At a breakfast gathering recently, a group of local veterans and supporters gathered to plan an app that would connect veterans and communities. It was an exciting venture. I was happily surprised to see Ron—an old friend and a Vietnam veteran. I’d first met Ron years ago when he joined…
Category: Honoring Those Who Serve
Dedicated to those first responders, troops, and veterans who serve and have served.
Mary T. Klinker died in 1975, serving our country and serving the children of Vietnam. Captain Klinker was a flight nurse, and her final mission was to escort a plane full of children as part of “Operation Babylift,” an effort to evacuate as many orphans and refugees as possible from…
I get messages like the following and they floor me. Every time. I wrote the poem this young man references when I could barely leave my bedroom and was completely consumed by pain, anger, and despair. At it’s worse, PTSD makes you feel like garbage. The idea that I’d soon…
A recent NBC news story talks about how a PTSD diagnosis can break an individual. Yes it can, but I believe what is broken can be healed. We can defeat PTSD. A life destroyed, can be a life reborn. From the NBC news article: PTSD can really ruin peoples’ lives,…
I’m continually amazed at the ignorance that still exists over posttraumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. This ignorance is the primary reason we are doing such a poor job confronting this epidemic. Here are some things to consider: 1) ANYONE can get PTSD. A young girl, a special forces soldier, a…
There is evidence that the US Department of Veterans Affairs, the VA, has been systematically putting high risk veterans on “wait lists” and falsifying records of how long it takes a veteran to get care. It’s hard to hear, but in many ways, the VA is killing veterans. While this…