How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news - Isaiah 52:7
Thank you to DonQuixote for helping me post my last Good News offering. I have been on vacation with my family in Colorado for the past two weeks. I am a great beach lover but let me tell you, the mountains in the summer are absolutely breathtaking! We stood at the top of Mt. Evans at an elevation of over 14,000 feet. We saw Bristlecone Pine Trees that are over 1000 years old. We hiked 200 feet to the top of a waterfall. We walked through caves that were first discovered in 1881. What a wonderful planet we live on!
Read below the fold for some great stories about the GOOD that is happening in the Military world.
The beginning of this is an attempt to bring you up to speed on what has been going on this past year leading up to the purpose of this post, a New Investigation on Veterans Care, and the request for those listed in the subject title to get involved with, especially the Veterans having their troubles with the VA and their Care.
It is especially tough to be a soldier at war. The separation from family, the fear, the unexpected. And, many times, when a soldier survives his or her tour of duty they return to a new war. The war in the mind. The war called Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, or PTSD.
American veterans face a high incidence of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Self, in his book Two Wars, will detail his personal struggles with PTSD, as well as detailing the heroic efforts of his men at war in Afghanistan.
This book is an important read for any veteran, or any person presently serving America in the armed forces. Veterans and their families alike will benefit from the insight into the way a soldier thinks. In addition, Nate Self will inspire them in their faith in God and in their fellow soldier. Two Wars is entertaining, inspirational and educational; a must-read for the military professional.
So, since my last entry, I was really hopeful that there would be room on the plane for me, and there was!! I was called and I was waiting to get my boarding pass from the next counter, until someone asked the Airmen at the desk, "Why are dependents getting on the plane before Active Duty members?"
Apparently, this man and his daughter were in the same situation I was, his wife was deployed to Iraq, but what he had on me was, he was an Airman who came out of Ramstein, and HOW THEY DO IT (the right way) is that Active Duty members on leave come before (the new policy) dependents whose sponsers have been deployed for 365+ days.
So, not only did I get bumped, but two moms and their kids who already had their tickets and bags checked in, were bumped so a couple of the guys could get on the plane.
We are in the middle of PCSing to Germany. Mannheim to be exact and I can tell you right out- I am EXCITED. I'm excited about getting to see Europe with my husband and girls, about my oldest daughter being able to start school due to the late dates that Department of Defense schools allow- I could go on.
One thing I am not excited about is all the phone calls I've been making lately. To the electric company. To the insurance company. The TV company, the internet company, the phone company, the WIRELESS phone company- you get my point. I spend a lot of time on the phone, while I juggle a garbage bag in one hand, the phone cradled on my shoulder and my girls demanding my attention every 3 and a half seconds. It's tiring.
Yesterday I managed to get the phone calls I needed done- the last thing I have to deal with is picking a home warranty company. Three different companies call me at least a dozen times a day wanting my business. I let most of those go to the answering machine until I make my decision.
The thing that's killing me now is all the places I called yesterday who are calling me back today wanting to know why they are losing my business. I am fairly certain that I explained to them, in great detail, that we were moving overseas where my AT&T DSL will not work, nor will my DirectTv service. It doesn't matter- I got exactly 11 phone calls today from different departments within just those 2 companies- wanting to know how they could entice me back, wanting to know if they could offer discounts to get my business again.
And I'm wondering "What exactly did that customer rep person right down yesterday when I explained why I was disconnecting these services?" because none of these particular 11 people know why I will no longer be a customer after July 7. It amazed me.
But then again, about 9 months ago I switched from Dish Network to DirectTV and Dish still calls me at least 3 times a week to ask if I'd changed my mind yet. Geez. I'd hate to think about how many more phone calls I would get if I were actually a disgruntled customer.
So my answering machine is now running out of room and my caller ID has recorded nearly three dozen different numbers. I'm grateful no one ever had my cell phone number because i might lose my mind if THAT never stopped ringing too.
Back to my point- I'm going to Germany. And I'm excited. And I've made a mental note that I will probably never want to get a job in customer service from ANY sort of utility company. :)
This week has been crazy, amazing, perplexing, challenging... a million and one things all at once!! This week, I tried to get on a Space Avaliabe (MAC, AMC, HOP... etc) flight back to Italy. DJ will be home sometime, sometime soon, and I am still stuck here in America.
