Soldiers Face Obstacles to Mental Health Services (NPR)

(This is an Audio report, no transcript has been posted as of now, but this story lead off today's program. This report focuses on Fort Carson, CO, but it sounds like this is happening all over the country.

According to this report, in a National Study, the GAO has found that 80% of returned troops that the Army's own testing showed had potential signs of PTSD problems were NOT REFERRED for Mental Health follow up.

Nobody at the Pentagon or anyone above the level of Sargent would talk to NPR about this over the last 2 months, and the Sergeants that would talk (on tape to NPR) said they thought the troops reporting PTSD were "Faking it" just get out of going back to Iraq. This story is definitely not for the emotionally fragile.)

I hate to even post this but people need to know WTF is going on out there. I have a friend who knows that one of his employees is going to be killed by her now x- husband. He knows it, she knows it but they can't get any help for this guy through the VA in CO. Everyone involved is scared to death and with good reason. It isn't his fault but how many times does he have to threaten before Someone takes this seriously? It will happen and it won't be a surprise when it does. It is just awful and could be prevented if * and the republicans really support the troops like they claim. Give the VA the resources it needs! You fucked up by invading that issue can be debated forever but fix what you can fix now!

They plan to dump it in the laps of the Democrats come January, by then it'll be too late, not only for this woman but others as well.

BushCo doesn't think it broke anything, so why is there a need to fix it. Besides, with the leadership of such great organizations like the American Legion and the VFW, who stand up and cheer
just about everytime Bush and Cheney even look in their direction, leading the way for veterans care
why should the Repukes be concerned?

on our cars? I mean, do you want to support the troops or SUPPORT THE TROOPS?

...with a lot of text and pictures. It seems that instead of giving these guys help with there PTSD, they are just kicking them out of services, which cost the Government less. How nice.:mad:

Soldiers Say Army Ignores, Punishes Mental Anguish

by Daniel Zwerdling

Audio for this story will be available at approx. 7:30 p.m. ET

All Things Considered, December 4, 2006 · Army studies show that at least 20 percent to 25 percent of the soldiers who have served in Iraq display symptoms of serious mental-health problems, including depression, substance abuse and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Administration officials say there are extensive programs to heal soldiers both at home and in Iraq.

But an NPR investigation at Colorado's Ft. Carson has found that even those who feel desperate can have trouble getting the help they need. In fact, evidence suggests that officers at Ft. Carson punish soldiers who need help, and even kick them out of the Army.

Soldier Tyler Jennings says that when he came home from Iraq last year, he felt so depressed and desperate that he decided to kill himself. Late one night in the middle of May, his wife was out of town, and he felt more scared than he'd felt in gunfights in Iraq. Jennings says he opened the window, tied a noose around his neck and started drinking vodka, "trying to get drunk enough to either slip or just make that decision."

Five months before, Jennings had gone to the medical center at Ft. Carson, where a staff member typed up his symptoms: "Crying spells... hopelessness... helplessness... worthlessness." Jennings says that when the sergeants who ran his platoon found out he was having a breakdown and taking drugs, they started to haze him. He decided to attempt suicide when they said that they would eject him from the Army....

(More and audio at link) <http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6576505>

especially when you heard the soldiers say those suffering from PTSD are just a bunch of pansies, that they need to "buck up" and "be a man". De Nile ain't just a river in Egypt, you know. I was glad to hear that one "tough guy" finally admitted he had issues to deal with too.

This god forsaken war has killed almost 3000 of our young people, ~600k Iraqis, maimed 30k troops, and psychologically scarred how many on top of all that? What a fucking nightmare! :mad:

What struck me is that it seems that no one who has any control over anything seems willing to admit that the soldiers are sick.

This one goes all the way up to Secretary of Defense, our so-called "Commander-in Chief" and the members of this Republican Congress who have been cooking the books, making it look like they are funding Mental Health programs, when they really are NOT. And then Bush goes around Selling this lie.

I'm sure everyone below the Secretary of Defense have been ordered NOT to talk about this issue, but as I'm sure someone is just waiting to say, that's just my Conspiracy theory.

What else can I say? I had a driveway moment. I am glad that NPR's market share has about doubled so that twice as many Moms and Dads heard this story.

What I mean is, he sounds like an old pro, but I only started hearing him, on NPR, a few months ago, and mostly doing quirky Science stories. Anyone know where he came from (before NPR)?

I received a message from them that they may use it.

They did say they got a lot of mail on this.

