john999

The MMPI has a scale that is supposed to show if a subject is trying to make themselves look worse than they are, or better than they are. When they give the MMPI to someone on death row that person has a major incentive to make themselves look crazy since they cannot execute someone who is psychotic. You have to know why you are being killed by the state. On the other hand, someone who is being screened to be a cop might try and hide mental problems they might have so the scale identifies them.

If you are going for IU your doctor needs to say that you cannot work due to your DMII. That is the basics of an IU claim. He should explain why your DMII makes it impossible for you to work.

I started at 10% 38 years ago. Now I am at 90% and IU. The most important rating I ever got was the 10% because that is the lever you can use to get 100% one day if needed. People laugh at 10%, but it gets your foot in the door. You never know what is going to happen 30 years later.

I had this one C&P doctor who said he could not evaluate me for IU because I was not working. This is the kind of crap that makes me always keep a few doctors on the payroll to write my medical reports.

It is about money. That is all it is about. If VA makes heart disease presumptive for AO it will cost the VA millions and millions of bucks in compensation and DIC. They don't want that and will do anything to delay that outcome. I hope I am wrong, but I think they learned from the DMII AO presumption. That will cost them major bucks. The public wants us vets to be taken care of, but congress has other uses for tax dollars. Our enemies are sitting in D.C. helping themselves to taxpayer's money. That is all politicians.

Yes, you are taking a powerful anti-psychotic med. That side effect your doctor is worried about is very serious. You can have involuntary movements from the drug and they can be permanent. I know someone with that problem. It is usually from long time use of the thorazine type drugs. I have seen a person with this disorder and they have constant jerking motions of their body.

My shrink at the VA says he refuses to sign off on giving psychotherapy. He says that 15 minutes every 3 months is not psychotherapy, and he is right. If you have problems you will never get real improvement depending on the VA. They are just pill pushers. Not every problem can be solved by taking a drug. My shrink tells me jokes because we both know that what we are doing is BS. I get pills and then see him 3 months later. What a joke.

If you are working that is the real factor in getting a high percentage rating for MH claims. You will notice they always ask if you are working during the C&P. That is the difference between a 50% and a 70-100% rating. I was 30% and working. When I lost my job everything was the same except now I was rated 70% because I was unable to work due to my SC disability. They I got IU. It all boils down to be able to work since is really the main difference between just have a problem, and being severely disabled in VA Think.

This is good, yes!

Down in the bayou country they have those giant aquatic rodents, nutria I think they are called. The swamp people eat them and why not? I think the big snakes need really warm temps year round. We have walking catfish in Florida. This used to be a nice place to live when I was a kid. We have coyotes in the county here in central Florida. I know that is no big deal in Texas but it is a big deal in Florida. The natural predators have been wiped out (bobcats and panthers). The alligator is the main predator and there are about 1,000,000 of them in Fla.

He's a one man Bonus Army. He is going to D.C. to search for an honest man. He won't find any.

I have a pet now. I caught a snake in the road a few days ago. I took him home and let him go under my house where all the other snakes live. I hope he finds friends, or at least is not eaten. Some place south of my about 40 miles a 14 ft python was caught in some culvert or pipe. These things are growing wild in Florida and eating up the local critters. The Everglades is full of them and they are breeding. People buy them when they are small and they grow fast. They become mean and the owners let them go in the swamp. They even try to eat the gators. Southern Florida has become exotic pet world.

I don't think it matters much which VSO you use, but the VA has to find or reconstruct the lost C-File. That is their error.

Once you get the IU you can go to town on the VA for every benefit you can get because you will have a paycheck coming in and you can take your time. You won't be staying awake at night wondering how to pay your bills.

I think your rating has to be a final decision to be a CUE. The VA can call a CUE on itself.

You have a good chance at IU. Have you applied for SSD as well?

If you file a new claim you lose your earliest effective date. You can appeal this decision and get new evidence are preserve your early date.

Rock You are going to have to come up with the money to get someone like Bash to do this thing for you. You need a medical advocate and not just some doctor who is putting in his time. I think this is what is being said. John

Pete You really have to wonder if the VA was protecting your dad's privacy, or protecting the compensation they would have to pay if they let his family members in on the truth. If they knew he had PTSD why did they not initiate a claim for him? That would have been in his self interest.

You want to soft peddle the work history. The VA may try and say that your accidents at work are the reason you are unemployable. You want to stick to your injuries and illnesses that are result of the military. If you SSD records report two major back surgeries that are not service connected that won't help you. You want to show that your anxiety rose from military experience and not from back surgeries that are not SC.

Nobody from the American Legion is going to recommend you get a lawyer. They would be cutting their own throats. You decide for yourself if you want a guy who does a hundred claims a month or someone who gets paid to win. The lawyer only gets paid if he wins. If he takes your claim it is because he thinks he can win. The VSO takes all claims. If you claim is complicated, and is in appeals then I think a good lawyer may be the way to go.

I would agree that the test results are good, but you need a letter from your doctor to interpret those results. You don't want to give VA raw data they can spin against you. If it is an MMPI then the test has an interpretation of the results with it, but you still need your doctor to put his spin on it.

There are lots of WWII vets who suffer from PTSD. It was the dirty little secret that patriotic Americans did not speak about in the 50's and 60's when many of these WWII vets were drinking themselves to death. There are great books about WWI vets who suffered greatly during and after the war. I think 20,000 Brits were KIA'ed in one day at one of the mighty battles of WWI. They got up out of the trenches and just walked into machinegun fire. 18th Century tactics with 20th century weapons.

Papa If you set foot in Vietnam you are presumbed to be exposed to AO. Were you at an Airbase in Vietnam?

The average RVN vet is probably at least 60 years old now. If they wait much longer we will all have had heart attacks, so I guess that will prove it. Unfortunately, half of us will be dead. I am already SC'ed for heart disease as secondary to AO DMII. All I want to know is that my wife gets DIC one way or the other. That is the gift that keeps on giving. I want the VA to pay for my funeral. One way or the other I worked for the federal government for about 20 years. My wife gets tiny survivor pension from the civilian feds. It is really pathetic. My federal pension will be only around 1200 bucks a month when I hit 62 and if I croke she gets half of that all of which is taxable. I understand that a wife can get half of what a husband makes for SSA. When does that provision come into effect. I mean will she get half at age 62 or does she have to wait until 65?