BENEFITS FOR RETURNING VETERANS WITH PTSD

The repeating occurrence of a traumatic event or events is known as post-traumatic stress disorder (Department of Veterans Affairs).

Avoiding events and places that remind veterans of the trauma, a change in beliefs, flashbacks and dreams, and hyper arousal can all be symptoms (Department of Veterans affairs).

One in eight veterans return home with PTSD (NBC News).

A project done with 536 returning veterans within Operation Iraq Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom showed 30% of them tested positive for PTSD (Daux et all).

Ninety- three veterans affairs healthcare centers had fake wait lists, causing veterans to wait over 400 days for care (60 Minutes).

"Taking care of our veterans is a cost of war. If you can spend six trillion dollars sending them to war, you can spend a few billion dollars taking care of them when they come home." (Bernie Sanders).

"When some veterans get to a certain point they completely black out. When my husband tried to kill himself he was in Iraq. He was not here," (Kime).

PTSD CAN CAUSE SECONDARY PTSD

"We are not monsters. We are not time bombs. And we are not victims. We are soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines. Some of us are survivors. Others of us have just begun our stories in the military" (Constantine).

WORK CITED

• Constantine, Justin. "I'm Not Crazy: Just a Survivor." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 20 July 2014. Web. 14 Dec. 2014.
• Department of Veterans Affairs. "PTSD: National Center for PTSD." What Is PTSD? -. Department of Veterans Affairs, 17 Jan. 2014. Web. 14 Dec. 2014
• Kime, Patricia. "Families: Vets' PTSD ‘like Living in Hell'" Army Times. Army Times.com, 11 Feb. 2013. Web. 14 Dec. 2014.
• The National Child Traumatic Stress Network. "Secondary Traumatic Stress." Secondary Traumatic Stress. The National Child Traumatic Stress Network, 1 Jan. 2014. Web. 15 Dec. 2014
• NBC News. "1 in 8 Returning Soldiers Suffers from PTSD." Msnbc.com. NBC News, 30 June 2004. Web. 14 Dec. 2014.

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