Ch 9
Crosshairs
Jan 2010. Though I was at my lowest point yet physically (and financially running a three ring circus) it seemed the table was set for forward momentum after years of delay. I was going in for my first appointment with a new VA doctor at the clinic. My wife went with me as I was unable to go unassisted that day. I had been out of both morphine and hydrocodone for several days and with one of the coldest winters for South Texas there was no chance of me being able to drive.
Everything pointed to it just being another routine visit in most regards (I had heard plenty of good things about this doctor from multiple sources, so yeah, I let my hopes and expectations up a little). Same common pleasantries with the personnel and small talk in the waiting room with more experienced Veterans. Waiting was never an issue there as being a small clinic it was more common for there to be an interesting story in the air to bid the time. Upon my name being called we went back into the office with a young nurse who was also new to the clinic.
Now at every appointment there is a set of questions you get asked, various from the types of visits they may be. This time though I was tired of letting them hear what was right and proper. I liked the amount of pride I carried myself with and there was an aura of strength in character typically presented (in other words, I didn‘t want to sound as if I was complaining about how bad we had it when many were so much worse). This time it did not matter, a gritty truth was to be told. All we had from the VA overall was hardship on top if our adjustments to my disabilities, not help. So I for one was done being shy and treating this person as I maybe should have, a stranger.
At the beginning of the pre-exam she asked about medication, and I went off on a tangent. We had to suffer repercussions each and every time they neglected to fill my medications, morphine is as strong as it gets, and the withdraws are to match. I wanted the VA to not only fix whatever may be wrong in that aspect but actually admit that it’s inconsistencies needed to be addressed in the first place. That is the short hand of it at least.
Through the interview in whole, even when my wife was crying in the chair adjacent, I kept my emotions on high. I needed the suffering we were going thru to get across, and to date that message seemed to disappear in the VA system‘s black hole. Not to say understanding that the VA was at the root of all our problems overpowered me in so I would start cursing or get irrational (yell, flail around (not that I could in that much pain) or even sit in any possible “aggressive“ manor), but I was letting my self enjoy pushing on the topics that had become such a thorn in our sides as to the VA.
Now it takes a turn for the south….
Q: “Are you suicidal?”
A: “Yes. It is impossible to be in so much pain this long without constantly knowing all the options that could make it stop. There are only so many days you can go until that thought breaks thru into your brain, “the day I die might be the day this pain may ever be over”. I have had an MRI already by the VA itself confirming spinal damage and yet I’ve still been treated as though I am making it all up. More than one VA doctor has told me it is possible I could be in a wheelchair before I turned thirty. I have to live in pain everyday of which I have gotten no treatment yet that has actually helped. Right now I feel as if I‘m just surviving off the inconsistent medications I am fully aware only sedate me, and make everything worse long-term. On top of it all the last act the VA Doctor I was seeing before did was to cancel my prescriptions. So yeah, if you’re your asking has it has crossed my mind, it is an option, but not one for me. I have a wife and two kids. I don‘t think there will be a point where what I still have to offer them outweighs the burden I may cause (even if a day came where I was permanently paralyzed)”
Q: “Do you have a plan (or anything of the sort)?”
“No. There has nor will be a plan to act on. In fact I feel I do better than many who find themselves close to being in my shoes. I love my kids and wife too much and will take any amount of pain for as long as necessary. Without them maybe things would be different, but that is not the case.”
Q: “Are you homicidal?”
“Sure. Let’s be honest. I’m a battle tested and approved war Veteran. I can say without a doubt given the proper circumstances I could take a life as if it is second nature. Does that mean I’m going to go around killing people? No! Even in Iraq there was no point I could be pounded down to where I would have unnecessarily drawn blood. If someone tried breaking into my house tonight I would attempt to use as little force as possible, maybe shoot a knee out to level the paying field. I am disabled after all and wouldn‘t want someone, unarmed or not, to get the jump on us if possible. Breaking and entering is already an offence in the aggressive nature, so a preemptive action on my part in that situation would be necessary. If though I assess it is the only course of action that will keep harm from my family or self then a decision to kill wouldn’t even have to be made, I just would be... Instant. Any though towards it would be well after the action“
Q: “…anyone in particular?”
Of course. If I was walking in a city per say, saw someone getting raped in an ally and no other amount of force is able to stop it immediately, I may call 911 as I close distance, but I am not going to wait around for help. I will try and provide it. You could make a list of offences and circumstances I would kill for (under). We all saw the aftermath of Katrina, it is possible that a National or Natural disaster could impair law, and just because I’m out of the Army now dose not mean I stop serving my country if needed. Not to say anything like that is probable, but to say it is not possible I say is either ignorance or arrogance. ”
This all seemed to get at the new nurse as she excused herself from the room in the middle of the pre-appointment interview (at least I knew that there should have been a few more questions). A moment latter another doctor came in to sit with us. We held small banter while waiting on the my doctor but as time dragged on my wife had to leave to go pick up our daughter from school. I was unaware of course, but when she left the room she was pulled aside and told I needed to be evaluated by the state mental department and she was not let back into the room to warn me.
