Disabled Military Service Veteran Seeks Government Grant To Recover Lost Family And American Dream

by Russ
(Krum, TX, USA)

I've always been fairly strong and healthy for most of my life: service time in the military, able to work and support my family, typical American dream stuff.

About six years ago I started having problems with periodic weakness, feet swelling and very minor chest pains. In February of 2008 I passed out after feeling like someone was sitting on my chest and short of breath.

My then wife rushed me to the hospital where they installed a pacemaker after my heart stopped several times. I remember none of those three days even now.

Since then I have gone from being healthy, owning my home, working and providing for my family and living our dream on five acres to being barely able to walk 30 feet with a cane on good days and maybe a few feet on bad.

I'm in a powered wheelchair most of the time due to weakness or swollen and or ulcerated feet. I can’t sleep without a CPAP strapped to my face, I can’t bathe without handles and benches, and the pain is now constant.

I can't work. My living arraignments are at the good graces of my ex-wife. I feel trapped in a body and mind that have abandoned me.

Long story short, due to my job loss, my then wife being laid off, loss of insurance and turnover in the VA system, I’m now on my 4th go-round of a different set of doctors trying to pin down just what went wrong.

I have not handled this well. I haven't adjusted to what I am now compared to what I was. The waiting list for counseling with the VA is years still, the money for private practice is nonexistent.

The result has been not only depression for me, but my family as well. To the point where I’m no longer married.

I'm now on my own. My wife couldn't deal with my disability and the uncertainty of diagnosis anymore than I have been able to.

I'm on Social Security and was qualified for disability first time around. But it isn't much and I'm very far from the rest of my family.

I just want a way to get the counseling that I know I need to cope with this, some doctors who can stay the course and tell me what's really wrong with me so that I know what it is that I'm fighting, some semblance of dignity and as much self-sufficiency as I am able.

I don't like asking for "assistance" like this. I would MUCH rather work and/or fight my way out of it. All I want is to know what I'm fighting and to have a place to live in where I feel safe and can see my children.

In other words, I’m asking for help.

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