PTSD and Vets: advice for resources

February 25, 2007 · Filed Under Politics, Psychology, Social Work · Comment 

Apropos to some posts and comments on how returning vets can get resources they need to cope with PTSD, Bobby Muller, head of Veterans for America, provided this excellent advice for those seeking information about how to handle PTSD:

“We have a good resource guide up on our web site veteransforamerica.org. When you go to the site go to the community tag; under it you will find resource guide which lists all sorts of areas veterans can get info and referal stuff.

The one on PTSD is here.

I found that the best general referral is to Vet Centers. These are the more storefront type places that are not hospital based and understand the PTSD issue the best.”

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Why don’t women get the soundbite?

February 23, 2007 · Filed Under Feminism · Comment 

or, why does Eleanor Clift often look so pained on the McLaughlin Group?

Because…

“On the influential Sunday morning political talk shows, women represent only 14% of guest appearances

(”Who’s Talking?” The White House Project, 2005)

From shesource.org, a very cool site. Also:

“On the three main U.S. broadcast networks, 87 percent of expert sound bytes are provided by men.

(Women, Men and Media and The Freedom Forum Media Studies Center, 1998)

Despite their growing ranks as experts in fields ranging from national security and military spending to technology and health care, women continue to be drastically underrepresented in the news media as policy shapers and leading voices of authority on critical issues. We’ve heard from journalists that say the main reason they do not quote women as experts on a range of topics is simply because they do not know how to find them.”

It always bothered me that Dr. Phil, the person who made psychotherapy part of our vernacular, is a man.

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PTSD, Iraq veterans, and the VA: Want to take action?

February 14, 2007 · Filed Under Politics, Psychology, Social Work · Comment 

A few weeks ago I wrote about Jonathan Schulze, a Marine who killed himself upon return from Iraq.

“On January 11, 2007, accompanied by his parents, he went to the VA hospital in St. Cloud, Minnesota and told people at that VA facility that he was thinking of killing himself. They told Schulze that they could not admit him as a patient and sent him on his way.
The next day, January 12, Schulze called the VA, reiterating that he was feeling suicidal. He was told that he was number 26 on the waiting list. A man who had risked his life in Iraq and done everything that was asked of him by the United States government, was told by that same government that his sacrifice would be repaid by being 26th on a list of Veterans similarly crying out for help.”

Schulze’s brother commented on my post on BlogHer. He wrote:

“Hi all. I am Jonathan’s
Comment by 19D_Scout posted Sat, 2007/02/03 - 5:37pm

Hi all. I am Jonathan’s oldest Brother, the Marine we are talking about.

Our family has 10 veterans (1 Navy, 5 Army, 3 Marines, 1 Air Force). So believe me….we have experience with the VA and Jon had strong family support.

I’ve seen posts from people asking why Jon did not go right to a civilian hospital. Well, Jon did not have private insurance and the cost to do so would have been even more of a burden to Jon whom did not need anymore issues to worry about, especially with one 6 month daughter and one on the way!

Jon has a long history with the VA. He regulary went to the VA for help, so it’s not like he just showed up and asked to be admitted. Every time he went for evaluations he usually had to wait hours just to even get the chance to see a doctor.

People ask why the family did not do more….we tried hard. At this point the only thing we could have done was lock him up in a room…he was his own man and made his own decisions…this was impossible. Although, Jon came from a strong line of military heritage it was the “So Called” professionals at the VA that should have caught/red flagged the severity of his PTSD! They had several years on record.

Jon was your poster child for PTSD and the Gov. failed him badly. He saw and was involved in some of the worst combat since Vietnam.

From a military family history and die hard patriotic family……we have lost faith for the first time in 70 years.

I’m telling you the VA will cover their backs. I would not believe a word they say. I know first hand WHAT HAPPENED. Shame on them!

How can our government spend 600 BILLION on the war and fund so little on our military heros? I’m almost ashamed to be an American these days.

If your curious ask and I will reply where I can.”

So, if you want to pursue this story, post a comment at http://blogher.org/node/15047#comment-15352 

 

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Hillary Clinton and women’s language

February 13, 2007 · Filed Under Feminism, Politics, Psychology, Social Work · Comment 

Right now, I’m kind of the like the breathy young undergrad I never got to be (mostly because I was too busy being distracted), because, in grad school, I’m reading Carol Gilligan. I feel like I’ve discovered a new world, even when I’m reading a classic! Apologies to Carol Gilligan because this isn’t the heart of her work, but one point seems to fit.
So I wrote this post on Hillary Clinton and women’s language.

You Go Girl: talking Hillary Clinton

Women relate differently to Hillary. If you’re a blogger and you think you actually blog differently about Hillary than other politicans or candidates, let me know, will you?

When Hillary Clinton was campaigning in New Hampshire this past weekend, several women stopped her with a hearty “You go girl!” To wit,

Mothers brought daughters. Fathers towed along sons, who were urged to absorb the moment. Adult women tucked copies of Clinton’s memoir under their arm, and yelled “You go, girl” from their seats.
“Come on, I’m a ’60s girl,” said Joan Chamberlain, the director of a local Berlin arts group. “She inspires me to hope again.”

In Iowa a few months ago:

“And Hillary herself says, “The fact that I’m a woman the fact that I ‘m a mom that’s part of who I am,” she said at the Des Moines town hall meeting. “But I’m going to ask people to vote for the person they believe will be the best president.”At one point during the Des Moines event, a woman yelled out, “You go girl!,” to which Clinton replied, “You go with me!”

But then I came across this interesting piece in Mother Jones,

Hillary’s “womanhood” is in need of public revelation? What does that say about her? But, more curiously, what does it say about us that Hillary inspires this casual intimacy? Her life, her looks, her politics, her marriage…are all daily grist at the nation’s coffee shops, still, 15 years after she was introduced to America.

I don’t think the intimacy is casual. I think the “You Go Girl!” phenomenon part of the Oprah-fication of the Hillary personality. The overfamiliarity and cult of hyper sisterhood is a powerful way of gaining female voters. But I also think it’s genuine, and it’s really a true exposition of women supporting women. It’s one of the nice ways women talk to each other (and anyone who has been to middle school knows there are plenty of not nice ways women talk to each other too).

Surely, no one owns her womanhood more than Hillary Rodham Clinton. Carol Gilligan, the noted author, scholar, and psychologist, is someone I’m currently studying. She writes about women’s relational tactics and women’s psychological development in many powerful ways, but here she writes something which, I don’t know, doesn’t seem such a stretch when thinking about Hillary Clinton, how Hillary relates to American women, and how American women hear Hillary. I hear Hillary talk casually, as if she knows me, as if she is my friend but also an idol and a mentor, and that is powerful to me precisely because she is a woman. It seems that with Hillary and her female consituents, we’re learning from each other, as Gilligan wrote in “In a Different Voice”:

The differences between women and men which I describe center on a tendency for women and men to make different relational errors — for men to think that if they know themselves, following Socrates’ dictum, they will also know women, and for women to think that if only they know others, they will come to know themselves.

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With all due respect Cindy

February 7, 2007 · Filed Under Internet Media · Comment 

First off, I don’t have a Typekey account, so I am going to do a trackback instead.

Cindy Samuels, who is brilliant, is wrong on this post:

“One of my favorite bloggers sent me a note asking my opinion about a service that pays bloggers to  write about client products.  It’s not secret, the writers disclose their contracts.  Even so, I told her that as an old newsie, I thought that, unless she was desperate for money, she shouldn’t go near the idea.  WHY?”

Journalists do endorsements, why can’t I? Not that anyone’s asking, of course.

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