The Military's Showdown with PTSD
FORT HOOD, Texas, April 17, 2008
(CBS) Twenty-two year old combat medic Jonathan Norrell volunteered for every mission during his year in Iraq.
He was bombed, ambushed, treating wounded under fire - and the memories still haunt him.
"The things that affected me the most weren't the IEDs, which I went through six or seven of, and all the firefights, and all the combat," Norrell said. "It was the psychological stuff, the people I failed to help."
By the time he came off his tour of duty he was diagnosed with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder: anxiety, sleeplessness, flashbacks. Military doctors recommended immediate discharge and treatment but the command refused.
Instead they forced him into combat training exercises. He turned to drugs and alcohol.
"I just lost it," Norrell said. "I didn't wanna do it anymore."
So the Army he served so well in Iraq threatened to expel him without medical benefits.
Norrell's case reveals the showdown inside the military, between the new school and old school view on how to handle PTSD - one of the signature injuries of the Afghan and Iraq wars.
And experts warn there's a storm coming: a generation of soldiers coming home with PTSD.
CBS News has been given documents showing more than 100,000 vets of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars are seeking help for mental health disorders.
Norrell decided to fight back by reaching out to veteran's groups and advocates like Carissa Picard of Military Spouses for Change. Picard's husband leaves for Iraq in June.
"Our soldiers didn't choose to wage this war; they didn't choose to go to Iraq or Afghanistan," she said. "We've sent them there. We need to take responsibility for what happens to them."
Norrell's struggle for help took months of meetings, phone calls, e-mails, lobbying Congressmen and the top levels of the Pentagon before she finally got help at Fort Hood.
We asked the man in charge there why it took so long.
"The field commander recognizes the soldier has a problem, and they request the soldier to be transferred to the warrior transition unit," said Col. Casper P. Jones III.
Dozier said: "That sounds great, but we know in this situation, for several months, it didn't happen."
"It didn't happen," Jones said. "I think there are lessons from this case that can help us all as we move forward."CBS News has learned that top Pentagon officials have made visits to bases across the country. They're telling Army commanders to take their doctors' diagnoses more seriously, and get the troops treatment.
Norrell hopes that by speaking out, other troops won't have to fight so hard to get the help they need.
"Hopefully what happened to me won't happen to any more soldiers," he said.
Link: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/04/17/eveningnews/main4025681.shtml
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Hello Friend,
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Craig J. Phillips MRC, BA
Second Chance to Live
Our circumstances are not meant to keep us down, but to build us up!
Second Chance to Live has been published through out Europe, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and the United States of America.
Growth Point, social and therapeutic journal, Summer Edition 2007, Thrive, The Geoffrey Udall Centre, Beech Hill Reading RG7 2AT email info@thrive.org.ukBrain Injury
Association of Texas newsletter, Summer Edition 2007, Austin, Texas email info@biatx.org
In Touch, newsletter, Summer Edition 2007, Westminster, Colorado, email Elaine@ImAlreadyHome.com
The Brain Injury Handbook, Rehab UK, September 2007, 62a, Peach Street Wokingham Berkshire, RG40 1XH email ninahillier@rehabuk.org
Transformation Times, October and November issues. Transformation Times is a mini-magazine, serving men and women of the armed services and their families and is published by Operation Life Transformed. My articles are listed under, Traumatic Brain Injury and Activities of Daily Living with in the mini-magazine. You can access the mini-magazine through http://lifetransformed.org/Documents/Oct_T_times_final_(3)[1].pdf . Operation Life Transformed can be contacted through contactus@lifetransformed.org
European Brain Injury Society E.B.I.S. with in their Autumn 2007 Newsletter http://www.ebissociety.org/automn/newsletter-angl.htm in both French and English. Specifically, My Journey thus Far has been printed with in the newsletter.
Brain Injury Association of Niagara My article, Traumatic Brain Injury and Displaced Energy has been published by the, Newsletter January 2008 http://www.niagara.com/bian/
Virginia Commonwealth University’s Department of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation Neuropsychology http://www.tbi.pmr.vcu.edu/ My Journey thus Far, TBI Today Volume 6 Issue I — winter 2008 issue News, Ideas and Resources from the Virginia TBI Model System
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