…for her part, crying during the appointment and stating “we had a fight the night before and didn’t get much sleep” (True, but the VA failed to acknowledged she also said the argument was about the VA, her burners were on high for how the VA had been treating me (us) and I was the one talking her down from just going into the office the next day with the aims of unleashing a verbal lashing), the VA claimed (still does from what I know) that it demonstrated my “argumentative nature” and the that “my wife was afraid I was going to kill her, the kids, and finally myself”. They used her crying during an emotive appointment about not only my health and welfare but the negative treatment we had experienced thus far, combined with my statement, as they interpreted, “The only thing stopping me from killing myself is my wife and kids”, as their supporting evidence on their claim’s (at first)…
Back in the room though tension grew thicker as excuses grew thinner of why it was taking so long for the doctor. After an hour and a half I finally gave up and walked out the door with what was an unexpected amount of verbal resistance from the doctor telling me to waiting longer. I was down the last hallway and close to the front doors when police and paramedics made their way in. I stopped to let them pass, and in part for the internal thought process of who might be in need of the help and why. I turned again to the door and before I could put one foot (and cane) in front of the other the yell from the hall drew my gaze. My sight landed on a finger pointed right back at me.
Not to paint the picture of some officers tackling a disabled Veteran crouching over his cane with back braces on (had two on that day, hard not to remember), but skipping the details that sure was how it felt. A few civilians also showed up to run an investigation and I had a couple of closed door interviews with a various people. Eventually my wife showed up and also tried to testify as to what had happened (verses what they were telling her happened). At this point the accusation was leveled at me saying I was a threat to myself and my family. That I had been talking of killing myself and the wording I used of “…it not even being an option with my family..“, was actually a threat at them. (I guess it should be said here that it was also spun to say I was directing threats at her indirectly during the interview, and her crying was in direct response to immediate fear for our life’s)
After a while of explaining from my wife and self, we were given many apologies on their behalf and even got promises that an investigation would be opened on the nurse who had started it all in addition to addressing the neglect on their behalf. We were told to relax and wait while things were straightened out. We talked with the VA staff there about scheduling more appointments and getting taken care of finally both medically and for my claim. The phrase “let ya’ll fall between the cracks” has never been repeated so many times. When Mental health specialist came back though the news was a shock.
Regardless of everything, he said the VA was pressing that I needed further evaluation and it was decided I would be forcibly incarcerated into the Texas State Mental Hospital. After being allowed to say goodbyes with my wife (kids had been dropped off at a relatives before she came back up there) and I was put in the back of a squad car and driven to Big Springs. My last time ever being at that clinic was looking out the back of police car after being escorted back and fourth and eventually out of the offices in front of everyone as a criminal.
I was released the same day that I was brought before the Board of Doctors there, but just to get to this meeting took nearly a week. A long few days. Many of the people there need help. Having someone like me there not only congest an overloaded and overburdened facility making it harder to do their job, but can additionally be detrimental to the sane outnumbered by insane. Getting there on a Friday evening made my processing a low priority. To make things worse more accusations were lobbed my way.
In intermittent interviews before the evaluation I was told progressively worse stories as to what happened. It started with notes from the VA that I had stated “I had a list of people I planned on killing”. The next day it was relayed that I said “I planned on pulling a Ft. Hood, going there to shoot up people (This was right after the Fort Hood Incident by the way. I may have been stationed at Ft Hood, but there is zero correlation between the military and the VA). Within a few hours it changed again to me saying “Big Springs” instead of Ft Hood. and then “Waco”. Finally the next day It was said I had “threatened to blow up the San Angelo Clinic” (then it changed again to blowing up Waco, then changed lastly to Big Springs). The order may be off a bit, for the entries and order I have of the records on it from the VA are not exactly spot on when it comes to accuracy...
On the outside my wife was pressing hard for my immediate release. She repeatedly contacted my VA lawyer in Houston, both the San Angelo and Big Springs VA, the State Hospital and Congress. All was futile at the time but documented. She went as far as attempting (for a while afterwards also) to find out the name of the nurse who had said it all in the first place, since in the end it was her word against ours, threatening to sue for slander (can’t sue the VA directly, but her feathers were ruffled and a personal lawsuit for slander would have done for her). The name of the accuser was never provided though and she was told “the nurse in question no longer works there”.
Short of a week, I finally had my evaluation with the board in the institution. After a brief explanation I was told “I was not the first nor do they expect the last. The VA has a contract with the State Hospital for a couple of beds a month, so if they have a problem this can be an easy way for them to deal with it. Plus since they already pay the bill why not use the service?” I was taken aback at the information I was given, and appalled the VA could sink to such levels (not my first nor last time I think “the VA could sink no lower” than what I was experiencing at that point in time).
Free as I may have been, a virus started spreading. Each and every time someone within the VA would go over my files and reviews of “the incident” they would write their own review the story. Since the sole accuser conveniently “disappeared” they would assume her statements were the facts (even as the actual retelling of the story on their part changed every time), and nothing my wife nor I could say changed that. We were both labeled in my VA files as lying (many less tasteful phrases and accusations…) and each time they rewrote it, based off the same “facts” (incorrect as they may have been), even the basic facts they stated evolved to become a demonizing set of documents. So long after no “new facts” were introduced into the equation, the story would still change as the next person would read everyone else’s opinion, plus the last person to interject their two cents, on what was hearsay in the first place.
Furthermore, up to this point the only actions taken against us were in the form of mismanagement, lack of common sense, or at worse just an individual with an ax to grind. We were now living in fear of VA retaliation. Not just denying my medical treatment, medical files, medications, financial compensation, but freedom itself. All the VA had to do was say it, and by the power of their words (conveniently logged in by the VA) I would be locked away until I can prove I am innocent, not the way your taught when you grow up, innocent until proven guilty (not exactly the only system in America that I hope is far off from it‘s original intent). Now not only had we felt the VA was slipping up too many times to be accidents, but the VA, under it’s own power and authority can have someone incarcerated with no facts of evidence what so ever, and I felt as if I had just been “punished” by the VA for speaking up for myself.
