Tuesday, December 31, 2013

PTSD: And the Other Ultimate Sacrifices

Dr. Phil Leveque, Professor of Pharmacology Salem-News.com-Dec-30-2013

Is there any limit to what Veterans must endure? Where is the "support for troops" now?

Dr. Phil Leveque, PTSD sufferer/survivor.
Photo by Bonnie King

(PORTLAND, Ore.) - I have nothing but honor and utmost respect for the 300,000 of my fellow dogfaces in WWII who were killed so that I could write these stories honoring them.

I was committed to combat late in WWII, but many in my company and my battalion whom I knew well were killed, many just in front of me. It is an eerie feeling just to remember “there but by the grace of God, go I”. This happened too often when I was in a combat zone but for only about three months. I even get those feelings today, 68 years later. This is PTSD.

My title may be strange to some people, but there are things worse than death which my fellow Combat Infantrymen are suffering today.

The VA treatment of injured veterans, especially those who have PTSD, makes me wonder if the V-A stands for Veterans-Assassination, or Veterans-Abomination; both of which seem applicable at the present time.

The VA is killing more veterans than died in combat, by bad drug treatment, or no treatment at all.

The Army Infantry and the Marines brainwash their men to be psychopathic killers, then order them to “go kill your enemies”. This was a severe shock to most of the men but the concept was regularly beat into their heads. If we didn’t do as we were ordered, we might be sent to be a point man, leading an attack, a Scout going out to seek trouble or a Forward Observer, like a goat in a tiger trap. All these three were frequently suicide missions.

And for many, that was the result. I know --- I was there, many times.

What I’m really getting to is/are the deplorable medical services mostly denied to Veterans/PTSD victims who usually are subjected to the deny-deny-deny till the veterans do die.

Right now, there are at least 1 million PTSD Veterans in this category who have really been thrown into the ash can with no medical support whatsoever.

In addition to this mistreatment, or part of the group (million veterans) are at least 200,000 maybe more who are homeless, or living under bridges, or sleeping on the sidewalk someplace in ragged clothes.

As a result of this denial of medical care, we have the Veteran PTSD victims turning to alcohol which they were taught to do in basic training. And tobacco addiction, which they learned at the same time, or illegal drugs like cocaine or meth, which allows them to escape their miserable existence for even a few hours.

Another part of the ultimate sacrifices is being in jail or prison, usually for the use of illegal or lethal drugs mentioned above.

Many veterans die from taking the medications given them by the VA, prescription drugs kill about 106,000 patients per year, many are PTSD Veteran victims.

Along with this are about 80,000 deaths by alcohol. Most are veterans.
Tobacco kills about 435,000 a year. Most of these also are Veterans.

There are other ramifications about PTSD. Statistics indicate that PTSD causes an increase in divorce. But also, that divorce cause PTSD. This ends up with shattered families so that Veterans PTSD affects families and children.

The overall adverse effect of PTSD goes far beyond the combat soldiers or Marines who are the most effected by PTSD and its sequels.

Others also get PTSD, and I am not diminishing that fact. I am only writing about what I know best.

Psychotherapy by whoever has been a very expensive bust. But I will admit that it possibly works for the lower grades of PTSD. For the more extreme cases, pharmacotherapy especially with Cannabis/Marijuana type drugs has been found to be the best and many PTSD Veterans have discovered this.

Cannabis is a complete substitute for the body’s own endocannabinoid anandamide which is sucreeted by the body in stressful situations.

It is always there in small amounts. When the body is over-stressed with PTSD, the body cannot overcome this stress by itself.

In the Israeli and Canadian Armies, Cannabis is freely given to soldiers who have suffered combat terrors which gives the essence of battle, is also used freely for the sequels of battle --- PTSD.

Despite many publications supporting the concept of Cannabis/Marijuana as the best medicine to treat combat terrors and PTSD, the US Government and the VA assassination teams still refuse to allow combat veterans to use this medicine.

The results I have given above.

These are: