ptsd Subject: [veteranissues] Waiting Line For Ptsd Was Too Long, Another Vet Suicide

[Guest allan]

fwd from: Colonel Dan

Subject: [VeteranIssues] Waiting Line for PTSD was Too LONG, Another Vet suicide

Read the article below, and tell me when "Help is on the way" to quote the

President, Tell me when it will arrive.

This is devastating...it's an outrage...who in the VA will get a bonus for

reducing costs.. who will be fired?

Which politician will give a speech about their support for the soldiers?

"Say what you mean, Mean what you say"

My prayers go out to the Family of this Marine.

Dan Cedusky, Col, AUS, Ret, Champaign IL

<http://www.startribune.com/462/story/963363.html>

http://www.startribune.com/462/story/963363.html

----Original Message-----

From: Langlie [ <mailto:slanglie@usfamily.net> mailto:slanglie@usfamily.net]

Sent: Saturday, January 27, 2007 10:32 AM

To: Colonel-Dan@SBCGlobal.net

Subject: This Marine's death came after he served in Iraq

Dear Colonel Dan:

I wish to bring to your attention the following story from our local

newspaper, the Minneapolis Star Tribune:

Two weeks ago, Schulze went to the VA hospital in St. Cloud. He told a staff

member he was thinking of killing himself, and asked to be admitted to the

mental health unit, said his father and stepmother, who accompanied him.

They said he was told he couldn't be admitted that day.

The next day, as he spoke to a counselor in St. Cloud by phone, he was told

he was No. 26 on the waiting list, his parents said.

Four days later, Schulze, 25, committed suicide in his New Prague home."

It is about time that we, the American veterans, from all parts of our

country, demand real accountability from the Veterans Administration, as

well as from President Bush and his whole administration! We should not let

this pass without making our voices heard! Contact your congressman or

congresswoman today; let them know what you think!

Sincerely,

Stephen L. Langlie

DAV Post, Washington County, MN

American Legion Post, Chisago City, MN

<http://www.startribune.com/> StarTribune.com

marine012707

Last update: January 26, 2007 - 11:38 PM

This Marine's death came after he served in Iraq

When Jonathan Schulze came home from Iraq, he tried to live a normal life.

But the war kept that from happening.

By <mailto:kgiles@startribune.com> Kevin Giles, Star Tribune

At first, Jonathan Schulze tried to live with the nightmares and the grief

he brought home from Iraq. He was a tough kid from central Minnesota, and

more than that, a U.S. Marine to the core.

Yet his moods when he returned home told another story. He sobbed on his

parents' couch as he told them how fellow Marines had died, and how he, a

machine gunner, had killed the enemy. In his sleep, he screamed the names of

dead comrades. He had visited a psychiatrist at the VA hospital in

Minneapolis.

Two weeks ago, Schulze went to the VA hospital in St. Cloud. He told a staff

member he was thinking of killing himself, and asked to be admitted to the

mental health unit, said his father and stepmother, who accompanied him.

They said he was told he couldn't be admitted that day. The next day, as he

spoke to a counselor in St. Cloud by phone, he was told he was No. 26 on the

waiting list, his parents said.

Four days later, Schulze, 25, committed suicide in his New Prague home.

Citing privacy laws, Veterans Affairs officials wouldn't comment

specifically on the case, nor would they confirm or deny the Schulze

family's account. However, Dr. Sherrie Herendeen, line director for mental

health services at the St. Cloud hospital, said Thursday that under VA

policy, a veteran talking about suicide would immediately be escorted into

the hospital's locked mental health unit for treatment.

She also said that after hearing of Schulze's death, the hospital is doing

an internal review of its procedures.

Schulze's father and stepmother, Jim and Marianne Schulze of rural Stewart,

Minn., say their son would be alive today if the VA had acted on his pleas

for admittance. They say they heard him tell VA staff in St. Cloud that he

felt suicidal -- in person on Jan. 11 at the hospital, and over the phone on

Jan. 12.

On the evening of Jan. 16, Schulze called family and friends to tell them

that he was preparing to kill himself. They called New Prague police, who

smashed in the door and found him hanging from an electrical cord. Police

attempted to resuscitate him, but it was too late.

Schulze's family doctor in Stewart, a farming crossroads in McLeod County,

said he was convinced that Schulze suffered from post-traumatic stress

disorder, a disabling mental condition that can result from military combat.

