Warrior's Wife Adventure

My spouse got blown up in Afghanistan and all

I got is this crummy case of secondary PTSD and severe insomnia.

Forget the T-shirt! Give me your free stuff.

Let me bleed your non-profit dry. America owes us.

Six years ago we were newbies to the whole wounded veteran community. There were barely any resources out there on the Internet and as soon as Facebook really got going, it seems there was a new resource page added weekly. Somehow, I kept being automatically added to these groups. As soon as I would look at one, it was only a matter of a day or two before someone logged in with the question,”My husband got blown up in the war so is there an agency out there that will pay for our move?”  “We need a slab poured for our RV. Can so and so help with that?” Since when is an RV an emergency, a necessity, or something that requires others to assist you with?

Really? You didn’t foresee a move coming up in your family’s financial future? So why wouldn’t you start budgeting and saving money from the time you found out that you needed to leave your area? I get that emergencies/family issues happen. However, here are some of the others I have seen. “I need new tires on my SUV. Is there an org that can help with that?” “My veteran has PTSD, he needs a new chair that provides massage. Is there an org out there who can hook us up with that?” Or even better yet, “We need a new bed. Can someone buy us a Sleep Number bed?” I have heard women say that “America owes us. He sacrificed his life and got hurt, he deserves..xyz.” The sacrifice our military makes for our nation is not anything I would disagree with. However, at what point does personal accountability start and laziness end?

So if a massage chair fixes PTSD, what does a platinum-covered Japanese-manufactured and Tiffany’s logo-branded marital aid do for secondary PTSD and the rest of the issues caregivers suffer from? I want one of those!

What happened to personal accountability? We have a lot of medical bills that Tricare/Medicare don’t cover. We pay them ourselves, in addition to all of the other bills grown ups face in life such as new tires, house repairs and utility issues, car issues.. etc. You name it. Just paid $1700 worth of car insurance for six months. Yes, bills are horrible, but they are a part of daily life whether you are a veteran, a caregiver, a Leprechaun, or a Mummer. Bills exist and sadly, we all have to pay bills.

When you own a home, there is always something that needs to be repaired. Cars always need maintenance. If you can’t afford your car payments and your home payments and you are driving a fancy SUV and living in a fancy big home, you might need to switch to a Hyundai and move somewhere more affordable. Live within your means, people!  If money is tight and you only have one child, do you really think you can afford two more?

Non-profits are not there to supplement your income. Some are there to help you in a crisis, such as a short-term issue like the time of which you don’t get paid when you convert from active military to VA disability payments. It takes a good month and a half for that to switch over. When you know you are getting retired, start squirreling money away to help cover that gap. Be proactive, not reactive. Credit cards are not real income. If you use credit and you can’t pay it off, you are living under false financial pretenses. .

I don’t see many caregivers just wanting support and answers about health/medical/benefit questions, but more on material requests. What happened to helping each other out and giving advice and helping someone navigate through the bureaucracy we all have to tangle with? Many are in need of respite and retreats to have a bit of recharge time to themselves. Why not share the information when you hear of things?  What can you give me for free has become the mantra of many. Not what have I learned that I can share, but “gimme gimme gimme.”

My family and I were very fortunate in the kind things that some groups have done for us in the past, however we did not seek out those things.  Having a combat wounded veteran does not entitle you to spend all of his benefits and then look around for more which comes from either donors or tax payers. Entitlement is the plague of our nation.