Mike,
Can you take a look at this video? (only 3 minutes). Neat story about a psychiatric assistance dog that helps a veteran with PTSD. But check out how many bottles of pills this guy has in his cabinet. Is that normal? Reasonable?
The Wounded Platoon
I'm not sure what to say about this documentary. Tommy Lee Jones's In the Valley of Elah was based on an mech-infantry platoon cross-attached to my tank company during the initial invasion back when I was a young PL. This documentary is something you should watch. It both saddened and angered me in ways that I cannot neither control nor understand. I simply wish that I had a solution.
The Wounded Platoon
PBS Frontline
v/r
Mike
Last edited by marct; 05-19-2010 at 12:16 PM.
Mike,
Can you take a look at this video? (only 3 minutes). Neat story about a psychiatric assistance dog that helps a veteran with PTSD. But check out how many bottles of pills this guy has in his cabinet. Is that normal? Reasonable?
The modern day story of Philoctetes. Starbucks did a recent blog about this dilemma in Wings over Iraq.Originally Posted by Schmedlap
I’ve started viewing PTSD, TBI, and substance abuse as an internal insurgency, a struggle within one’s mind. I’m applying the same counter-insurgency principles as an alternative means of prescription or better self-governance to borrow from COL Jones. The dude in the video is one of the target audiences for a project that I’m working on with some of the caregivers at Bragg. We want to do it off-post, holistically, with limited drugs that confuse or suppress the mind.
In the “old” days, we’d tell him to get a haircut, come down to formation for PT and run 5 miles, and suck it up. "Dude, you’re an officer. You’re highly decorated. You’re 3rd ACR. Suck it up.”
But, that’s not the issue. He’s stuck. His heart is broke. He’s isolated himself. The question is how to undo?
It reminds me of George Strait’s Living for the Night. Specifically, “Friends stop by to check in because I’ve checked out.”
It's similar to Foreign Internal Defense. How can we help/assist someone to help themselves? That's my current study. That and Solomon's Ecclesiastes.
Last edited by MikeF; 05-19-2010 at 08:08 PM.
An example
I watched the video again a couple of times. Louis is very thoughtful, sincere, and probably has quite a bit of wisdom. Can you imagine what impact that he could have teaching in our public school systems or volunteering with others?
But, again, he's stuck. He is trapped in his tent.
I want to figure out a way to assist guys like that to walk away from their own struggles.
I was just shocked by the amount of medications he was on. I don't see how that helps him.
Regarding "getting people out of the tent" - I'd try to find a way to give that guy a bunch of responsibility so that people are relying upon him, forcing him to forget about his current issues. How specifically to do that, I don't know. Maybe start him off, first, with pets. Put him in charge of a giant kennel of 100 dogs who rely upon him for food, water, and shelter. Something like that. I suspect he'd be so focused on their needs that he'd forget about his problems.
I know when I was in the Army - particularly while deployed - it was easy to forget about simple things like eating and sleeping because I was so focused on making sure my Soldiers ate and slept. When I got out, it was a bit disorienting. Nobody relied on me. It took quite a while for me to figure out what I was supposed to do when nobody was relying on me for anything and I was not accountable to anyone. If I had PTSD, I could see that leading to me just closing myself off from the world and focusing on the condition.
Guys take uppers (Redbulls, WildTigers, Monsters) during the day to keep themselves awake. They take Ambien and other downers to force themselves to sleep. It is a vicious cycle that counters the natural adrenaline forced to the brain, but we do not yet understand the unintended consequences.
I'm leary of the drugs prescribed to soldiers. I've refused anything stronger than Motrin even to counter the migraines, dizzyness, and vertigo. I just dealt with it and allowed my body to heal naturally.
ConcurRegarding "getting people out of the tent" - I'd try to find a way to give that guy a bunch of responsibility so that people are relying upon him, forcing him to forget about his current issues. How specifically to do that, I don't know. Maybe start him off, first, with pets. Put him in charge of a giant kennel of 100 dogs who rely upon him for food, water, and shelter. Something like that. I suspect he'd be so focused on their needs that he'd forget about his problems.
One trend that we're seeing in the overused term of resiliancy is the family support structure. No man is an island, and when a spouse or family leaves them, then they hit a break point that leads to being stuck or worse.I know when I was in the Army - particularly while deployed - it was easy to forget about simple things like eating and sleeping because I was so focused on making sure my Soldiers ate and slept. When I got out, it was a bit disorienting. Nobody relied on me. It took quite a while for me to figure out what I was supposed to do when nobody was relying on me for anything and I was not accountable to anyone. If I had PTSD, I could see that leading to me just closing myself off from the world and focusing on the condition.
Eventually, I want to find a means of preventive medicine- a point of intervention prior to the officer retreating to his tent or the soldier commiting manslaughter/murder.
It's a really nasty problem and, IMHO, medication does tend to be over prescribed. I used to do a lot of counselling work with street kids who had a lot of the same issues, including the drugging both via prescription and self medication. It tends not to work, and just stands in the way of them actually dealing with the problems (as opposed to the symptoms).
