Posted on 04/29/2019 2:01:00 PM PDT by Chainmail
I was listening to the Larry O'Connor Show this afternoon on WMAL and while he was discussing the latest mass shooter atrocity at the synagogue in Poway, a caller named Todd called in and described being in shock that VA facilities had "no security checks" and after all, "veterans have PTSD" and "could bring a weapon in at any time".
I tried to call in to the show to talk to Larry but he very shortly segued into Redskins football and the bored-sounding lady screener let me know that I wouldn't be on.
First of all, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is the completely normal human response to some period of time where the person is subjected to experiences that they would never ordinarily experience: strong, unrelenting fear, seeing people killed, including friends, and maybe suffering wounds and permanent damage. When we send our young men and lately women into combat, they are all in some way changed by that experience. During my war, the war in Vietnam, we had mines and booby traps that made you watch the ground very carefully, snipers that could pick you out of a group and kill you, mortar and rocket attacks to hit you in your positions, and ambushes, night attacks, infiltrators, and so on.
PTSD or the "Shakes" were a given. Everyone had some form of it and when we got back, it caused nightmares, the Fliches, maybe broken marriages, maybe drinking, and in some rare cases, suicide.
It has almost never caused violence against others. That was a Hollywood myth that sold a lot of tickets during the aftermath of our war - you know, the "Crazed Vietnam Vet" going bugeyed nuts at the smallest provocation and slaughtering everyone their paths. You know, Rambo and Billy Jack and scores of others on the big screen and TV.
The reality is that most or all of us came home, adjusted, healed and went forward with our lives. If anything veterans are the most stable and solid members of our nation and all that I have see of our latest veterans of Afghanistan and Iraq confirm this view.
I wish that Larry had immediately countered that caller and came to veteran's defense but he didn't.
I can’t imagine what you go through.
I was no where near any of it. But had contemplated taking a job with a local office of Marsh & McLennan, which would have put me there in NYC for some training on 9-11, based on my 2nd or 3rd interview, and I was asked whether I could make that work. I expected the job offer(probably mid-July), then NEVER back from them again.
I have always felt lucky they did not ultimately hire me.
Although I've never sought treatment at a VA facility I did,in order to pick up some extra $$$,participate in a research study conducted by one of Boston's VA Hospitals...that study being in conjunction with Harvard Medical School.
It was a study on head injuries...and given what's been happening in Iraq/Afghanistan it's easy to see why the VA,and Harvard,would want to study them.
During BCT I suffered a head injury which I've always been inclined to think of as comparatively minor. although the Medical Officer who examined me seemed to think it wasn't.
But at the VA Hospital one of the many things that were done was for me to be interviewed by a physician that I think was a psychiatrist.She talked to me for several hours and asked me many,many questions that seemed to be focused on my overall mental health.
They let me go home so they must not have thought that I was too "disordered".
The shooter had PTSD? Hadn’t heard that.
You’re exactly right, and PTSD is the most over-diagnosed mental disorder in DSM-5. In fact, it’s become a catch-all or like a proprietary eponym like Coke, Jell-o, Popsicle, Q-Tip or Kleenex. In most cases of claimed PTSD, it’s something else like Acute Stress Disorder, or one or more of many anxiety or depressive disorders. All of its notoriety is attributable to the VA’s connection to permanent, tax-free structured disability benefits. Now, everyone has “PTSD.” Just ask them.
Yup. Suicidal? Depressed? Too much booze? Non prescribed drugs? Every time.
Roger that!
My own father was sent stateside during WWII after being in his 7th plane crash and being the only survivor, my father never hurt anyone and wasn’t even diagnosed as “shell-shocked” as our family doctor was. My medic uncle became an alcoholic but he never harmed anyone. I just think of so many of the men in our small town that I grew up with who had been on the Bataan Death March, they never shot up the town, they were the backbone of our culture.
I know Vietnam veterans, some became alcoholics, one killed himself but so many others became stellar citizens. IMO, it would take one stoic human being to go to war and do and witness the acts of war and not be profoundly changed but they aren’t changed into monsters to be feared.
One profound example was our town drunk, he wasn’t quite like Otis but close. The cops put him in jail when he needed to get cleaned up and fed regularly. He was always walking around town and we all talked to him. Our parents didn’t try to make us afraid of him, he was just like “John with no arms” a part of our community.
It wasn’t till I was an adult that I found out he was a hero and had saved many, many lives on the Death March.
Dude, educate yourself.
After many years in the mental health profession, the OP is correct. The human organism becomes overwhelmed with unmanageable stressors from which it cannot escape. The post traumatic stress response is completely natural and normal.
I have long objected to the use of the term “Disorder” as have many others. The proper definition would be Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome.
To anyone struggling with this, please know that help really is available. Research has been progressing at a supersonic clip, due in no small part to rapid advances in brain studies, including brain biochemistry. We know now that overwhelming trauma causes massive biochemical changes throughout the brain and body.
Please, do not suffer alone. Reach out.
Long story short, if not for the extraordinary skills of the pilot, I would have died that day at 19 years old.
Except for a few sprains and bruises, we all 3 walked away from the crash.
Scared to death of flying after that, and when I HAD to, I would always board sh*t-faced drunk.
PTSD?
Damn right, used to have frequent nightmares about falling from great heights, and I haven't flown in over 37 years.
But never felt like harming anyone either.
Thanks for your service.
I have never served in a traumatic situation, so I cannot comment on that.
But I admit, it really bothered me back in the Seventies the way they painted every Vietnam Veteran as being damaged goods, unable to control themselves or keep their lives together. I grew to hate that image the media and Hollywood presented, because I knew that even though many good men were traumatized by their combat experiences and managed to forge on in life successfully, there were also good men who had great difficulty dealing with their experiences.
