The Broken Soldier

Today my wife and I had an argument. Like most of our arguments these days this argument sprung from the stresses and pressures of my physical condition. In the heat of this argument my wife made an interesting statement. An observation really. An astute one. “You aren’t yourself anymore.” She’s right.

Before this injury, and the symptoms that seem to grow in number and intensity each day I go untreated, I was happy. I was strong. I was active. Friendly. Trusting. Generous. Productive. Valuable. At the time I left for WTC I was incline bench pressing 375 pounds. I could leg press close to 2,000 pounds. I was running 3-5 miles a day. I was well on my way to earning my fourth college degree: a masters degree in Military History. I had a 3.9 CGPA on a 4.0 scale. I was working freelance waiting for OCS to start. Writing. It was easy. And well-paying too. My plans were well thought out. The toil, which wasn’t too much toil for me, served to lay the foundation upon which my wife and I would build our life together. The mistakes and missteps of youth and the consequences of them were well on their way to becoming distant memories. Life was as close to perfect as one can expect. So was I.

The MIARNG killed me. The good parts of me anyway. I’m a broken man. Depressed and miserable, and depressing and miserable to be around. I can barely lift a milk carton. I lie down between 20-24 hours per day each and every day. I’m distrustful, somewhat paranoid (I say somewhat because my feeling is rationally justified), and cynical. Our financial situation precludes meaningful shows of generosity. I don’t do anything anymore. I am almost completely useless to my wife as a husband. And I’m a drain on her physically, emotionally, and financially. I’d kill myself, but I fear Hell may be slightly worse.

This is my reward for choosing to serve my country for a second time. This is how the promise of medical care is kept. I used to be a patriot too. I loved this country. I loved its people. I loved its military. That part of me is dead too.

I received authorization for medical care last week. At first my wife and I were excited - in a guarded sort of way. We felt perhaps our efforts to get care under the approved line of duty had paid off. That feeling of excited relief was quickly replaced with familiar anger and frustration.

As my wife and I feared, the medical care authorized was not the solution to our problems (as it was billed). Like the last authorization this authorization was written in such a way that what is covered is unclear. From a casual reading, which is all one can expect from a medical clinic billing department, the visit is covered, but not the procedures or prescriptions. I asked for specificity with receipt of the last authorization because of this very problem. It is clear the people involved do not feel my input, based on my experiences in continuing to pay for medical treatment for an approved in the line of duty injury, that of congressional aids, or civilian medical professionals is important.

As well, the authorization is for pain management. A pain management clinic is not equipped or designed to address my condition. Pain management is by definition a palliative specialty. That is to say, one whose goal lies in addressing symptoms but not cause(s) of those symptoms. If those in positions to grant approval for medical care were paying attention, assuming they possess knowledge of medicine greater than or equal to my own, they would have granted approval for a neurosurgeon. The request for pain management was, as stated by both my doctor and I in written requests, a means to an end. That end was a neurosurgery consult and hopefully some pain relief between the time of our request and the time surgery could be performed. When it became clear authorization was going to take much longer than five business days (the explanation I received from SFC Weir in MING JFHQ Health Services), my doctor and I requested a direct neurosurgery consultation. This request was ignored. Authorizing the wrong care took more than two months.

Medical personnel granting authorization should also understand, again assuming they possess knowledge of medicine greater than or equal to my own, consistent with current literature, the longer an injury like mine goes untreated the worse the prognosis becomes. Surgery at this point, eight months after the injury, will likely do little to improve my condition. Surgery will, however, arrest further expression of new symptoms, and may have a remote chance to reduce in degree of those already present.

These people simply do not care. They don’t care about the job they do, and they don’t care about the consequences their below average performances create for those they service. The longer they wait the harder my condition is to treat. The harder my condition is to treat the more expensive it will be to treat it. And with the line of duty concluded and approved the government is on the hook. You, the tax payers, are on the hook. You will be paying for my medical care and my disability compensation. You’ll also likely be paying for me to retrain, possibly sending me to law school. (Thanks by the way. You may want to thank your local congressional representative, as they have the power to make this system more efficient but lack the courage to do so. They aren’t the most refulgent stars in the cosmos though, so I’d lay the sarcasm on real thick.) Again, in this we all lose. I lose the full use of my legs and a life generally lived without constant pain. You lose money in the form of tax dollars to pay for medical care, disability compensation, and costs to re-educate me. The government loses a body in uniform, a fledgling company grade officer, revenue from property taxes, and a portion of its budget. Sacrificed on the alter of status quo by dull, lazy, audacious and complacent agents of the government (who are here to help).

