This Veteran found the help that she needed at VA
Kris:
Hi, I'm Kris. I served in the U.S. Army from 1975 to 1990. Oh I loved it. I absolutely loved it, the best job of my life. I was a Radio Operator and a Paratrooper. I knew I was a girl at four or five years old and I went through life a strong, macho, masculine guy. I put on a façade. It was difficult. I couldn't say a word to anybody, not even my wives. I've been married five times. You can only hide you are for so long and so I'd end up with divorces, so I had to do a lot of soul searching and decision making.
Back in ’14 my niece shot herself in the head in front of me and her mom and I kept her alive. I told her mom to go downstairs and call 911. They did three surgeries that day and now she’s doing wonderful. This is four years later. She’s just an amazing young lady now. I ended up with PTSD from that and depression. I couldn’t get up in the morning. I would lay in bed till 1 or 2 o’clock in the afternoon. I wasn’t cleaning my house. I had dishes sit in the sink for months and I wasn’t taking care of myself. I realized that “Hey, I might be suffering from depression.”
I’ve been using the VA since I got out of the Army in 1990 for a number of issues. I had an appointment scheduled in February so I waited until February to talk to a psychiatrist about what had happened. So the psychiatrist prescribes medication for that. The depression was gone. I was cleaning my house again and living a normal life. Mental Health helped with that counseling.
I think there’s a lot of Veterans that don’t know what the VA has to offer. Go in and get counseling or get an evaluation. That includes the primary care of the Nursing Staff, Mental Health or Social Workers, and Pharmacy. It’s just an amazing organization.