Then, when Gulf War I and II came along, the media and Hollywood portrayals and news coverages of military personnel with PTSD seemed to skyrocket again, but this time, even more so. It brought back all those feelings of anger for me, because it seemed that it was being over-reported.
I have tried to keep in mind that many military people now survive injuries that even as “recent” as the Vietnam era, would have not survived, and that may be part of the apparent increase in presentation to the non-military public, particularly with respect to traumatic brain injuries.
I support the efforts of the medical community to address this in various ways, and I think if a veteran who has seen combat has difficulty coping...there should be readily available and effective help made available to those who need it.
Like you said, and I agree...PTSD is a normal human reaction to traumatic events, and I have always felt that people deal with it differently. Some people deal with it straightforwardly and personally with varying degrees of success. Some deal with it by engaging professionals...also with varying degrees of success. I think much relates to the individual, and there simply isn’t any way of getting around it.
I have heard it occasionally said that more emotionally sensitive people incur a greater amount of psychic “damage” as a result of traumatic situations, and less emotionally sensitive people seem to transit the combat experience in a more “intact” state, but...the more I consider it, the more I feel like I am channeling a psychiatrist, so I am in territory I don’t have any right expressing opinions on.
But I will say this-I dream a lot, and sometimes, it is so realistic and the situations portrayed are so unpleasant, that, even though it may only be a dream for me, it can take a better part of the day or week to shake it completely. Having a fertile imagination, it is unnerving for me to think of having dreams that vivid, based in personal, actual experiences, particularly combat. And the thought of having them repetitively, night after night, year after year, well, that prospect makes me blanch.
When I hear a veteran describe experiencing nightmares (and in my profession, I had some opportunity) it rings all too true. A few years back, I spoke for several hours to someone who had been aboard the USS Indianapolis when she was sunk. He did not discuss the dreams in detail, but simply told me he had them for years.
And some fifty years later, after the event, as he described to me having the dreams, his face turned crimson, and he began to get very emotional and choked up.
Fifty years later.
I told him he didn’t have to discuss it anymore, but he said he wanted to, since he “never talked about them to anyone”.
Honestly, his reaction to only TELLING me about having the nightmares terrified me. I just cannot contemplate it, because I have some idea just how vivid and real dreams can be. I thank God I have never been put in the situation to “find out” how I would deal with it.
As a result, my gratitude to those who have (on my behalf) is genuine and deep.
I don’t know what to make of the seeming epidemic of PTSD, so I am going to generally stay out of that aspect of it since, like combat, it isn’t my place to comment on it. I will leave it to those who know of what they speak.
Chris Kyle suffered from PTSD also.........and he's a hero in your eyes. Go figure.......
Thanks for that great response - guess ‘Alberta’ has led a charmed life, made so and protected by better folks than she’ll ever be.
After WWII, veterans were told to "put their memories into a wall locker and leave them there" and so there were few visible signs of those of them who survived the really hellish stuff - but most of the WWII generation drank heavily so a lot of their suffering was concealed.
One of the more common visible effects is how they reacted so a sudden loud bang near them... causes many to dive for the ground. That effect lasts for decades.
No question - after all, what could be more important than football?
Rage can also be a symptom of PTSD. It is beyond normal anger, it is your kill or be killed instinct being activated even though you are not actually in a kill or be killed situation.
At Fort Knox we were shown functional MRIs of people with a healthy brain, bi-polar brains, schizophrenia brains and PTSD brains. The areas of the brains light up differently. I’m PTSD sufferers the communication to the basal ganglia (or reptile brain) is supercharged and your pre-frontal cortex which deals with higher brain functions is suppressed. The “reptile brain” only cares about eating, fighting, and surviving(fighting) and it doesn’t matter is the perceived threat, remember reptiles will eat their young.
As a vet with PTSD I have also been surprised by the lack of security at the VA hospitals I’ve been at. The security guard at the outpatient clinic I go to is an older black lady who I could easily overpower and take her weapon if I wanted to. She is not stopping anyone but the oldest vets in there.
The good thing is that from recent statistics I’ve seen Veterans commit fewer homicides than the general population. This is probably due to the discipline we develop in the military. The flip side of that is if we do decide to commit homicide we are much better trained to do it than the general population. Just my two cents on it.
Just look at the epidemic of anti-depressants that are being prescribed across this country and you will get an idea of what it's all about.........No different from the opioid epidemic.
And if you can get a VA psyche doctor to classify you as having PTSD, you get disability benefits too..........
Where have I seen that before?
Excellent post - Thank You!
“”I just think of so many of the men in our small town that I grew up with who had been on the Bataan Death March,””
How many Bataan Death March survivors can there be in a small town? I’ve lived for years in places from NY State to CA and have met one in my lifetime - that was in Anaheim, CA.
Funny you should mention Marsh & McLennan. The company I worked for at the time of the bombing was a subsidiary of theirs called Guy Carpenter Insurance.
Marsh was kind enough to provide the bombing victims with a coffee mug, glazed midnight blue with a silver logo on it that said “Welcome back to the World Trade Center”.
Said mug was stolen off my desk, I strongly suspect by a federal employee, in DC about 8 years ago, kind of capping off just how thoroughly wrong every aspect of the situation was and continues to be.
That’s one thing about PTSD... having the situation remain unresolved decades later does not help at all.
With the exception of the bozos at My Lai, our Marines and soldiers fought with courage, patience and faithfulness throughout eight long years of war.
Between his ilk and Hollywood, we had to reduce our circle to just our close family and other veterans long after our war.
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