Me And The I.R.S.

My latest battle is with that corrupt & useless government agency know as the Internal Revenue Service. My taxes are a mess, since 2001, Since the 9-11 attacks I had been on the go with my Army National Guard, deploying & moving many times my paperwork became a mess. While at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, I contacted the I.R.S. to get help sorting my taxes out. I got the rudest, most disrespectful bitch on the phone, telling me that being deployed to a combat zone & recovering in a Army Hospital is no excuse for being behind with my IRS paperwork & taxes. I have tried to get help w/ my taxes through the Veterans Administration, but they don't provide help with that. I know I can't call the I.R.S. because I saw the kind of to expect from them. I guess I will try & get help from my Congressman's or Senator's Veteran Liason, but it takes a long time to get through on the phone.

I suppose, I could draw all my money out of my banks(not that there is much left), take a leave of absense & go the homeless route for a while this way all they can go after is my Veterans disability checks. Just what I needed more stress piled on top of the mountain of stress that I am already under. Like Johnny Paycheck says "To Hell With The I.R.S. !!!

Help For PTSD Sufferers!

I have found some blogs & info concerning PTSD and healing, that I would like to share. I have not had time to read & digest all the information, but I decided to put it out there in the hopes, that it may help some of my fellow PTSD sufferers. This is my second attempt, I had a post almost completed, I accidently hit a button & wiped it out, really pissed me off, what is the use of having a save now button, when u can't go back to portion u saved? Sorry, got off track there, just had to vent!

The first blog is from Dr Cindee Grace, Naturopath. http:askios-survivors.blogspot.com She has a free ebook dealing with PTSD & DID (Dissociative Identity Disorders) titled "Holistic Self-Care For Post Traumatic Stress & Dissociative Identity" You can download it free from following sites:

http:amyweintraub.com/HolisticSelfCareForPTS.pdf

www.amyweintraub.com/resources.html

http://www.freedom-center.org/files/HolisticSelfCareforPTSD+DissociativeIdentity-CindeeGrace.pdf

http://veteransinfo.org/ptsd.html - This is site I downloaded from.

Dr Cindee Grace, has given permission to download for free & distribute, so long as you download in entirety & do not attempt to make money off her work, you can download for free.

Another blog site I found was http://healmyptsd.com/ptsd-blog The blogger Michelle Rosenthal is a PTSD survivor, who says she is now healed and able to live a normal life. Michelle is on twitter @HealMyPTSD She has a PTSD workshop outlined in her blog, and a lot of good helpful posts. I have not had time to read them all yet, but I thought that I would share these to in the hope that it may help some of my brothers & sisters in arms out there suffering from PTSD.

I urge any of my readers or if you know of others suffering from PTSD to take advantage of this free information, & see if it will help you. Main thing is read with an open mind, a closed mind does not absorb, & may pass on something that may help. When I have had a chance to fully read & absorb, I will let you know how it has helped or not helped me. But, remember, everyone is different, what works for one person may not work for another & vice versa. I wish you all good luck in battling your PTSD, but remember there is help out there, u just have to find it. Never give up!

The New Fight - Will I Join The Homeless?

I have been fighting to keep my job with Coca-Cola Enterprises, unfortunately it looks like I am about to lose this fight. Unum (Life Insurance Company Of America, Leave Management Services) which handles Coca-Cola Enterprises Family & Medical Leaves, has decided to harass me with constant requests for more paperwork, rather than contact my doctor for confirmation, and are refusing my Family Medical Leave, due to my PTSD & Combat Stress, which has added more stress to my already bad psychological condition. Causing more chest pains, panic attacks & nightmares to what I already suffer from. I have been unable to make it to VA Hospital to get refills, & the VA will not renew by phone, I have been out of my Psych meds for a couple of months which makes things even worse, & harder to leave my apartment. I have been using some old pills from 2005, which are expired but they don't seem to help much. My pain meds are almost ou & my heart meds are running low. I can't wake up during daylight hours to get in to VA Hospital, or to contact my Senator or Congressman for help.


If I lose my job with Coca-Cola Enterprises, I figure I have to about October or November before I move out onto the street. I will not burden any of my friends or family, I have plenty of training, & can survive in the wild. Main worry is what do I do, with all my stuff. I will have to find a way to disconnect the GPS system on my Jeep so it can't be tracked, don't need a repoman tracking me down. I have sleeping bags, a cot, & shelter halves, I can make myself a nice little
hooch & live off the land. These are just contingency thoughts, for if I do lose my job. I am still fighting so the battle is not yet lost.



Tomorrow, I will attempt to get up early & contact Senator Gillibrand's Office & try and get her assistance in dealing with Unum. Also I need to try & contact the Veterans Representative in Hauppauge, & try to get some assistance. This is really frustrating, before I went to War I was super reliable, worked long hours, little sleep, now all I do is sleep & miss work. The largest growing group of homeless are OIF/OEF Veterans. I guess we can thank the U.S. Army for not
taking care of there own!

