Is this blog right for you?
Posted on Oct 25, 2011 by Ken
This blog is devoted to providing hope, information, and reassurance that recovery from combat induced Post Traumatic Stress is possible and achievable.
What you will never see on this blog:
- Political conversations of any kind.
- Any content that does not support our troops, veterans, and their families.
What you will find on this blog:
- Information, resources, and insights to better understand a combat survivor’s “language of silence.”
- Comments, ideas, and checklists about what to do, and what not to do, as a spouse, adult child, or loved one of a warrior experiencing combat induced Post Traumatic Stress.
What you need to know about me:
- I am not a clinician.
- I am a Viet Nam combat survivor (11th Cavalry 1967-68) who has lived with combat induced Post Traumatic Stress for 40+ years.
- The insights and ideas that I share on this blog are based on my personal experience and observations.
- I have written two FREE ebooks about combat induced Post Traumatic Stress for warriors and their loved ones.
- I retired from a 35 year business career in December of 2010 so that I can devote my time to serving our troops, veterans, and their families being affected by combat induced Post Traumatic Stress.
First and foremost, I want to thank you for your service. I also want to thank you for sharing your experiences. I’ve spoke with numerous other vets about their PTSD and even though many things seem the same, the experiences, and how we relate to them are different.
I guess I should introduce myself. My name is David Horton and I am a recently medically retired Soldier who did eight years and three deployments to Iraq. I was diagnosed with PTSD shortly after returning from OIF1 in March of 2004. Since then, I have been through a myriad of military doctors, over 50 different medications and a lot of Bullsh*t involving my former chain of command failing to realize PTSD as an illness.
I didn’t completely fall through the cracks though. Once I transferred over to the VA, I teamed up with a wonderful psychologist. This person is very real to me and genuinely cares about her job rather than treating Soldiers a lot like numbers. She has me involved in individual therapy, a group therapy, a PTSD skills group and, more recently…prolonged exposure.
I am interested in learning more about the monster that has tried to take my life from me. Respectfully, Dave
It’s a pleasure and an honor to meet you, David. Thank you for your service and your sacrifice as an American warrior in Iraq.
I am very pleased to learn that you have found a counselor at the VA with whom you can work so well. This is an enormous step in your recovery process. Congratulations for hanging in there until you found the right person to work with. Yours is certainly a story of inspiration and example for others to follow.
There are a great many sources of information about combat induced post traumatic stress. Two come immediately to mind: http://www.va.gov has a wealth of information. Use “PTSD” as the search term.
The other site is http://www.notalone.com This site has online support groups for warriors, spouses, and parents of warriors with PTS.
If you use Twitter I distribute content there about PTSD, TBI, and other information. My Twitter handle is @akvet
Thank you again for your comment and your service, David.
Ken
Dr Ken, Thanks for what you do and thanks for serving your country. I have just added you to the resource section on Veterans Directory. I’m sure many of our Veterans can benefit from your website. Thanks again!