I am not proud of any aspect of this, but I though I'd share since it took me to tears to describe and I was compelled to do so to keep my job. If you want to skip to the point that took tears to relay, skip down to paragraph "d" and "e". I feel for all of you regardless of what brought about your PTSD symptoms. Take care, and remember, you're not alone.
x1. I suffer from a rare condition in my inner ear which the VA Otology team in [Somewhere] believe was likely caused by damage from a head trauma. It’s called Superior Canal Dehiscence and has left me with symptoms that combined with my service connected PTSD can occasionally make normal daily tasks difficult. These symptoms include occasional vertigo and frequent moments of dizziness, I have learned to cope with these for the time being and am looking forward to a craniotomy to repair the damage in [A few months]. When I first started suffering from this I found that the effects of alcohol can sometimes exacerbate these symptoms making the experience unpleasant, and as a result I stopped having an occasional drink (within responsible limits). An unintended side effect was that as I rarely drink, I was unable to accurately self-assess the limits on intoxication levels before driving that night. I felt at that time, that I was within limits, and voluntarily drove my own vehicle, heading for home. [Explaining a DUI I got on my birthday, the only one I've ever had, and one that did not involve an accident]
x2. I was not swerving, or driving in a manner that would raise suspicions of driving under the influence, and was told so by the two police officers that pulled me over. They observed a cigarette ash out of the passenger side window and as that’s a citable offense, pulled us over. I stopped immediately and was fully compliant, opting for a blood test. I was cited for driving under the influence and released on the morning of [sometime].
x3. Knowing that this could affect my clearance, and my newfound career, I chose to employ a lawyer. This also allowed me to continue working overnight shift work. I reported this to the [appropriate security clearance office] in a timely manner. My lawyer informed me that my test results had come back and that that night, I was in fact over the 0.08 % Blood Alcohol Content. We agreed that a no contest plea and complying with the courts penalties was the most responsible thing to do. I was required to not drive for a period of time and was allowed to apply for a restricted driver’s license. I did so and complied with all conditions. I started my three month first offenders DUI class on [sometime shortly after] and completed it on [later that year]. I received my restricted license early on (to and from work and DUI program), and applied for and received my unrestricted license in [the earliest time frame I was aloud to]. My other conditions in effect until [for a couple years] are that I am subject to provide a specimen to law enforcement at any time they deem necessary and may not drive with any measurable amount of alcohol in my system, to which I have no problem complying with. My social life does not include frequent visits to establishments that serve alcohol, and on the seldom occasions that I do enjoy a responsible amount of alcohol over a responsible period, it is almost exclusively within the safety and low risk environment of our home. In any other event, there are cabs, and the other online safe rides home for a fee are quite sufficient to remove this risk from our lives.
x4. I have never had any other incident involving alcohol, and know this or anything remotely like this will never happen to me again. For clarification, I have attached a character reference of me by a VA clinical psychologist that supports my claim that alcohol is not an issue for me. This incident does not fit into a pattern of issues, and is an anomaly, not an indicator of poor character. I believe the dropped hit and run charge from 2012 was somehow combined with this DUI incident in 2014 on the Statement of Reason which understandably paints a very different picture than the truth of these two separate events. Upon receiving and reviewing copies of my background investigation from the Office of Personnel Management, the two incidents were noted separately.
Addressing a dropped charge of assault I was required to explain:
a. In [Sometime ago] I returned from my final deployment to Iraq, which was my third combat zone deployment, second tour to Iraq. I returned from this deployment significantly affected by my experiences. The sensitive mission I supported involved me running my own missions outside the wire in the red zone and operating in a manner which was in direct opposition to the ethics and morals I was raised with. These were the same ethics and morals that are mirrored by military core values. While these operations complied with the directives and laws surrounding intelligence operations and the limitations surrounding collection in foreign theaters of war, I was wholly unprepared for such a departure from my normal career field of analysis. I was able to perform this job and did so in such a manner that earned very high recognition within the compartmented and appropriately anonymous world of collection. This however came at a cost to me personally. I hoped this stress would diminish within a few months of returning like it had with the other two deployments, especially my tour in Afghanistan. I was wrong, and despite my attempts to solicit help within appropriate channels, I was ultimately failed by those who were supposed to help me. Writing about this comes at a cost that I am happy to report I am now able to endure with relative ease thanks to not only adequate but outstanding help from the mental health team at the [Some Place's] Veterans Affairs Community Based Outpatient Clinic.
b. I was ultimately diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) over a year after getting out, for which I was awarded a 50% disability rating (which combined with other damage leaves me rated at 100% both total and permanent). For some people, PTSD is from a specific traumatic experience, for others (myself included) it is a culmination of many experiences that took place on multiple deployments and include a plethora of events. These events took place at all times of the year (on different deployments) spanning birthdays and holidays which makes it difficult to pinpoint and prepare for specific anniversaries of traumatic events.