I have been on four planes and I am not waiting till 20:35 to see if I can make it on a plane to Italy... HOME!!! I am sitting in the USO and I would have to say, the nicest set of people I have ever met! Haha, I know all USOs have a unique set of people who volunteer their time and their love to our Service Members, but I wanted to give a BIG shout out to the USO at the Baltimore-Washington International Aiport. This has been a BIG adventure (that I will share later) and I thank the USO for giving me some place to sit down and r e l a x!!
And what Anniversary would that be, you ask, Well:
Of President Franklin Roosevelt's signing of the GI Bill, which enabled millions of veterans to go to college, and is credited for sparking the post-war economic boom.
This is a tribute to courage. It takes a lot of courage to stand up in front of people and say you need help because you are just a human exposed to events so traumatic you are changed. Courage is what you are willing to do. Courage is doing it. Courage is coming out of it after. Courage is taking the next breath. It's standing up and moving one foot after another. It does not mean that you do it all the same way you did it before the event. It's doing it while your heart is still pounding so strongly your shirt vibrates with every beat. It's doing it when you feel your nerves crash inside of you playing a sick game of bumper cars until you are ready to bounce off the wall. It's doing more wondering what to do next when you can't remember what you did first. It is saying the words out of your own mouth explaining to people you are not the same and you need help, knowing that if they said it to you, you would stand there judging them. You tell them just the same knowing they may never look at you the same way they did before, think you were less than you were before, talk to you less than they did before, but you do it all the same because that part inside of you, that part that made you do what you did, go where you went, is still there and still getting you to move from here to there one step at a time.
Anyone who admits they have PTSD, a wound they did not create but trauma did, they are all courageous. Because of them, more wounded will speak out and seek help for being a human wounded by events.
Just for fun in time for summer- I thought I'd pass along my thoughts and a review on the new "Sex and The City" movie.
I was a fan of the TV show- I can't say I saw every single episode- actually, I saw more edited-for-TV re-runs on TBS than I ever saw on HBO. All 4 main characters- Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte and Miranda all return to their roles- along with spouses, children, and all those wonderful SHOES!! (Let me add, I do not own a pair of Manolo Blahniks, and I probably never will. But I sure can ogle them in this movie!!)
The movie picks up 5 years after the series finale ended- Carrie has her Mr. Big and they've decided to get married. Whether they actually make it to the altar or not is a HUGE spoiler that I won't divulge here. There are some seriously tissue-grabbing moments involving these two- the Big and Carrie storyline was always a big part of the show, and it was a big part of the movie. Miranda deals with Steve's infidelity, and raising son Brady in Brooklyn. Charlotte, who adopted a baby girl in the series finale, finds herself pregnant in the movie. Samantha isn't even in New York anymore- she's moved to LA with boyfriend, Smith, and is managing his career. She does a LOT of plane hopping to New York throughout the movie.
My overall opinion- it was kind of long. It was a little drawn out- but it was still funny, entertaining and full of the same things fans who loved the show will appreciate in the movie. It's fun- it's something you should grab a couple of girlfriends to go see it with. It's raunchy and sexy and full of colorful quotes from Samantha. It seemed to me that Carrie was in it WAY more than everyone else- but I know she's the main character and that's how they meant for it to be. My personal favorite is Samantha and I think she should get her own movie!!
If you get the chance to check it out- it's worth your time. If you're waiting for it to come to DVD- that's great, too- that way when it drags on and you need a break you can take one!!
POSTED BY DON QUIXOTE FOR inSANEmom who sent this in while she is on vacation.
Pain nourishes courage. You can't be brave if you've only had wonderful things happen to you.
Another week full of GOOD NEWS has passed. I hope one or more of these stories lightens your heart, lifts your day, or makes you smile.
Websites for Heroes http://www.websitesforheroes.com/ The organization "Websites for Heroes" provides free, personalized and password-protected websites to troops and their families. Each website allows for unlimited photo uploads and can support two hours of streaming video so parents can see what the family is doing back home. Among other features, it also provides a message board and kids' calendar, which helps mom or dad stay actively involved in their child's life. For more information and to request your free website, visit the website for Heroes website.
