PTSD is rapidly rising

In this news story it explains on the numbers of veterans seeking help and does not even address the active duty soldiers and Marines still serving.

A startling number of war veterans are seeking treatment for post traumatic stress disorder. According to the Department of Veterans' Affairs, claims are up by 70-percent. Those numbers represent soldiers who fought in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and as one local veteran explains, those servicemen are dealing with some serious hidden wounds.

"You know it never goes away. Never. It's with them forever," says Vietnam veteran, Art Nottingham.

Americans turn on the TV everyday and see images of war, but for our nation's troops who serve overseas, those images are all too real.

"These guys here you can't identify the bad guy. It's very difficult, like in Vietnam we couldn't either," say Art. He now works with the Arizona Department of Veterans' Services. He says back when he was a soldier, getting help for mental issues was uncommon.Meanwhile, Art says if it goes untreated, PTSD can take over your life.

"They kill themselves a lot of them do. They go through four or five marriages, they lose their family, they lose their job."

Stats provided by the VA do not include active servicemen who have been diagnosed or the many veterans who do not come forward for help.

I can attest to this later part of Art's statements, I am on marriage number five, some lasted months, one lasted 13 years (mother of all three children) all of whom now refuse to see me or to let me see my 7 grandchildren due to my PTSD symptoms. I can't blame them, my new wife and my VA Mental Health doctor are working on a reunion for the family to see if we can start to repair some of the damage. I have lived with PTSD since 1975 and I have to admit, I have dealt with it like most veterans, quite badly. I refused to admit I even had a problem with mental health issues until January 2003 when I finally sought help after a month of sleepless nights, from the nightmares and cold sweats, you can NOT function on 20-40 minutes of sleep a night, my coping methods had run their course, drinking myself to sleep was not the answer anymore, illegal drugs had quit being an answer decades ago, the only help available to me was thru mental health, after months of interviews and MMPI testing and other VA tests, the panel of three doctors explained the tests and the results to Dori (wife #5) and myself, I don't know who was more surprised by the diagnosis myself or my treating psychiatrist, and since then we have worked to get the medications right, counseling and other medical problems under control. I am one of those men that unless it's bleeding or falling off, I don't need to see a doctor. Well old age is catching up, and if I had not been so stubborn in refusing help decades ago, my problems might not be chronic now, seeking mental health in the 70s was a career ender in the Army, you learned to suck it up and drive on, as a Squad Leader and later as a Platoon Sergeant I taught hundreds of men the same attitude, to them I apologize, and all I can hope and pray is that I did not screw your life up as bad as I did my own.

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