Vet Corps Program Helps Veterans Overcome Nightmares

The Washington State Department of Veterans Affairs has implemented a new program called Vet Corps. This program provides numerous benefits to veterans and their families from job searches to helping them sleep at night.
Green River Community College holds a Vet Connect meeting the first Wednesday of every month to get veterans together so they know they are not alone in their daily struggles; however, on February 3rd the Vet Connect meeting was anything but ordinary.
Licensed Psychologist Diane Nakamura spoke about Beverly Ann Dexter’s new method that could help veterans overcome PTSD driven nightmares. Simply stated, the method is called No More Nightmares. The program is not meant to work in one night, but is a practiced skill that can help change unsettling dreams into visions of success. She emphasized that there is no such thing as a bad dream and that dreams are not meant to be analyzed.
The planned dream intervention teaches veterans to stay asleep during the nightmare, but to learn how to create a bridge in their mind that will allow the dream to end successfully. The dream intervention does not have to be realistic, but could be anything from ordinary to magical. Each person is different and must learn what type of intervention works for them. The intervention is not meant to change the dream, but to continue in the desired manner. By writing down the dream or feelings from the dream and the intensity, veterans can then return to the same situation the following evening and continue with the story line that they control rather than being controlled by their mind and memories.
The speech hit home for every veteran in the room. She was able to connect with them and provide a new alternative that will eliminate one of their many daily struggles. This is one way that the Washington State Vet Corps program is helping many veterans and shows the potential to help more of those who have sacrificed so much for every American.

~Brianne Leimbach

PTSD's best friend, a service dog is helping veteran

WENATCHEE -- Life has become calmer, safer and less stressful for Chris Goehner since he paired up with Pele.

Goehner, 25, a Wenatchee Valley native attending Central Washington University in Ellensburg, suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. It's something he picked up while serving two tours as a Navy corpsman attached to a Marine Corps emergency room unit in Iraq. He worked as a medic in Kuwait and Iraq in 2004 and 2005, before being diagnosed with PTSD and discharged in 2006.

Pele is his service dog. Since November, the two have become inseparable.

Goehner is one of only 21 Iraq War veterans suffering from PTSD who have been paired with service dogs since the military recently started a new program to try to help soldiers with the disorder.

Pele was trained for the program by an organization called Puppies Behind Bars. The nonprofit organization uses prison inmates to train service dogs in several New York regional prisons.

The military began tests in 2008 to see if the dogs could help PTSD victims.

Pele, a 20-month-old golden retriever/ Labrador retriever mix, accompanies Goehner to his classes, when he goes to the store or mall and when he goes out to dinner. Pele sleeps in his bedroom at night, guarding his rest from haunting nightmares of bomb attacks and shot and blown-up soldiers.

"Pele is my little Marine. He watches my back," said Goehner, referring to the Marines who offered him protection when he was working close to the battle in Iraq.

Since getting Pele, Goehner said he's slept better than he has in three years. He's been able to take a nap for the first time since leaving the military. He can go into a crowded place with less fear that he's going to be attacked or shot at. He's not as unnerved by loud noises that remind him of shellfire and isn't constantly filled with anger and ready for a fight.

Goehner can't say enough about how Pele has already changed his life.

"A lot of that anger I had has gone away. It had to. You have to use positive reinforcement with a dog. Anger doesn't work for him," he said.

Pele is a calming focus point when Goehner goes out in public places that previously made him nervous. By directing his attention to the dog, he said he can forget about the things he used to worry about.

And Pele does watch his back. It's one of more than 90 commands the dog has learned. He'll move in between anyone who tries to come up to his master.

Goehner credits Pele for vast and quick improvement with his insomnia, for helping him become more stable and responsible.

Rebecca Murch

Rebecca Murch with VetCorps-Americorps is serving at the VA Hospital in Seattle assisting a Vocational Rehabilitation Counselor with patients/veterans.


Each week she meet with about 6-8 different veterans that are enrolled in the VA's Compensated Work Therapy program. These veterans have, or currently are, suffering from drug/alcohol addictions and/or mental health issues and find it hard to maintain or obtain employment. Many of the veterans have combat service either in Vietnam, Gulf War or our current conflict in Iraq/Afhanistan, and as a result suffer from PTSD, depression, etc. Again, which are obstacles that make it difficult for them to maintain or obtain employment.

She meets with the Veteran to assist them with developing a resume, teach them job searching strategies in today's job market, assist them with practicing for interviews, assist with applying for Federal jobs and teach some basic computer skills as needed to perform the before mentioned tasks.