Bill Seeks More Counseling to Prevent PTSD http://www.armytimes.com/news/... Reps. Mark Udall and John Salazar, both Democrats, are urging the creation of pilot programs at the two Army bases to try to prevent post-traumatic stress disorder in combat troops, and to provide early detection and treatment for PTSD when it happens.
Army Invention Saves Severley Injured Servicemembers' Lives http://www.defenselink.mil/new... A new lifesaving standard of care has garnered the U.S. Army Institute of Surgical Research here a prestigious recognition: invention of the year.
I am a Warrior and a member of a team. I serve the people of the United States and live the Army Values.
I will always place the mission first.
I will never accept defeat.
I will never quit.
I will never leave a fallen comrade.
I am disciplined, physically and mentally tough, trained and proficient in my warrior tasks and drills. I always maintain my arms, my equipment and myself.
I am an expert and I am a professional.
I stand ready to deploy, engage, and destroy the enemies of the United States of America in close combat.
I am a guardian of freedom and the American way of life.
I am an American Soldier.
Add this to it.
They are fallen comrades who have been wounded. Don't leave them behind!
This is the soldier's ethos. What we have today is a lot of fallen being left behind. A fallen soldier is not just a soldier who has died in the line of battle but also includes the wounded who have fallen. This needs to be remembered. A soldier with PTSD is a wounded soldier.
There is a new video the military finally got right and it's powerful. Every spouse needs to watch it along with every member of the military and every veteran.
Battlemind needs to be replaced with this video. It's honest and makes PTSD real. If you really want to help them, play this video from coast to coast, when you deploy them and when they are coming home.
In 2007 I wrote a policy paper about military spouse employment. It is intended to be a primer for legislators who want to help military spouses advance their careers. It's organized around a series of "action items" followed by a background discussion supporting each. The action items are directed at public policy initiatives - not DoD initiatives. This is because I believe that Congress must modernize its policies toward the military, including its policies toward military families, if it wishes to maintain a healthy and diverse All-Volunteer Force. Legislators appreciate statistics and information, but they listen even more closely to personal examples from constituents. What I'd like to do over the next few days is collect stories from the readership here that related to the action items.
So without further ado, I give you my first installment - the challenges of licensed professional spouses. If you have a compelling story about your professional license (out of control fees, unreasonable regulations, inability to become licensed before your next PCS) please either add it here, or email me. Include your name, town of residence and email address, if you are comfortable. We will collect your stories and use them to try to convince our legislators that we are not just a few disgruntled spouses, but a broad swath of this country's citizenry who need them to find creative ways to overcome the challenges that we are facing as a result of our service to this nation.
I have reviewed a few articles about military divorce rates, and they all contradict each other. Some say that the divorce rates have increased due to the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts, while others are sure that the rates have remained fairly the same throughout the war. What is consistent across all of my research is that female soldier divorce rates are several times higher than their male counterparts. "While the rates of divorce among males has increased gradually in the past six years, the rate among women has skyrocketed. By September of 2007, female soldiers were filing for divorce at a rate three times greater than the Army's men" (www.reporternews.com). This gap is considerable and exists for many reasons. There is no definitive image of what a military husband is; we all know what the image of the military wife is. And, the support groups for spouses are dominated by civilian women, so the activities and functions are going to be geared toward this demographic. Husbands of female soldiers have minimal social outlets, and so it becomes difficult for some of them to truly understand their wives' duties and responsibilities.
So, are the divorce rates increasing or what? Would it be a surprise if they were rising? There was a spike in the military divorce rates in 2004: "more than 27,000 service members filed for divorce in 2004 - a 44 percent increase over 2001" (www.reporternews.com). The Army responded to the spike with new programs and resources targeting troubled couples. For example, Strong Bonds is a chaplain-led program that includes weekend retreats for couples. I hope that these programs assist with the loneliness and isolation that many military couples and families have to bear. The isolation that today's military families experience may be more prevalent than during past conflicts as more people seemed to be directly touched by wars such as WWII.
