Ilona Meager met many of us, especially us veterans, through using this technology, especially in research and posting on interactive community boards, and her awaking interest in a subject she had never thought much about until reading reports about suicides by returned veterans of the Afghan and Iraq occupations well into the start of both conflicts. Her interest caused her to start researching the why these were happening, joining her were other online researchers, many like her who might have heard about but never really thought about an extremely important issue, we veteran advocates have been fighting to get much more recognition for from the masses since especially our occupation Vietnam. That issue is Combat PTSD.
Using the communities found online, like Daily KOS and others, she and her online friends, started posting up what they were finding, then started their own site ePluribus Media as well, and she moved to starting her own site PTSD Combat: Winning the War Within
Taking the research they were finding Ilona moved on further to write a book on the subject, “Moving a Nation to Care: Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and America’s Returning Troops”, more like a great little reference guide on the issue of Combat PTSD for those seeking information and understanding, just as she has posted with her online site.
From not thinking much about she has become one of the many dedicated advocates on the subject with a wealth of understanding and caring, along with her work, those of her online friends, as well as those civilians over these years who joined us veterans, it has helped do what many of us ‘Nam Veterans have been trying to do for close to four decades, joined by Veterans of WWII and forward. Bringing the subject of our occupations of others and war as to what that causes to many in the form of Post Traumatic Stress from the trauma’s of War into the minds of the country and beyond as well as into the main stream media, investigative journalism, and touching subject lines of the drama’s and movies made. And not only as to Combat PTSD but also the understanding that many who never face combat but do live through extreme traumatic events in their lives can and do suffer from same, Silently, up until now.
A book review any author would be bowled over by {this one being no exception} appears in the premiere issue of the VA’s Veterans Law Review journal.
It’s much more than a mere review, however.
Written by Holly Seesel, Mary Sorisio, and Paul Sorisio — Associate Counsel with the Board of Veterans’ Appeals at the Department of Veterans Affairs — the 24-page (!) ‘book review essay’ provides an in-depth look at my book (Moving a Nation to Care) and another by Stanley Krippner, Ph.D., and Daryl S. Paulson (Haunted by Combat).”Consequences of Combat” {pdf} begins:…>>>Rest Found Here
Visit Ilona’s post, at her site, on this well deserved recognition, at the links above, and visit the premier issue of the
Veterans Law Review Vol. 1 – 2009
I am pleased to introduce the seminal issue of THE
VETERANS LAW REVIEW. As part of the Department’s (VA)
outreach to all veterans and their families, this volume highlights
legal issues and legal-policy concerns that are currently faced by the
Office of General Counsel, the Veterans Benefits Administration,
the Board of Veterans’ Appeals and the Court of Appeals for
Veterans Claims (Court) in their service to our men and women
who have served this nation in uniform. Topics addressed in this
issue include VA’s duty to provide medical examinations, our duty to
assist under the Veterans Claims Assistance Act of 2000, the effects
of representation by attorneys in cases before VA, and the causes
and effects of remands emanating from the Court. As additional
foci, the REVIEW examines both the role of the new media in the
delivery of veterans’ benefits and how the Department is addressing
undiagnosed illnesses from the first Gulf War with Iraq…>>>Rest Found Here {pdf} also top link at site.
Once again the two books, and authors, recognized and referenced:
“Moving a Nation to Care: Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and America’s Returning Troops”