Readjustment symptoms include hypervigilance, insomnia, irritability, exaggerated startle response, withdrawal, isolation, depression and anger. An act-first-think-later approach to problem solving may keep one alive in combat, but it's not helpful to family harmony.

The biggest problem is simply not enough qualified counselors and not enough government funding to meet current needs. Those needs have grown exponentially, as the number of vets seeking treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder and other mental health issues doubled from 4,467 to 9,103 between October 2005 and June 2006, according to a report last month by a House subcommittee. That's just the beginning of the wave building now.

"But rather than viewing its shortfalls as a resource problem, the Administration is choosing instead to ration health care and dissuade eligible, deserving veterans who might not have other options from seeking VA assistance," said Evans.
 
VA insists that it does not need emergency supplemental funds to provide timely quality service, with the Secretary of Veterans Affairs claiming in correspondence to Congress, " . . . I do not foresee any challenges that are not solvable within our own management decision capability."  His words were cited on the floor of the Senate to defeat a Democratic effort to provide emergency funding for veterans' health care, one in a series of such attempts undermined by the Administration's stance.
 
"There is more than a little irony in the fact that as we now mark 30 years since we left Saigon and 60 years since the end of World War II, we are fighting for adequate funding for veterans' health care and responsive benefits for returning and former servicemen and women," said Evans, adding that "VA's suppression of information certainly brings into question the integrity of what this Administration has to say about the budget for veterans' benefits and services."

House Appropriations
Earlier this year, the U.S. House of Representatives approved legislation funding veterans programs at $68.1 billion for the coming fiscal year. The DAV is extremely disappointed that the funding level passed by the House for veterans medical care is grossly inadequate, falling $2.7 billion short of what is needed according to the Independent Budget recommendations. The House passed measure provides a meager 3 percent increase over this year?s funding level. This is far below the 13 to14 percent annual funding increase VA says it needs just to maintain current services.
Since VA's disclosure of the budget shortfall, the House Veterans? Affairs Committee held a hearing regarding the weaknesses in the processes used by the VA to forecast health care demand and shape its budget. The Administration has requested, and the House passed, a $975 million fiscal 2005 supplemental spending bill to address the shortfall.

Senate Appropriations
The Senate Appropriations Committee has postponed considering the funding levels for VA medical care in light of the recent disclosure of VA's funding shortfall. In light of the April 2005 defeat of the amendments offered by Senators Patty Murray (D-WA) and Daniel Akaka (D-HI) to add $1.9 billion for veterans? medical care and the pending VA budget shortfall this fiscal year, the Senate voted on two amendments to provide VA with additional funds.
Senators Patty Murray (D-WA) and Robert Byrd (D-WV) offered an amendment to add $1.42 billion in fiscal 2005 VA funding to the bill. Senators Kay Bailey Hutchison, Rick Santorum (R-PA) and Larry Craig (R-ID) offered a second-degree amendment boosting the total to $1.5 billion, which was approved. Murray?s provision was then approved, as amended, by an identical vote.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan along with the aging of our World War II, Korea and Vietnam War veterans have increased demand for VA services.  However, year after year you request inadequate funding for veterans' health care.  Each year your budget submission includes proposals to increase veterans' co-payments and fees, essentially taxing certain veterans for their health care.  Each year your VA budget fails to request what is needed and relies on accounting gimmicks such as "management efficiencies" and inaccurate health care projections.  Such efforts are transparent as the true consequences of your administration's budget flaws are being realized by current and future veterans. Indeed, recently VA officials themselves acknowledged that greater funding was needed to care for our servicemembers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan suffering from mental health disorders and traumatic brain injuries.
Mr. President, during your tenure, health care waiting lines have increased, appointments and medical procedures delayed, more than 250,000 veterans have been turned away from entering the VA health care system, and disability and education claims backlogs have grown to unreasonable rates.  Moreover, Congress has been forced to add billions of dollars in supplemental VA funding due to embarrassing funding shortfalls.

Reyes votes against the fiscal year 2007 budget resolution, which cuts $6 billion from the Veterans Administration, freezes Pell Grants, underfunds educational programs, and cuts homeland security funding.
The fiscal year 2007 budget resolution, which cuts $6 billion from the Veterans Administration, freezes Pell Grants, underfunds educational programs, and cuts homeland security funding, passed the House of Representatives late last night. Congressman Silvestre Reyes, D-El Paso, voted against the measure.

"As in previous years, the Administration's budget request includes legislative proposals that would impose additional fees on our nation's veterans. Implementing a $250 enrollment fee and increase in pharmaceutical co-payments from $8 to $15 for veterans that are deemed as having a "higher income." In El Paso County a Priority eight veteran who is considered "higher income" would be making as little as $26,902. I am dismayed that the VA expects to achieve savings almost entirely from retirees dropping out of the VA healthcare system. I find this absolutely unacceptable and will assure you that I will work with the Committee to remove this language in a bipartisan fashion as we have done in the past.

"I am also concerned about an article published in the Washington Post dated January 9, 2006, concerning the Department of Veterans Affairs regional offices. The article brought to light an internal memo which indicates that only 19 percent of callers into the regional offices were given accurate information on disability claims. This is to say that 81 percent of incoming calls were give inaccurate information. In addition, the article stated that incoming callers were received by unhelpful and rude VA workers. I am sure that all of my colleagues will find this information extremely disturbing and look forward to hearing how the VA is addressing this issue.

So, as I stated above:  Tell me those lies again about how much John Warner, Lindsey Graham, St. John McCain, bush/cheney and the entire maladministration "support our troops".

Non sequitur.

PTSD, been there, done that, not pleasant.

Make fun if you like, unnamed one, if you are ever stricken by serious health problems, near death experiences, years of recovery, endless doctors, medication regimens that would kill a horse, and a lifetime of endless neurological pain that never goes away, ever, well, I hope you find someone with more compassion than yourself to help you.

Great article post, Edger, but some people can't be distracted by facts or the personal experiences of those that have been there and done that.