c. The exclusions now built into background investigations were intended to mitigate the stigma surrounding seeking treatment for PTSD. I had hoped that this exclusion would also protect those of us that suffer from PTSD from having to relive the worst times of our lives. Due to my decade of military Intelligence work, I am intimately aware of the need to protect our nation’s secrets and prevent people who shouldn’t be trusted from access to it. I appreciate the irony of being the original classifying authority and author of documents that I cannot currently access. While this event in my life is something to be taken serious, it was the result of not only combat stress but a military installation that was wholly unprepared to provide even the most rudimentary help in coping with combat stress.
d. This topic forces me to revisit a chapter of my life that was the result of significant traumatic events combined with an apathetic chain of command and negligent mental health care staff all at [this one horrible military installation]. Similar to my combat stress adding up from many events to become PTSD, a situation similar to this materialized from a combination of unprofessional supervisors, painkiller addled OIC’s, inattentive [second in command], and absent [in command]. This work environment, combined with a mental health department with actions that flew in the face of the Hippocratic Oath made for a personal perfect storm for me. Instead of the brotherhood portrayed in the media, or the teamwork and combat stress awareness taught so frequently to active duty, I was received home from deployment with cold shoulders instead of open arms. I had been assigned there long enough to establish a pattern of good performance results in this assignment (which were consistently very positive throughout my career until this period of time). I was blinded by my inner conflict and nobody cared. My girlfriend felt hopeless and frustrated, seeing me in such a state and the “help” I received was so unhelpful, that she didn’t see a light at the end of the tunnel.
e. I do not mourn the impact PTSD has had on me, I mourn the impact my having PTSD has had on my family and loved ones. I would gladly go through it all again, if doing so could guarantee that they would be protected from the secondary impact of combat stress. It is this concept of “over my dead body” that sends me back into the fight, this time combating the effects of living with PTSD. I deserve to feel whole again, and to be the husband the love of my life for the past seven years deserves. I deserve to be a proud father who knows his trauma won’t be passed on to our potential kids. I will learn to not only live with this but ensure nobody else will be negatively impacted by my experiences.
f. The incident in question happened on the night of [while I was at my worst and undiagnosed]. My girlfriend of (at the time) over four years was overwhelmed and at the lowest point in her own life, watching someone she loved return a shell of himself. She wound up drinking more than she anticipated that night and in my opinion misdirected her frustration with our collective situation onto me. The simplest explanation was that she was mad at me because she really couldn’t help me and had tried (and continues to) and it hadn’t helped and was only getting worse. I was completely sober, and had tried to remove myself from the situation by sleeping in the guest bedroom. Having been at the parade field all day in a ceremony, I was still dehydrated and slipped out of the guest bedroom to get a glass of water. She confronted me while I stood at the refrigerator with a Brita plastic water filter jug about to fill up a glass wearing nothing but my underwear. I felt vulnerable and attacked. In a somewhat understandable fit of frustration, she hurled it past me and it shattered on the fridge. The moment she threw the glass, she turned to run back into the master bedroom, and without cohesive thought, I reacted with something that was purely instinctual. I threw the plastic pitcher past her at the hall door frame. Half full, the momentum of the water contained in a brittle Brita pitcher caused it to shatter on the door frame. I never intended to cause her harm and didn’t have the slightest idea that I had. I went to the master bedroom door and heard her on the phone with the [local township law enforcement] department, so I dressed and filled a water bottle with water and sat on the porch trying to call my first sergeant while I waited for them to arrive. I complied with all requests and spent an even more traumatic weekend in a noisy jail. The [local township] courts declined to prosecute the incident as a felony assault, I imagine understanding that there was probably more to this as I was active military and a combat vet. Unfortunately despite my girlfriends attempts to clarify and correct the allegations with the information that she was the primary aggressor that night, which she made both in writing and in person, [Colonel egocentric asshole] (who retired shortly after) judged the article 15 as “guilty” of assault and I received non-judicial punishment of a minor fine and reduction in rank and summarily continued my plan to separate from the military at the end of my second term (first was six, second was four) at my ten year mark. My girlfriend gave her account of her being the primary aggressor when asked about it by the background investigator. I was a shell of myself during the time that this happened and have made great strides in learning to live with this. Reference the attachment from [super awesome, super 'no-bullshit', over 20 years of experience treating PTSD] , Clinical Psychologist regarding her treatment of my PTSD and my prognosis for alcohol use and my progress in therapy. [Which was very good.]
Submitted March 28, 2015 at 01:48PM by ObfuscatedConnection http://ift.tt/1ELlrGq ptsd
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