Resources for good mental and physical health

Roy:

My name's Roy. I served in the Marine Corps from '79 to '83. Was in Beirut from '82 to '83, and I got out for about four months and really couldn't adjust to civilian life so I went back in.

I just couldn’t deal with the past. The bombing in Beirut, things that’d happen in Desert Shield, Desert Storm, things had happened, wife leaving me all I wanted was a family she had said I’d changed and I didn’t realize I changed. You want a perfect world, but it’s not, and it’s not everybody’s tuned to military and they don’t understand you. It got so bad at one time where I didn’t want to leave my home. I was cooped up in a trailer, and maybe come out once a month.

At first when I got out I self-medicated, and I was driving a truck at the time and then I drove a truck for maybe five years. I couldn’t hold down a job. I was forced by law enforcement to go into rehab and I went into rehab and the Counselor said that “You need to get somewhere. You got some serious issues.” And then I was in a rehab center and one of the guys was a Vietnam Vet and suggested that I go to VA.

Mental health helped me, we talked about issues and then I got into some classes with talking with other Vets about I got real bad anxiety issues. They had the same issues that I had, there were other Vets that had anxiety issues and they were doing the same thing, and talking to them and it helps a great deal. I have a Counselor, a Psychiatrist I see every six weeks now. At first I would say we did every two weeks and he’s really helped me out, and I’ve done ITT which is individual therapy training, TWE, which is transitional work experience and then I got 10 percent disabled on my ears so I could go back to school, and I went back to school as culinary arts, graduated from that. Unfortunately, I had a stroke while I was in there. Luckily the VA knew the symptoms right away, my Doctor got me right down there to the CAT scan place and found that I had a stroke, and then he found I had a rare blood clotting disease. If it wasn’t for the VA, I’d probably be dead now.

Completing the school was a big deal for me. I wanted tostart something and finish it even though I can’t work in that trade now because of health issues. It was a big deal to me to graduate and a lot of the program’s TWE was a great help because during that time frame, I didn’t have no money coming in and TWE helped that way. I feel real stable about myself. It’s not a cure for all things, but they can stabilize it where you can deal with it. Just go to the VA, there’s Vets out there from all wars and they’re very much willing to help you.