ptsd New Ptsd/pain Claims

[Cpl. B]

I am new to posting on the forums here but was looking for some advice.

I served from 2000 to 2004 in the Marine Corps (0311 Infantry) and then from 2006 to 2010 in the army national guard(92A automated supply).

I was seen once in my marine service for depression, saw no direct combat, went down several times as a heat casualty, and beat my body up

pretty bad. On 9/11/2001 we were woken up to watch the news feeds of the planes crashing into the twin towers. Not an hour later we were

loaded up and standing post on another installation in Japan in the middle of a typhoon. About a year and a half later we were deployed to Bahrain

on the security crews for the pre-positioning ships around the Gulf, set on high alert and spun up all the time.

The long and short of it is, I almost feel ashamed to put in a claim for PTSD due to those two stressors, but I am experiencing most of the symptoms

of PTSD to a point that I have been married, divorced, walked away from several very good jobs because I cant deal with being around people, I have

horible nightmares of things that I feared would happen while we were deployed but never actually happened, etc...

I have a diagnosis of PTSD and have been being treated by the VA for about a year for it now and am just now coming to filing a claim, again because I

sort of felt ashamed to.

I have 2 main questions..... to start out with.

1. Is there any chance of winning a claim like this for PTSD?

2. Since I rarely went to medical while in service will I be able to claim my joint issues?

Thank you for reading and any help...

Cpl. B

[brokensoldier244th]

If you have mental treatment in service, and seek treatment now, the combination of the two might be enough for some form of mental health compensation. It may not be PTSD, but even if you don't get compensation, getting treatment is probably a positive.

As for the rest, it still comes back to did you get treatment, and is there documentation of that treatment, and can it be tied to something you have now that is under ongoing treatment?

[Philip Rogers]

Cpl.B - why would you feel ashamed to file for PTSD??? I believe having PTSD means you are or were a caring person and what happened or what you saw affected you. That's nothing to be ashamed of - at least not to me. Please don't give me any of the marine BS bravado, either. I'm proud that I'm a caring person and that it affected me!!! Sure beats being some a**hole who all he cares about is basketball, football or some other foolish a** game. He's probably not even a vet and waves the flag like it's him that protects us. jmo

Yes, to both questions, but don't expect it to be easy.

pr

I am new to posting on the forums here but was looking for some advice.

I served from 2000 to 2004 in the Marine Corps (0311 Infantry) and then from 2006 to 2010 in the army national guard(92A automated supply).

I was seen once in my marine service for depression, saw no direct combat, went down several times as a heat casualty, and beat my body up

pretty bad. On 9/11/2001 we were woken up to watch the news feeds of the planes crashing into the twin towers. Not an hour later we were

loaded up and standing post on another installation in Japan in the middle of a typhoon. About a year and a half later we were deployed to Bahrain

on the security crews for the pre-positioning ships around the Gulf, set on high alert and spun up all the time.

The long and short of it is, I almost feel ashamed to put in a claim for PTSD due to those two stressors, but I am experiencing most of the symptoms

of PTSD to a point that I have been married, divorced, walked away from several very good jobs because I cant deal with being around people, I have

horible nightmares of things that I feared would happen while we were deployed but never actually happened, etc...

I have a diagnosis of PTSD and have been being treated by the VA for about a year for it now and am just now coming to filing a claim, again because I

sort of felt ashamed to.

I have 2 main questions..... to start out with.

1. Is there any chance of winning a claim like this for PTSD?

2. Since I rarely went to medical while in service will I be able to claim my joint issues?

Thank you for reading and any help...

Cpl. B

[Cpl. B]

Thank you guys for your support.

I have some more time now so I will throw out what I have done so far and see if there is perhaps any suggestions.

I got a VSO rep to help me start my claim. Got her copies of all of my attainable military records and my proof that I served in theater during OEF. I got statements from my fiance, mother, and 2 very close friends.

I have 3 statements coming from buddies that I served with going over both physical and psych issues. I wrote out my 2 stressor statements and did my own statement in support of claim outlining exactly how

my physical and mental symptoms are effecting my life, to the point of not being able to get a decent job and keep it... I have sent in release forms for all of my civilian doctors for the issues claimed and gotten an

IMO from my primary civilian doctor.

Can you think of anything else I can do to ensure that this goes well?

Thanks again...

Cpl. B

[john999]

Cpl

You were pretty close to the combat zone. Did you ever go to Iraq or Afghanistan at any time. Did you see wounded or were you put on alerts? All these general officers flew over fire fights at 10,000 feet and put in for air medals. Everyone of those guys gets disability and they spent their time eating off fine china and having their boots polished by some enlisted servant.

[Pete53]

There are more ways to get PTSD than combat but the VA makes it hard on you if it was not caused by combat stress. In fact they make it pretty damn hard no matter how you get it.

If you do some research on the net you would be surprised at how many different stressors PTSD has.

Good Luck to you and welcome to Hadit

PR I have seen you post that PTSD often affects caring people and for some reason that gives me great comfort although my experience tells me that many who suffer from PTSD put up a wall of defenses to keep people from getting close.

One of the really nice things about getting older is I really no longer put up with a lot of people I don't care for.

[Berta]

"Can you think of anything else I can do to ensure that this goes well?"

You will fall under the new PTSD criteria that is in our PTSD forum here.

The claim should be worded with the new criteria in mind.

I hope your PTSD diagnosis is from a VA shrink- the new regulations disregard any outside diagnosis of PTSD.

"Since I rarely went to medical while in service will I be able to claim my joint issues?"

You will need a diagnosis of the disability these issues are causing (arthritis) ? or whatever it is and ,as others said,a nexus to your service.

Maybe you could obtain an IMO from your civilian doctor for the jopint issues but you must show a link to service for any claimed disability.