group for post-traumatic stress disorder.

"They said it’s good for us to have change now and to try to make it to the Vet to Vet programs. So in other words, they’re washing their hands of us"” Nogales said.

But Nogales, who is 100 percent disabled from PTSD and maladies from Agent Orange defoliants that were sprayed in Vietnam, said he prefers the traditional support groups that he’s been involved with since 2008. He said the one-hour sessions held every other week for 15 to 20 Vietnam veterans have helped them cope with the invisible wounds of war such as nightmares and flashbacks of their combat experiences. Many of them can’t hold jobs, he said.

Continue Learning:   http://www.reviewjournal.com/news/nevada-and-west/vietnam-veteran-still-fighting-time-vas-ptsd-support-group

The Rain

The trees were screaming while dying. They never feared the woodsman’s axe. Sure, one or two of them would be killed, but their brothers, millions strong, lived and grew. Their cousins, the bushes and vines, the grasses and the flowers, were always spared. Their friends, the birds and ground animals, would still sing the lullabies, or croon to lovers. Something had changed.

In the thousand years before, it had always been the ax, sometimes, fire. This was different. Nothing was being spared, not even those pitiful, two legged animals wearing green or black.

The trees had seen helicopters before, even losing a few brothers to the sticks of death they fired, but this was different. This was like the gentle rain so many had felt for hundreds of years, on these long-lived creatures of the forest. But this rain was wrong; it burned when it touched.

Their leaves, their fingers in the wind, shriveled and died. The flowers hung their heads and died. Bushes dropped their berries, and anything eating nature’s readymade meal, sickened and died. Great swaths of their brothers were dying, brother trees that had seemed to know Father Time himself were gone - dead, brown, lifeless skeletons with hands stretched towards heaven, as if in a final, unanswered prayer.

The helicopters caused the wind and the rain, a rain of death. Nothing was left on the mountains; they were now just red scars of mud and dirt, jutting up into the sky. Even the bugs were dead, no more songbirds, no more leaves playing in the wind while sunbeams danced with the shadows. Nothing, just a red smear of death. They called the rain Agent Orange.
© Copyright 12/17/2005 by Fred Alvis

Frank Elmore's War

(C) James J Alonzo

It was June, 1967 the monsoon season in the Delta, which produced a hot, humid, rainy night in the rainforest of this particular place in Vietnam. Viet Nam would be the ideal gig for a lazy weatherman reporting the weather, since there were only two seasons in the delta, Monsoon and Dry, and the temperature today, the low is 98 degrees, with the high 100 degrees hot!!

Today's weather; hot, humid, and rain. Tomorrow's forecast, more rain, more humidity, and hot!

This rain didn't slow the seemingly endless firefights Frank could see in the distance.

Frank was 19; drafted out of a Flint, Michigan. He had just started employment at the local Pontiac manufacturing plant out of high school, where he was a star running back, with a GTO Pontiac convertible and lots of friends, mostly women.

Here, he was just another soldier who should have listened to his mom, gone to college and stayed far away from this God-forsaken country. The nearest beautiful and exotic girls were miles away in Saigon.

These were his thoughts as he stood his two hour guard at night watch. His platoon was asleep, while he stood there with rain dripping off his helmet, his thoughts were of home, parents, girlfriends, even his younger sister and brother.

He thought about life, as he wiped the water off his M-16 for the twentieth time in almost as many minutes. His life, mostly: the past, present, and the future.

Was there going to be a future for him, he wondered? War seemed so senseless, however the rich and shameless and their cronies, old men in suits who were country leaders thought these wars up, and sent our nations youth. But not their sons and daughters, the rich don't choose to fight them.

Suddenly, something brought him back to the present, a noise, intuition maybe? He stood erect.

"Who goes there?" (nhung người đi đó?) he called out into the pitch black night.

He wasn't surprised there was no response, but Frank remained cautious, as he had his M-16 trained on the jungle. He gave the alert to his platoon, falling into a prone position, and opened fire on the bush.

Frank heard some (NVA) North Vietnamese soldiers fall out screaming, riddled with machine gun fire. Another VC jumped up and threw a grenade at Frank! The M-16 barked again and he joined the other NVA shot. The whole platoon was in position now and firing, for the enemy had a large force over there in the rain.

The grenade had landed between Frank and his sergeant. As Frank reached to get it, a bullet caught Sgt. Pavlovich in the chest. Frank threw the hand grenade back towards the bushes, but the shrapnel from it hit him in the left arm. Frank bleeding, still managed to field dress his sergeant's wound and carried him back behind the line of fire.

The platoon was able to drive the enemy back into the jungle but the cost was high. There was blood everywhere. Bodies lay scattered, some still alive, some dead, some dismembered.

Dawn was breaking - the rescue choppers were landing in pairs with a third gunship spraying the jungle with gunfire to hold the enemy back. The medic who treated Sgt. Pavlovich credited Frank with saving Pavlovich's life. Frank was put on a stretcher also and sent to the Medivac hospital.

Upon arrival, the doctors thought at first, that he would lose his arm but the doctors managed to save it. However, as Frank convalesced, he found out he would permanently have limited use of it. So he was sent home with a Purple Heart, and the Bronze Star Medal of Valor for saving his segeant's life.

He never heard from SGT Pavlovich and wish he could locate him to see how he has been. The soldiers who had died in this battle were sent home and given proper military funerals.

Frank went to the funeral of one of his buddies from Detroit, Michigan, and as he stood there, listening to the playing of taps and then witnessed the twenty-one gun salute at the funeral's end. That also signaled that Frank's war was over.

*********************************************
© Copyright 2012 James J Alonzo All rights reserved.
James J Alonzo has granted Agent Orange Legacy its affiliates and syndicates non-exclusive rights to display this work.