There are some technologies that do work pretty well, but they tend not to be used, unfortunately. The "buck up, you're an officer" may work, but it usually requires a lot of support and someone who actually knows what they are doing, otherwise it tends to repress / suppress the problems. Rivers did some good work in the area back during WW I.
Sic Bisquitus Disintegrat...
Marc W.D. Tyrrell, Ph.D.
Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies,
Senior Research Fellow,
The Canadian Centre for Intelligence and Security Studies, NPSIA
Carleton University
http://marctyrrell.com/
There are no one size fits all answers for any of this. What works for one person may not work for another and may even exacerbate the problem. Some people certainly would thrive under the responsibility of having others depend on them, others would become deeply resentful not wanting to worry about someone else's problems when they significant one'e of their own.
I would also be careful with making judgements about the use of drugs to treat these problems. Just as there are those who think that we can fix anything with just a pill or two, which leads to the over-prescription of drugs, there are also those who automatically distrust the use of any drugs, which leads to under-prescription or patient non-compliance. Both are unhealthy and invariably lead to more problems down the road. The brain is essentially a highly advanced biological computer. Physical problems can and do have emotional and/or cognitive manifestations. Therapy and determination to get better are not always enough by themselves. Some people need to be on those drugs and some do not. Either way, it should be a decision for a health care provider to make along with the patient based on the patient's needs rather than on preconceived notions or media-inflicted bias.
“Build a man a fire, and he'll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.”
Terry Pratchett
That was really my concern. I wonder if this guy is getting the attention he needs, or if someone just kept prescribing drugs for him until he turned into a manageable zombie that could be looked after by a dog.
I think Uboat nailed it, and this problem is the hardest for us as Army leaders or any bureaucracy. We want indoctrinization and routinization. While that works well on the front end for transitioning from civilian to military, it does not quite work out on the back end in all cases.
I think that the approach must be more ad-hoc and hollistic. Realistically, 85-90% of soldiers/marines readjust well through their own internal resolve, family and support structures, and military communities, etc... I'm concentrating on the other 10-15%.
v/r
Mike
http://lightfighter.net/eve/forums/a...61/m/243104086
Interesting posts over at the Lightfighter forums from people who have first hand knowledge of some of the people/incidents in this documentary. Sounds like some shoddy journalism from their perspective.
Combined with the recent story on the Carson WTU I suspect there is more truth than fiction here.
A very disturbing watch. The soldiers in question are responsible for their actions, but the video made me wonder if the Army wasn't an accessory through over-medication and inattention. Will be interesting to use as a tool for an OPD/NCOPD on taking care of soldiers. The investigation results were particularly interesting in the number of pre-service problems + medications + high casualty unit + PTSD = potential criminal. It would seem we could better ID these folks as leaders.
Hopefully the recession eliminated adding more waiver/CAT 4 types recruited in the 2003-2007 period.
A question of leadership?
Interesting interview on Frontline's website with the Army surgeon general:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontl...choomaker.html
Excerpt:
Tell me what was going on at Fort Carson, [Colo.]
What was observed was over a period of about four to five years on Fort Carson, about 10 murders or attempted murders, very violent crimes, very tragic crimes were committed by soldiers assigned to units on Fort Carson, and there appeared to be a clustering of these horrific crimes in one particular brigade, a unit of about 3,000 to 4,000 soldiers. ...
What we found was that, in fact, about 14 soldiers were involved over this four-year period ending in 2008. ... And of the 14, 10 of them came from one single unit, a unit that had begun as the 2nd Brigade of the 2nd Infantry Division in Korea, had been deployed to Iraq, returned to Fort Carson -- not to Korea where it started but to Fort Carson, because it was restationed there. They then had a fairly short dwell, meaning that they remained at Fort Carson for a year or less before they were again deployed to Iraq. It was at that point that the surge took place, and their 12-month deployment was extended to 15 months before they returned to Fort Carson.
Ten of the 14 soldiers involved in these crimes on Fort Carson came from that one brigade, and six of the 10 soldiers came from one battalion of 600 or so soldiers within that brigade. And I believe that you are looking at one platoon, one smaller unit within a company, within that battalion, and that appeared to have a very close clustering of violent crimes committed by a few number of soldiers in this very large unit.
Outlier-isolate ?
Niel, you're the quantitative social-sciences guy; I'm not. But, don't the SG's stats point toward an outlier-isolate situation - a confluence of the stars so to speak - where a number of factors, growing more and more proximate as they worked down to the specific platoon, contributed to the problem that hits us between the eyes ?
Regards
Mike
A couple more links
Mentioned in Niel's link to Frontline's Interview Lt. Gen. Eric B. Schoomaker are a couple of links. Very generally, a series of RAND studies are found at the Invisible Wounds of War webpage.
More specifically and to the point is the Fort Carson EPICON (epidemiological consultation) Report.
The upfront conclusions in this 126 page report are at pages ES-2 through ES-4.
Regards
Mike
Last edited by jmm99; 05-22-2010 at 07:12 PM.
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