The audio works on both Real Player and Windows Media Player:

Morning Addition
<http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6591590>

All Things Considered
<http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6594261>

Note: The first time you try to play Audio at NPR, you pick which player you'd like to use (because they are separate streams) and you need to have you computer set to: Allow sites to set "Cookies" (If you also check "For the originating site only" it safe, at least while you are at NPR, that is).

Also, I think WinAmp will work too, if you copy the audio link to the File>Open>URL Location...

They posted a lot of letters at this link with another "Talk of the Nation" segment that I need to hear:

<http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6593000>

They did not recite my email, but they posted it. Have a look, it won't take you long to find it! Now I have to email the link to everybody I know.

Little Creatures, huh? I thought Remain in Light was the Heads most intense work.

forced to do something about it.

:kick:

Peace,

freefall

it'll tear your heart out and get you raging mad at the same time.

can't get insurance companies to pay legitimate claims.
And the reimbursement rates keep dropping.
Can't pay over head....

Who is going to treat all these PTSD cases??

We are on the verge of a serious mental health crisis in this country because of this travesty. Welcome back Iraq veterans - we'll be seeing you on a city street corner very soon.....and the yellow ribbon supporters will be looking at them with disdain. Our next generation of homeless, broken, addicted....and we are turning our backs on them already. Pathetic!!!!

The transcript should be up by tomorrow morning, typically.

Just like my brother said regarding PGW-I in 1991: they were supposed to be thoroughly debriefed when they got back to home base (his was Germany) but the army didn't do SHIT! He had a mild PTSD/schizoid breakdown three years later that lasted about five days. He's been fine since, though. No thanks to the fucking army.

<http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6576505>

If you missed it, they did an even longer report this afternoon on "All Things Considered" at the same link.

...absolutely infuriating and appalling....the damage done to these soldiers is incaculable and they try to THROW THEM OUT Of the service so they don't have to pay mental health benefits...and the ones who DO suffer from PTSD are made to sufffer more than ever....god have mercy on the souls who inflict this on our people...

www.csindy.com/csindy/2006-07-13/cover.html


sorry, no exerpt, no time right now to find a proper sample, but it covers much of the same circumstances and people as the NPR story. i just wanted to share it to give a little credit to our local Colorado Springs journalists who covered this a while back.

freepers take note, stories like these are why we oppose the war!


edit, link didn't show

July 13-19, 2006

Pattern of misconduct

Fort Carson soldiers allege abuse and intimidation
by Michael de Yoanna

Pvt. Tyler Jennings returned to Fort Carson last August after one year in Iraq. Today, the 23-year-old active-duty infantryman is sitting in his Colorado Springs living room with the shades drawn. He takes a drag of his Marlboro cigarette before describing what life has been like since his return.

Two months ago, Jennings was intent on killing himself, getting as far as tying a noose of rope.
"The stress of being back home crept up on me," he says. "I just couldn't take it anymore."

But the Rochester, N.Y., native, a newlywed, says he was too drunk to carry out the deed.

Jennings is what other soldiers in his 2nd Brigade Combat Team platoon frequently call a "shitbag."
"A shitbag is what the Army calls someone who can't do anything right," he explains.

(more at link) <http://www.csindy.com/csindy/2006-07-13/cover.html>

(Looks like one of the same guys.)

The mental health care system in this country is so broken, we're on our own.

There is no real standard for treatment and what few rules there are, are regularly broken.

The system throws drugs at people and never really monitors them.

But, this won't surprise most of you because the mentally ill are our most vulnerable citizens and their families low hanging fruit for the corporati.

that such a thing could come from those pristine boys that went to fight the glorious war.

Hey guess what troops; when you come back from randomly slaughtering 650,000 Iraqi's you come back polluted. It's not an option. Every one of you needs to do clean out the cesspools of your mind before something nasty grows there.

Ask the surviving Vietnam vets how easy THAT turns out to be.

Shitty deal, to be sure, but is anyone surprised? There's a reason why mental health still has a stigma attached to it and why lots of people, military or not, don't seek help - who wants to be labeled as "crazy"? And that's just what will happen to you once you have a record of having seeked mental help.

That soldier was dead-on when he said, "You don't want to be that soldier that goes up to the mental health hospital, because you...you're done".

You can rail against this all you want, but the bottom line is, no one wants crazy people working for them. Arguably the military is the least place you'd want crazy people working.

But I think it absolutely sucks that they are trying to get rid of these guys and sweep them under the rug as having "patterns of misconduct" (i.e., symptoms of a mental problem!), just so that they don't have to pay them proper benefits. This needs to be stopped right away.

The problem I forsee, though, is you'll have tons of folks wanting out with medical disability benefits by claiming mental health problems.