It's hard not for me to plan ahead. If it was up to me I would probably plan out every day of his R&R. It's not that I like a schedule, it's that I feel like it's so far away until I see him again that maybe it wouldn't seem so long if I spent all of my free time planning out every moment of our time together. I know it's unrealistic. I also know it's the last thing he wants. I asked him recently what he would like to do when he came home. This is what he told me.
He said he would like to drive around for a while without worrying about being blown up. He would like to just sit on a couch and watch tv because it's been 3 months since he's done that. He would like to go outside and see kids who are not barefoot and half naked in the streets saying mister, mister, give me chocolate. He would like to spend time with his family wear his own clothes, and just relax. Such simple requests.
When I first followed my husband to the states, I was quite honestly still living in a fantasy world. I learned quickly that to the army, I didn't exist and with my limited knowledge of how things worked, well I was lost.
I found out around Thanksgiving that we were expecting. I had just started a job in a hotel, but quickly realized that the growth of my baby was more important. Throughout my pregnancy even though I had questions, I kept them to myself or researched them myself on the internet.
I just finished watching the season premier of Army Wives (Season 2). Oh my goodnees. Talk about a tear jerker.
In the Season 1 recap, to kind of "introduce" the characters of the show... I found myself really unable to "relate" to one of the women. Yes, we are all Army wives, but I am no where near where they are in their marriages, or in their Army wife careers. I am noy a general's wife. I am definately not a Lt. Con. Haha!! I am not a nurse.
The only one I can come close to is Roxy, she is absolutely in LOVE with her husband, and he just left for a deployment, but she has two kids. But this episode, wasn't really about who I can compare myself to, it was about the bond that all Military Spouses have to each other.
JenniferLebron's article "A Part of Normal Converstation" got me thinking about what is "normal" in my house.
When we were first married, my husband was in flight school. I studied Emergency Procedures with him daily. (I knew EXACTLY how to save a pilot from the outside of the aircraft if one happened to crash in our yard and knew exactly what to do if I was ever in a helicopter that crashed in water!) I worried constantly about his tests, if he was learning flying skills well enough, and mostly his safety. Eventually, telling a friend, "Steve is out flying tonight" became our new "normal" and not a big deal.
Everyone has inside of him a piece of good news. - Anne Frank
Hello, all! Welcome to another edition of The Cup Half Full where we chat about the GOOD things that are happening in the military arena.
First I must apologize for missing my deadlines recently. You know how life just gets away from you sometime? Ya... it's been a crazy couple of weeks! But I am back on track now and have lots of great news stories to share with you.
Officials to break ground on new TBI center http://www.armytimes.com/news/... Military officials will break ground on the new privately-funded National Intrepid Center of Excellence for traumatic brain injuries and psychological health issues Thursday in Bethesda, Md.
Congress passes tax relief for military families http://ap.google.com/article/A... Congress moved... to ease the economic hardships of military families by passing a $2 billion package of tax breaks.
Military Spouses Residency Relief Act http://www.texasinsider.org/mo... U.S. Rep. John Carter introduced the Military Spouses Residency Relief Act, which amends the Servicemember's Civil Relief Act (SCRA) to allow a military spouse who moves out of the state with their servicemember because of military orders to have the option to claim the same state of domicile as their active duty spouse, regardless of where they are stationed.
'Battlemind' is the Soldier's inner strength to face fear and adversity with courage. Key components include: - Self confidence: taking calculated risks and handling challenges. - Mental toughness: overcoming obstacles or setbacks and maintaining positive thoughts during times of adversity and challenge.
Battlemind skills helped you survive in combat, but may cause you problems if not adapted when you get home.
It may be the key as to why they suicide and attempted suicide rate has gone up. Honestly I don't know. The numbers don't seem to support it but trying to keep an open mind here considering I found very few complaints about the program. I tried very hard to find them only because there is something here that is not making sense with this program. How can it help when troops deployed into Afghanistan arrive still jet lagged, get two days of briefings and only 11 1/2 minutes of Battlemind "training" with all of that going on?
They had to do something but is Battlemind the best they could come up with or is it just better than nothing? This term I've heard from different people. It's better than nothing but why can't they give the troops the best possible with all seriousness?