Rebecca told me; "It has been very rewarding personally, as I tend to meet with a Veteran more than once, therefore I get to see them develope and be able to utilize the skills that I have taught them. Hopefully the skills that I am teaching them will help them to go on to have more productive and rewarding lives themselves. It is a great honor to me as well to be able to serve my fellow veterans!!"

"Helping veterans - one veteran at a time"

Free Tax Help for Military Families

Beginning January 18th, 2010, Military OneSource will offer military families the opportunity to use the customized H&R Block At Home® income tax program (formerly known as TaxCut) at no charge. There will be a special link to the H&R Block product at www.militaryonesource.com; wait until that link is posted and use it to create your tax account. A simple interview process will walk you through the return process, allowing complete electronic filing of federal and up to three state tax filings electronically.
Military OneSource notes the following on its Web site: “Do not go to the public H&R Block Web site to create a user account. If you create your account on the H&R Block Web site instead of through the Military OneSource site, the H&R Block system will treat your account as a public account. This means that you will receive the public version of the product instead of the customized Military OneSource product. The public version of H&R Block At Home® is not the same as the customized Military OneSource product, and it is not free. If you create an account through the H&R Block Web site, the H&R Block system will treat your account as a public account even if you access the account in the future through the Military OneSource site. To avoid this problem, please wait until the link is posted to the Military OneSource site.”

Tax consultations by phone will also be offered for free at 1-800-342-9647. And Military OneSource has a variety of educational materials that may be accessed by going to its Web site, clicking on “Find Information,” and then clicking on “Money Management.”
BBB Military Line will have more tax information in its February newsletter. Don’t forget that most military installations provide a Tax Center where you can have your taxes prepared for free by an IRS-trained volunteer!


1/13/2010
Scholarships Available for Spouses of Wounded or Fallen Service Members Applications accepted online through January 31
The National Military Family Association is now accepting applications for its Joanne Holbrook Patton Military Spouse Scholarship Program for spouses of wounded or fallen service members. Scholarships are awarded to military spouses to obtain professional certification or to attend post secondary or graduate school... Applications will only be accepted online at www.militaryfamily.org/scholarships and must be submitted by midnight January 31, 2010. Spouses of uniformed service members (active duty, National Guard and Reserve, retirees, and survivors) of any branch or rank are eligible to apply.


12/09/2009
Tax statements coming next week on myPay
Annual tax statements soon will be distributed to service members, military retirees, annuitants and federal civilian employees who are paid by the Defense Finance and Accounting Service — but they will be available electronically up to two weeks earlier to DFAS customers with myPay accounts.The first W-2s, 1099Rs and 1099-INTs, along with retiree and annuitant annual account statements, will start becoming available on Dec. 16, DFAS says. The first wave of forms — Retiree Annual Statements and Retiree 1009R forms — will be mailed that day.

10/2/2009
Homeowner assistance program now under way
A program to help military homeowners caught in the downturn of the housing market started processing applications Wednesday, sources said, with the publication of the implementing rules in the Federal Register.About 4,300 homeowners have applied for assistance under the expanded Homeowners Assistance Program, which was signed into law Feb. 17 with $555 million in funding. Eligible are people on permanent change-of-station orders, wounded warriors, surviving spouses and those affected by base realignment and closure actions.


The above news items were obtained from these excellent BBB websites:

http://www.bbb.org/us/Military/

http://www.bbb.org/us/Military/News/

http://www.bbb.org/us/Military/Newsletter/


Also see these websites:
http://www.bbb.org/us/storage/16/documents/Military_Families_Final.pdf
http://www.bbb.org/us/Military/Links/


REAL FINANCIAL HELP AVAILABLE
I found a excellent service today that is called AMERICAN FINANCIAL SOLUTIONS, which is a division of the North Seattle Community College Foundation. They receive funding through various agencies of the Federal Government, Washington State, and other groups. They offer mostly free services to those who need them. There are some small fees for some services. They offer the kind of help that you can’t get from the VA, or Family Service/Readiness Center.
They are located in Bremerton, WA. They work with you over the phone, e-mail, and regular mail. I called them this morning because I needed help, and felt like the sky was falling. I asked a lot of straight questions, and receive very good answers. I feel much better about my situation now.
http://www.myfinancialgoals.org/ 1-888-864-8699

Time to Start Paying VA Back?

On Saturday Jan. 23, VA posted the following letter on their website. Although the letter is light on details, one thing is clear, those of us who received the “cash advance” on our GI Bill payments will soon begin paying VA back as the VA begins “recovering” the advance payments.

The letter is posted here in its entirety.