...because, there were similar reports of this type of mistreatment of our returning troops, not getting proper Mental Health care due to under-staffing, having their pay docked while they were recovering from Physical injuries while in the Hospital, etc. since the 2003 start of this un-necessary War, but this is the worst yet.

Btw, I hope you don't usually refer to the Mentally Ill as "Crazy," it's not helpful.

I have several people in my family who have Mental Illness, and since they received proper treatment and take their medicine, you might not even know they're "crazy" if you ever met them.

I'm sure that the Office of Faith-Based Initiatives, even as I type, is organizing thousands of fundamentalist Christian Republicans (you know, the kind with the yellow ribbon and the alpha fish on their SUV's) to grab their Bibles and help the Christian Warriors in BDUs to battle the PTSD with the power of Christ.

:sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm:

:grr:

Daniel Zwerdling just did an updated on NPR's Morning Addition regarding this report, but they don't have a direct link yet, but here's the link to Morning Addition: <http://www.npr.org/templates/rundowns/rundown.php?prgId=3>

They said that Sen. Barbara Boxer, Sen. Barack Obama and Republican Senator who I've forgotten his name, made a formal request to the Pentagon, to which they said they had already started the ball rolling on this, even before they got the request, after hearing Monday's report.

If anyone can or wants to post the link when it's available, please do. You might also post an update to LBN too, I'll post one when I wake up if I don't see one then.

... collectively contacted the Assistant Defense Secretary William Winkenworter, who claims to have already have already taken the next step of contacting Lt. General Kevin Keilly(sp?) who he ask to investigate this problem. More in the audio.

Pentagon to Investigate Mental Health Treatment

Listen to this story...
by Daniel Zwerdling

Morning Edition, December 8, 2006 · Earlier this week,
an NPR investigation revealed that soldiers returning
from Iraq with severe mental health problems often have
trouble getting the treatment they need. In response,
the Pentagon is forming an investigation into its
treatment of soldiers with mental health issues.

<http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6597180>

if it weren't true that a lot of therapy for PTSD right now is utter garbage and makes people worse rather than better. The trauma field right now is probably one of the most backward areas in current health care and an embarrassment to science. It needs a full overhaul to root out all the garbage therapies and replace them with treatments that are empirically validated. THEN they need to provide full access to all soldiers.

"Treatments" commonly offered for PTSD often rely on archaic psychodynamic concepts about trauma (like, you have to "work through" trauma and relive/express all the emotions of the traumatic event) that have no basis in science. The field is also infested with silly voodoo treatments like energy therapies and "eye movement desensitization reprocessing" bunk. Pseudoscience has infested the trauma field.

Not only do these treatments not help, they appear in many cases to end up strengthening the PTSD response. Researchers are starting to talk about this, but the vast majority of therapists still have no clue. The way the field stands, referring a soldier for PTSD treatment may be the worst possible advice you can give him or her. Our soldiers deserve a lot better.

plausible...that would get your seal of approval? And how would you be able to judge unless you had suffered this problem and tried alternative treatments? I think when it comes to healing, it's whatever works. And that can be very different from person to person. Stigmatizing experimentation of alternatives as 'voodoo' is actually more harmful than a ineffective therapy. You said yourself that there really is no good solution to be found in the current health field, and yet you poo-poo experimentation? What authority do you have to judge? Healing is always a deep personal journey and there aren't any magic pills. Modern medicine knows alot about dealing with symptoms, but knows so little about the root causes and treatment of the whole person.

If you want to understand one psychotherapist's journey toward alternative treatments of PTSD, read War And The Soul, by Edward Tick. He actually goes back to some ancient practices combined with more contemporary ones and seems to be having success if the increasing demand for his services is any measure.

" The New England Journal of Medicine reports that 16 percent (one in eight) of returning Iraq veterans suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder. Such vets typically can’t hold jobs. They are incapable of intimacy, creative work, and self-realization. Some can’t leave the house because they are afraid they will kill or be killed.
The key to healing, says psychotherapist Ed Tick, is in how we understand PTSD. In war’s overwhelming violence the true self flees and can become lost for life. He redefines PTSD as an identity disorder with radical implications for therapy. First, Tick establishes the traditional context of war in mythology and religion. Then he describes PTSD as an identity issue and a soul wound. Finally, he presents ways to nurture a positive identity based in compassion and forgiveness.

War and the Soul will change the way we think about war, for veterans and for all those who love and want to help them. It shows how to make the wounded soul whole again. When this work is achieved, PTSD vanishes and the veteran can truly return home.


http://www.mentorthesoul.com/soldiersheart.htm