"Jonathan was a classic," said Dr. William Phillips, who said he first

examined Schulze in October 2004 when Schulze was home on leave from Marine

duty.

Phillips said Schulze was reliving combat in his sleep, had flashbacks when

he was awake, couldn't eat, felt paranoid, struggled with relationships and

admitted to drinking alcohol excessively. Phillips prescribed medication to

calm his nerves and help him sleep.

The doctor also asked Schulze to seek counseling at Camp Pendleton, the

Marine Corps base in California where he was assigned. Phillips said he was

unable to learn whether Schulze had done so.

"We don't have a system for this," Phillips said this week. "The VA is

overwhelmed, and we're rural doctors out here trying to deal with this.

Unfortunately, we're going to see a lot of Jonathans."

Seeking help

Maj. Cynthia Rasmussen, the combat stress officer for the 88th Regional

Readiness Command at Fort Snelling, said veterans returning to Minnesota who

have problems often don't seek help until their civilian lives begin to fall

apart. "Soldiers think if they go to get help that they're going to be seen

as weak, but they also think their command won't have faith in them," she

said.

Rasmussen said reasons for mental illness among returning veterans are many

and complex, but often relate to personality changes that service members

must make while in uniform -- and especially in combat zones -- and then try

to readjust to civilian life.

After Schulze left the Marines in late 2005, he continued to have aching

memories of combat.

"When he got back from Iraq he was mentally scattered," said his older

brother Travis, who also served there with the Marines.

Much of Jonathan Schulze's anguish seemed to relate to combat in Ramadi in

April 2004. Schulze, who carried a heavy machine gun, wrote his parents that

16 Marines, many of them close friends, had died in two afternoons of

firefights and bombings. Twice he was wounded but didn't tell his parents,

not wanting them to worry. He wrote them about dismembered bodies. About

youth and combat and disillusionment. And about the bombs.

"I pray so much over here and ask God to keep me out of harm's way and to

make it back home alive and in one piece," he wrote Jim and Marianne in May

2004. "I bet I easily pray over a dozen times a day and I always pray while

I am on patrol as I am terrified of getting hit by an IED aka a bomb. Our

vehicle elements and Marines on patrols are getting hit hard by these bombs

the Iraqis plant all over and hide on the ground."

Schulze carried guilt that fellow Marines died. He wanted to return to Iraq

to somehow redeem himself, said his father, who did three tours of duty in

Vietnam.

Because of that, Schulze at first resisted counseling, Jim Schulze said:

"Being a Marine, he was too proud to get help. They want to make you

impervious of any emotion. And when you get out it's almost impossible to

put it back the way it was."

When Schulze left the Marine Corps, he participated in military color

guards, visited aging veterans in the state homes, helped anyone in need. He

worked with his stepfather building houses. An unmarried father, Schulze

bragged of adoration for his young daughter, Kaley Marie, on his MySpace

website.

But the war always got in the way of a normal life.

Schulze was on an emotional roller coaster and couldn't get off, said his

close Marine friend from Iraq, Eric Satersmoen, who with Schulze's

stepbrothers described him as becoming uncharacteristically quiet.

"Lot of inner turmoil, lot of flashbacks, lot of nightmares," was how Jim

Schulze described his son.

The Jan. 11 visit to the VA in St. Cloud came a few weeks after Jonathan

Schulze waited for more than three hours at the VA hospital in Minneapolis,

hoping to be admitted, Jim Schulze said. His son last saw a psychiatrist at

the Minneapolis VA on Dec. 14 but someone there told him he couldn't be

admitted for treatment until March, Jim Schulze said. They went to St. Cloud

with the expectation that Jonathan could be admitted quicker.

Satersmoen and Travis Schulze think that Jonathan Schulze didn't intend to

kill himself. They said that he was drunk and confused and speculate that he

unintentionally blacked out before police arrived.

Secondary causes of death, said the Minnesota Regional Coroner's Office in

Hastings, were post-traumatic stress disorder and acute and chronic

alcoholism.

At the funeral in Prior Lake, Schulze lay in his Marine dress blues, two

Purple Hearts and his other medals pinned to his tunic. Dozens of young men

-- fellow Marines -- gathered in groups to tell stories. They called him

Jonny. He was funny, they said. The life of the party.