VA Letter:

WASHINGTON - The Department of Veterans Affairs is beginning the process of recovering advance payments made available during the fall 2009 semester to Veterans and service members who applied for education benefits.

“The advance payments were a huge success and helped thousands of student Veterans during the first days of the historic Post-​​9/​11 GI Bill focus on studies and not their finances,” said Keith Wilson, Director of Education Services at VA. “Now, we can get to the business of closing the books on advance payments and focus on supporting Veterans for the spring semester.”

VA will begin sending out notification letters this week explaining the repayment process.

In October VA instituted an advanced payment process for all eligible students who were currently enrolled in an institution of higher learning for the fall 2009 term to ensure that all Veterans and eligible students were able to focus on their academic studies and not be burdened with financial concerns. As part of that process, a web portal was established to allow electronic submission for advance payment. Advance payments were also made on-​​site at VA offices around the country. At that time student Veterans were told that advance payments would be deducted from future benefit payments.

In collaboration with the Department of Defense, VA will also notify active duty service members who may have mistakenly applied for the advance payment of their options for returning un-​cashed checks or reimbursing deposited funds.

VA discontinued advance payments via the website portal following the conclusion of the fall 2009 semester. VA is currently processing approximately 7,000 education benefits daily, up from an average of 2,000 at the beginning of the fall 2009 term. As of January 22 the Department has processed more than 105,000 of the approximately 132,000 spring enrollments received. Since the inception of the historic new program last year, VA has paid out more than $1.3 billion in education benefits, and opened the door to higher education to more than 183,000 Veteran students.

Veterans Conservation Corps

Veterans Conservation Corps in Washington State...Therapeutic Transition, Green Job Training and Valuable Conservation

Veterans Conservation Corps is sprouting in Washington state and being developed for expansion to additional states. This decompression time provides vets with new skills, stress management and new stateside friends. And their generous donation of volunteer time improves our homeland environment at the same time. Win-win-win-win...!

http://www.californiagreensolutions.com/cgi-bin/gt/tpl.h,content=3149

Thousands Of Vets Could Get Benefits Upgrade

Thousands Of Vets Could Get Benefits Upgrade

By Kimberly Hefling, Associated Press

WASHINGTON -- The military has agreed to expedite a review the records
of thousands of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans discharged with
post-traumatic stress disorder to determine whether they were improperly
denied benefits.

The agreement stems from a judge's order in a class action lawsuit
originally filed by seven combat veterans who alleged the military
illegally denied health care and other benefits to those discharged
because of the disorder during a six-year period that ended Oct. 14,
2008.

Legal notices are currently being mailed to about 4,300 veterans
informing them that they can "opt-in" to the lawsuit until July 24 to
participate in the expedited review. Attorneys for the veterans estimate
that millions could be paid to veterans under the agreement, with some
veterans receiving hundreds or more dollars in increased monthly
benefits.

The National Veterans Legal Services Program was to discuss the suit at
a press conference Monday.

Former Army Sgt. Juan Perez, 36, of Owosso, Mich., said the resolution
of the suit filed in 2008 in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims was a
relief. Perez, a father of five who did two tours in Iraq, said he
struggles with migraine headaches and an eye injury related to a head
injury sustained in Baghdad. He also has nightmares and takes medication
for his mood related to PTSD.

Since he left the military, he said he and his wife were laid off from
their jobs and declared bankruptcy, in part because of medical bills
from the birth of his two youngest kids.

"I'm glad that they are finally moving forward and reevaluating the
soldiers that need to be reevaluated and doing the right thing," Perez
said. "It's been kind of a struggle not only for myself but a lot of
individuals that didn't get what they were supposed to get in the first
place."

PTSD is an anxiety disorder that can develop after a terrifying event
where the person was physically harmed or felt threatened. Symptoms
range from flashbacks to problem drinking.

The lawsuit addresses the issue of the disability rating given by the
military to veterans discharged with PTSD. Each of the seven plaintiffs
was given a rating of 10 percent or less.

The law requires the military to assign a disability rating of at least
50 percent to those discharged for PTSD, said Bart Stichman,
co-executive director the National Veterans Legal Services Program, a
nonprofit organization that represents the veterans. Since October 2008,
the military has given the 50 percent rating to those discharged with
PTSD, Stichman said.

The higher rating ensures that the veteran receives lifelong monthly
disability payments, free health care for the veteran and the veteran's
spouse, as well as health care for the veteran's minor children.

If a veteran qualifies for a higher disability rating, they may receive
back pay as well as reimbursement for health care expenses.
Classification: UNCLASSIFIED