The Constant Battle!

I seem to be locked in a constant battle for my sanity. Between fighting the constant pain I am in, the nightmares & crazy dreams where I awaken, not knowing where or when I am. I rarely leave my apartment these days, I can't wake up in the daytime to go to work, I am awake during the night, trying to find a way to numb the pain so I can sleep, but when I get to sleep it is broken with nightmares & strange dreams, sometimes I am with fallen comrades, or with my old brothers in Iraq. Some nights I wake up screaming or swinging, I have attacked my stand up light a few times, I still reach for my m-4 or 12-gauge & still feel the panic when they are not there. I have not been able to make my appointments with the VA Hospital, because I can not wake up. I hobble around like an old man on the real bad days. I hate to go out, because I feel peoples eyes on me as I hobble around. I am unable to work, because I can't get up, & don't know if I can work through the pain.

I have exhausted my savings, the few dollars I get from the VA, does not help much. I have tried to make up for some with twitads, revtwt & Google adsense, but don't get enough clicks to really make a difference. Chatting with my friends on twitter & blip-fm helps me to keep my sanity. I also have some Veteran friends on here, that helps me realize that I am not the only one going thru this. I get to read their blogs, & see that this is a common problem, suffered by many War Veterans, I have some friends in English, & Australian Military that suffer from these PTSD problems. Also I see that their military do not give a damn about their veterans, just like the United States Army does not. It is pathethic how we, who amswered the call to duty, get treated like beggars by the corrupt and inept Army Medical Evaluation Boards (MEB) & Army Physical Evaluation Board (PEB). It is hard for me to accept, that at 47, I am broken down, and will have to spend the rest of my life, in pain, and fighting this constant battle.

Dealing With Pain!

One of my constant worries or problems I deal with, is the constant pain that I am in. No matter what I take my back is always in pain, it just lessens the degree of pain, but never eliminates the pain. On my bad days I hobble around like an old man, on my good days I can walk about with some degree of pain. While training up for Iraq, at Ft Hood TX & Ft Irwin CA, I wrecked my back running around with all the gear on, Body armor with plates, ammo, grenades, camelback filled w/ water, kevlar helmet & other gear putting a tremendous strain on my back. When I got to Iraq, my back got worse, but I had to keep going. Kept aggravating the injuries. I'd have to hit the deck when shots were fired, jump back up, with the body armor plates digging into my back. When the Iraqi guard towers were taken fire I'd have to race up the steel ladderways to get to the towers. I was 42 running around with 20 year olds. As an Infantry Fire Team Leader, It was my responsibility to be first man up into the towers & put my head over the wall. Adrenaline kept me going, there was no taking it easy. Sleeping on a hard army cot, did not help it any either.

When I got medevac'd out of Iraq 29 Jan 05, from a heart attack, it was a hard thing to leave my team behind. I tried to get the doctor to send me back, but they medevac'd me to Landstuhl Germany. My back started to heal somewhat while at Landstuhl, they gave me percocet & flexiril to help deal with the pain & heat packs to help my back. When I got to Walter Reed, I played down the back injury because I was trying to get my cardiac doctor to sign off on me returning to my unit in Iraq. He stalled me off until it was too late for me to go back, then I started to actively try and get treatment for my back. I went thru pool therapy, physical therapy, accupuncture, chiropracter, tens unit, they would help some, but my back kept getting worse. I was told that I was not a good candidate for back surgery. The final conclusion was that I would just have to live with the pain for the rest of my life.

I went through the corrupt and inept Army Medical Evaluation Board (MEB)/ Physical Evaluation Board (PEB). I was evaluated by Dr Harvey Cohen, who is openly biased against National Guard & Reserve soldiers, he told me that "You are just another National Guard soldier trying to live off the government" Now if he had been biased against me for race, gender, or religion there would have been a problem but it was ok for him to be biased against me for being a National Guard soldier. The board final determination was unfit for duty 10% which means I was medically retired with 0 compensation. Going through the MEB/PEB is one of the most humiliating and degrading experiences I have ever been to. They treated me more like a common beggar looking for a handout. I wanted to be fixed, they could not heal me so I wrongfully expected the Army to do the right thing & fairly compensate me for my disabilities.

I tried to get politicians to do something about the Army MEB/PEB, but no help, they smile shake your habd take a picture with you, then you never hear from them again. I Brought it to the attention of President Bush, Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY), Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA) Senator Domenci (R-NM), Senator Snow (R-ME), numerous Congressmen & Senators during the Building 18 scandal, but to no avail. The Army was allowed to continue its humiliating and disgraceful treatment of combat veterans. There were many other veterans screwed over by the corrupt system. I will go into further detail in future posts. Dr Harvey Cohen is still doing his biased evaluations & screwing hundreds or thousand of Wounded Warriors, in the MEB/PEB. It goes on because he saves the Army millions of dollars at the Wounded Warriors expense.

