john999

I use an anti-depressant named Cymbalta. It is supposed to help with depression and with pain. What it does for me is sort of divert my mind from thinking about pain, and focus it on issues right in front of me. This is good I think. It won't stop horrendous pain but is good for chronic pain. So is Adderall for me if you can get them to prescribe it for narcolepsy or adult hyperactivity. Not easy.If I take the right dosage I can concentrate without speeding. Sometimes I feel so depressed my mind just sits in neutral and so does my body. John

All it may take is a letter from a lawyer to wake their AZZes up, and get them to do the right thing. Many lawyers might do this just as a way to get you to come back for more serious issues, and good advertising for them to vet community.

You need to call your doctor or email them. They probably forgot about you.

I went today to a dermatologist for regular check-up. He found a suspicious looking mole on my back. He did a biopsy. I am not really worried, but I had no symptoms, and was not even aware of this mole. I think it is a real good idea for all of us to get checked out by dermatologist. I did have a history of pre-cancerous abrasions on my face and hair line, but no melanoma. By the time you have symptoms you are half way to the graveyard.You can even get melanoma in your eyes and intestines. John

Could DMII be a cause of OSA?

This is great news!

Don't dwell too much on anything that happened before the service. I would keep conversations to my pain and disability. If you go for mental health C&P exam do not talk about your childhood, or any thing pre-service. They will twist it around to find some other reason for your depression than your SC injuries. For instance, if you come from divorced family that is big target for source of depression. This would be non-service connected. I have been through this many times. John

Did the Army use that gun in 1969? I remember blood streaming down soldier's arms and being shot with a gun like the one in the picture.

If the VA is going paperless are they going to scan all our C-Files and then destroy the paper? Imagine if VA computer system goes down and all current claims disappear with no paper back-up. This is another good reason to get a copy of your C-File. My father's records from WWII burned up in St. Louis fire. All our records are still on paper. The VA wants to wave a magic wand over all these backlogged claims and make them go away. It may happen but not the way we want. John

Find a private doctor. If the pain is where you say it is then it is probably your neck. It took them years to locate my disc problem in my neck. Unfortunately I don't want neck surgery yet.

Make sure your claim is headed for DRO's desk and not being sent to the BVA. That happened to me once. I caught them just in time before they shipped my claim off to the BVA. I had specifically asked in letter form for a DRO Hearing. I made an appointment to look at my file and found out it was headed to the BVA. I got that stopped and a few months later won my claim at the DRO. I had no warning the VA was going to send my claim to the BVA and was just lucky I found out in time to stop them or months and possibly years would have gone by. I was claiming TDIU so I needed that claim to win and fast.

It sounds like they denied some of the symptoms of you cervical problems in your hands and arms. I have cervical radiculopathy and the main symptom is radiating pain down my shoulder into my left arm. Did your medical evidence say that your hand and arm problems were a secondary result of your cervical problems? If your doctor does not say it the VA will not connect the dots no matter how obvious. Yes, I have seen the VA do stupid things like this all the time. Appeal!

Wow, back in the day the vet would be sitting in prison. Some enlightened judge did the right thing for once.

That is enough for TDIU I think. I think 30% added to 40% using VA math is 60% which is enough to file for TDIU.

I would think that something like this would be useful for vets who are just leaving the service with a DX of PTSD. If a guy/gal has had PTSD for 20 years it might be less useful because a lot of the damage is already done. If PTSD has run it course of failed marriage, alcoholism/drug abuse, years of poor work history and alienation from family and society then it may be a little late, but never too late to get help.

If you did not have one I would get an IMO now that your DX is established.

If the military went back to Vietnam era they would probably find 200,000 PD discharges for those with bono fide mental disorders. During Vietnam you had to be chewing the carpet to be discharged for a mental condition. I was discharged for a PD and then immediately dx'ed with bono fide mental health disorder by the VA and granted compensation. This was 42 years ago.

The MF'ers may owe me some serious money as well, but I won't know for some months. This is the only way to make an impression on the VA. The doctor's who deprived this vet of treatment should be the ones to pay and not taxpayers, however.

I do look at obits every day and every day I see more Vietnam Vets dying very young 60-65 years old. A lot of older guys who were career military and did a tour in Nam are also dying off. I think WWII vets will out last us.

Isn't what this soldier did an instance of acute combat fatigue. Thousands of troops in WWII ran away or just went to pieces during combat but only one was executed. If a good soldier suddenly just breaks down why should he be punished for the rest of his life? I know the Army's rational: "If we let a soldier refuse a direct order to go into combat then we have lost control of the troops and nobody will go". This sounds like the "Red Badge of Courage" where the same soldier can be a coward and a hero in the same day.

This is especially true of evidence in form of SSD records and records from other government agencies. If you can get those yourself you can save months if not years. Even records the VA has and claims they don't have you can often get copies and submit them like a DD214.

If you have to go the next level you should have a lawyer. You can leave it in your lawyer's hands at that point because it is all legal arguments etc. Let's hope the BVA will resolve it. I imagine they will make a ruling and then remand it back to RO for implementation. The thing is, as you know, it takes time. Years waiting on some docket for a hearing and then back onto some other docket.

If you did not get P&T you can appeal and ask for it (Chapter 35). By the time they get around to looking at your appeal a year will have gone by and they can tell if you are stable and your condition is static. This is what I did. I did however, wait until I was out of work to really start tying to get 100%. As long as I could work I was OK with just 30% (what a dummy).

I had a BVA hearing in front of traveling judge some years ago on my CUE. My lawyer was with me and had written a brief. The hearing amounted to just an intake of my brief and a few questions regarding the nature of CUE's in general. The hearing lasted maybe 15 minutes. My lawyer seemed a bit baffled that nothing was resolved and that it just seemed like an intake session. 6 months later we got a denial and then appealed to the CAVC. I was glad I had the lawyer because the judge and every other officer that has done VA hearings in the past on this subject seems to believe we are asking to reweigh the evidence when we state very clearly we are not. I am not sure of the value of BVA hearings, but you have to go there to get to CAVC. I guess what I am saying is to just hang in there and don't expect any fast decisions either way unless your claim is just black and white and if it were you should never have got to BVA. My claim involves a lot of retro so I see why they are stalling.

I have read that at least 20% of nearly 3 million OIF/OEF vets have filed claims so far. I think we are talking about 500,000 new claims on top of millions of appeals. You will notice that you hear very little about Iraq vets these days. As soon as we get out of Afghanistan you will hear little about them as well. The pressure to fix this backlog will ebb. Only 2-3% of Americans are veterans these days and that number will drop as will clout of VSO's (if they had any). NRA has much more clout than all the vet organizations combined. Every surviving Vietnam vet should probably file a claim in coming years since DMII and IHD are presumptive. That is another 800,000 plus vets filing claims. John