My wife and I are pleased with the traffic to our site.  We’re thankful to those taking time to read our experiences, inform themselves, and get involved to whatever degree their consciences compel and schedules permit.

It seems though there is still a small segment of our viewing population confused about our motives.  I’d like to devote a few moments to them in hopes of clarifying points of confusion.

My wife and I were happy to allow comments when this site first launched.  We felt, and still do feel, this topic is important and worthy of frank, open, and honest discussion.  It quickly became very clear to us, however, comment privileges were being abused.  Rather than engage in meaningful discussion of the issues this site is meant to address, participants used this site to smear my wife and I.  This was done without the benefit of real knowledge of the situation in which my wife and I find ourselves, and without the usual cogency, recognizable cues that those posting understand the subject being discussed, intellectual honesty, good will, etc., most consider necessary for a real discussion to take place.  The site was quickly becoming indistinguishable from any other site in which people offer their opinions on subjects they have no reason to believe they understand.  I decided to suspend posting privileges.

Rather than address particular comments or particular commentators I felt it’d be best to restate what this site is and what it is not.  This site is informational in nature, and serves as a medium in which my wife and I can share our experiences with obtaining medical care for a line of duty injury.  In the course of sharing our experiences we will offer analysis and opinion.  It should be understood our experience is limited, and our analysis could be wrong.  We are open to learning where we’ve gone wrong, and different approaches we could take to get the medical care I need.  However, as of the date of this post (20 November 2007), a full eight months after my Line of Duty investigation began, a full two months since its favorable conclusion, I have still not been authorized medical treatment my doctor deems necessary to treat my condition.

This site is not a place to bitch.  It is not a place to garner sympathies.  It is not a place to broadly defame the military or those serving in it.  Bitching, gaining sympathy, and defaming don’t fix my back or restore the sensations in my butt, legs, and feet.  These things don’t pay my bills or reduce the pain I experience.  And they are not the purpose of this site.  Neither is it a purpose of this site to convince the invincibly ignorant.  Some will deny a problem exists with a system or a procedure within that system until it darkens their doorstep.  My wife and I fell into that category of people before we experienced it for ourselves.  Now weak physically and emotionally, with only one income, barely keeping our heads above water, we’re not in a position to do much about it other than talk and write about it.  I hope those reading will take a serious look at this system, and measure it against the promises we have made to the men and women serving our country.  There is a disparity.  Our hope is this disparity can be addressed and corrected.

To all those who have served and who now serve, thank you.  Your contributions and sacrifices can never be repaid.

God bless you and your families.

It’s been two months since my LoD was approved. It’s been two months since the approval authority at State JFHQ has had my doctor’s treatment plan. Nothing has been done.

My LT is doing her best to help, but she is almost as limited to affect change, and seems almost as frustrated, as I am. She is required to call to update me every week. It must be hard to gear yourself up to deliver no news - which, as she understands, given that the longer I go untreated the worse my prognosis becomes is bad news. I feel bad for her.

I am in the final stretch of medical evaluation. A physical evaluation board is scheduled for the 6th of December. There I will, I believe, receive the recommendation for discharge and possibly receive an initial disability rating. I’m simultaneously relieved and saddened. Relieved because finally this will be over. Saddened because I wasted close to two years of my life pursuing a goal, didn’t reach that goal, but managed to catch a nasty case of disability.

I can’t help but feel a bit suspicious of the motives of those appointed over me.  Those who are charged with making decisions that impact my life and the lives of those around me.  I’m not suspicious by nature, but my experiences while affiliated with the Army have, as a matter of induction, left me expecting and always bracing for the next regulation-flouting bumming.  I feel I am being positioned for discharge to shift the burden of caring for me from the Army, Guard Bureau, the Michigan State government, and TriCare system to the VA system. The thought of a VA doc cutting on my spine gives me the fantods.

Please say a prayer for my family and me.