So now I am going through the VA health care, where they seem to be trying to save money by not prescribing pain medications, and I must battle their evaluation system, right now it stands at 40% but I am sure it will increase in time. I have been out of work due to my various injuries & PTSD related problems. I just would like to get back to my normal self, if that is possible. I used to be outgoing, fun, life of the party, hard charger, now I am withdrawn, I stay at home, avoid friends & family.

Depression - as linked to Post Combat or PTSD

Many combat veterans have to deal with various forms of depression, when they return from a combat zone, especially those that get medevac'd out earlier from being wounded or injured, and leaving their comrades behind. Again I will start by using the Wikipedia definitions for various depression states, I did not find any relating to Post-Combat or PTSD, maybe in the future their will be when the Military Psychiatric Doctors & Medical Evaluation Boards start doing the right thing by our Combat Veterans. Also this Post-Combat or PTSD Depression is one of the major causes of so many suicides in our return War Veterans.


These are the various types of psychological depression, as defined in Wikipedia:


Major Depressive Disorder: (also known as clinical depression or major depression), a specific diagnosis from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders by the American Psychiatric Association.

1) Major Depressive Episode

2) Atypical Depression, a cyclical sub-type of major depression where sleep, feeding and perception of pleasure are normal but there is a feeling of lethargy.

3) Melancholic Depression, a sub-type of major depression characterized by an inability to feel pleasure combined with physical agitation, insomnia, or decreased appetite.

4) Psychotic Depression, a sub-type of major depression combined with psychotic or delusional perceptions.

Depression (mood).

Postpartum depression, a depressive episode occurring within a year of childbirth.

Dysthymia, a long-term low-grade depressive condition.

Adjustment disorder with depressed mood, previously known as "reactive depression"

Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), a depressed mood related to the seasons.

Depression is the fourth stage of the Kubler-Ross Model (commonly known as the "stages of grief").


That was the Wikipedia definition & breakdown of varios forms of depression, like I said above, I believe eventually there will be another diagnosis, dealing with Post-Combat or PTSD(Post Traumatic Stress Disorder/TBI Traumatic Brain Injury. I myself have dealt with and still is fighting depression, and it has been over 4 years since I have been back from Iraq. When I was first medevac'd out of Iraq to Landstuhl Army Medical Center in Germany, I fought and argued with the doctors to go back to rejoin my unit, I had a deep feeling of guilt and felt ashamed because I was safe in Germany and they were still in harms way. I have talked to many other wounded and injured veterans at Landstuhl and at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, where I was sent after Germany, they all had felt the same way guilty and ashamed to leave their comrades behind. It is some that the Army Medical Centers do not deal with properly, which is why their are so many suicides in wounded and injured soldiers. When I first got to Walter Reed, there were two to three suicides a week, we kept hearing the ambulance in middle of night pulling up to the Molonge House where many of the outpatients were housed. It got better, but there are still a lot of suicides nationwide at Army hospitals. A member of my unit that got medevac'd out of Afghanistan, gunshot wounded to arm, was recovering well, committed suicide at Fort Bragg, while recovering. The Army needs to take a serious look at the Psychiatric Doctors & Practices, many of Army Psychiatrists are fresh out of school and inexperienced. Coupled with the Army thinking that most returning Veterans, are "faking it" especially National Guard and Reservists.

The Army Medical Evaluation Board(MEB)/Physical Examination Board(PEB), does everything possible to avoid documenting & compensation soldiers suffering from depression, PTSD & TBI, the evaluating psychiatrists will blame it on pre-existing conditions, like pi-polar disorder, anxiety & mood disorders, or just claim the soldier is just faking it or exagerating his or her condition. It is really a humiliating process for a combat veteran to go through. It is hard enough in the first place(with all the stigmatism attach to these conditions), to come forward and admit you have a problem, but to then go through this process and be treated like a dirtbag or someone who is faking it, is too hard for some soldiers to bear. This is part of the reason for so many suicides in returning combat veterans.

I feel that the entire Medical Evaluation Board (MEB)/ Physical Evaluation Board (PEB) system must be revamped, get rid of all the people currently on there, and get qualified, caring and profeessional people on the boards. The Army has to stop trying to save money by the blood of it's combat veterans, and take responsibility for doing the right thing. Fairly compensate these soldiers for there wounds, injuries and mental problems. Get them the proffessional help they need. And follow up on these soldiers, even when they are out of the system and make sure the Veterans Administration is taking proper care of them.

Notice to my readers!

Sorry I have not posted in a while, I am working on a post to do with Depression due to PTSD, still researching & working on it. I hope to have it done in a day or 2. Thank you all for reading my blog, and the great support I get from you.