Cold wind ripped across the cemetery in Stewart where he was buried.

Veterans from the Hutchinson, Minn., VFW fired a three-volley salute. Travis

Schulze, dressed in black, and Satersmoen, wearing Marine dress blues,

removed the flag from the casket and folded it. Travis Schulze presented the

flag to his father. And saluted him.

"He was a delayed casualty of the Iraq war," Jim Schulze said of Jonathan.

Kevin Giles . 612-673-7707 . <mailto:kgiles@startribune.com>

kgiles@startribune.com

C2007 Star Tribune. All rights reserved.

<http://nmminneapolis.112.2o7.net/b/ss/nmmi...S/0?pageName=Lo

cal&server=www&channel=news&c1=http://www.startribune.com/462/v-print/story/

963363.html&c2=&c3=story&c4=&c5=&c6=&c7=local&c8=&c9=&c10=>

[Pete53]

Well if the Veteran asked the VA for help and was put on a waiting list after telling the VA he was planning to kill himself and they put him on a waiting list someone should get fired at the VA.

Looks like the VA does not have the time, the money nor the inclination to take proper care of Veterans

Thank you for this article Alan.

[Berta]

This is another OUTRAGE and they should SUE!!!

"Rasmussen said reasons for mental illness among returning veterans are many

and complex, but often relate to personality changes that service members

must make while in uniform -- and especially in combat zones -- and then try

to readjust to civilian life. "

personality 'changes' ??? is that where they get the PD idea????

It is beyond personality changes- it is PTSD-

I think that Maj. Rasmussen certainly meant PTSD when she said this-

but all the RO has to see is the word "personality" 'changes' in a vet's counselling records and I think they would try for a PD diagnosis.

She might be the combat stress counselor- but I take exception to her statement.

[betrayed]

Been there done that, they put me on a waiting list for 4 days I was told (before my first addmission) 7 days later still no phone call to come in. I pulled the pistol from my safe to eat a bullet. I just couldnt do it to my wife. I wrote a email to my son my wife my lawyer, and my congressman, told them I was going to the VA hospital for one more chance and if I didnt get help something bad was gonna happen. I walked into the ER and told them I was gonna kill myself and thank god they admitted me with no hesitation. I dont know what happened in this case but someone should hang for it.

[Stan n Pam]

ABSOLUTELY OUTRAGES!

After we have sent our young men and women to war, if even one of them comes home and just whispers HELP! - shouldn't it be the responsibility of someone to respond and to be held accountable?

Our government, the same government that sent them, has appointed, or I should say charged, a sizable agency to perform this task.

What in Heaven's name are we thinking? The Veteran's Administration was not formed to give people jobs and to keep them in the system no matter what. My father was in the AF for 30 years and was head of the personell office at Ramstein AFB in the late 60's. I can recall my dad say many times - that so-n-so just got promoted out of a job - that meant that instead of being FIRED or demoted, they were promoted to another rank so they could get them off base. I didn't know it then (I was in high school and very distracted..) but later when I married and Stan started his problems, we talked about just how things are done in the military. Not all the time - I have to say, that it only happens once it's too much.

The VA is not the military - it serves the military. Who do they think they are they to put themselves is such positions as to where they determine the rest of our lives or in this young marines situation - his death.

Can any of you imagine - even imagine....... turning away a young man like this young marine who came to you and asked for desperatly needed help? Of course not!!

Then who let the person or persons, that made this life and death decision, promote to such a responsible position? Heads need to roll in the VA - that's for sure.

I'd like a name of someone, high up in the VA, that is respected by the Veterans. Any help would be appreciated in locating this person.

Berta is so right - they should sue! I hope they do!

Sometimes I wish I had the stamina and GUTS that I had in the late 60's - you know - an awlful lot of good actually did came out of those days! I may be getting older and more tired but I think I have a few more days of 'rocking the 'ole boat' in me - who knows, might even get to tip one over someday.

I hope that we little "lost in the system" veteran's and their families can make a difference 'in the system' someday - because sadly, it doesn't look like our present war or war zones are going away any time soon.

[betrayed]

"I'd like a name of someone, high up in the VA, that is respected by the Veterans. "

GOOD LUCK

[Pete53]

I think many here respected Sec Principi before he was replaced by the stooge that is there now.