Delta
Surviving the VA: A Veteran’s Story
My name is Delta. I began working with Mike Coonan LMSW, ACSW, BCD, because the VA turned me away. He brought my wife into the process. This is my story.
I was raised in Michigan, in a family that looked out for one another. I stayed busy growing up with sports, odd jobs, and the usual things. After high school, I enlisted. It felt like the next right step. The Army sent me to Fort Knox and Fort Sill. I served with artillery in Germany, then was sent to Vietnam in 1971. I ended up on Fire Base Pace close to the Cambodian border. Those months were a grind. Incoming rockets and mortars were part of the routine. My friends were hit and killed. I carried them to the Medivac.
When I left Vietnam, my body came home. My head didn’t. Civilian life never fit right after that. I stayed tense, drank too much, and slept too little. Sudden noises made my heart race. I pulled away from my family without meaning to. I didn’t know what PTSD was back then. I only knew something in me had shifted, and I couldn’t find my way back. Things spiraled. I reached a point where I didn’t want to keep going. I was hospitalized at the VA in Battle Creek after a suicide attempt. Those records are missing now. My DD214 was incomplete. I was in artillery, and the VA did not believe I was in Vietnam, let alone in combat, for months.
Over the years, I went to the VA off and on. What I received never added up to real help. Appointments were short. Medications changed. No one took the time to look at the whole picture: combat, work history, drinking, sleep, anger, and isolation. PTSD was never clearly laid out. I was expected to manage symptoms I didn’t understand. I worked when I could. Carpentry helped for a while because I could keep my head down and my hands busy. Then my body fell apart after multiple surgeries, and I need a walker to keep my balance.
Nightmares never let up. Panic came out of nowhere. Sleep stayed broken. My wife had to step in more than she should have to remind me, steady me, and keep things moving. I avoided people because being around them took too much out of me. It wasn’t until I went through a full Military History Psychosocial Assessment with Mike Coonan that someone finally slowed things down and listened from start to finish. He didn’t rush me. He didn’t look for shortcuts. He treated my life as one connected story, not a list of symptoms. That assessment explained who I was. With Mike’s support, I took his report to the VA then I tried to follow through with the VA referral to the VA psychiatrist. I ran into a gatekeeper who diverted me to an appointment that was described as psychiatric, but it wasn’t. With Mike’s help, I got past him. Mike also drove 200 miles round-trip to help me look for my records because my DD214 was wrong and incomplete. I could not prove I was in Vietnam. Together, we found bits of records that put me with my unit at Fire Base Pace, and I was awarded a 100% VA disability rating. That changed my life. For more than forty years, I lived without proper treatment or a name for my combat trauma. That time can’t be given back.
Mental Health/ Military History Psychosocial Assessment was written by Mike Coonan, LMSW, ACSW, BCD.
His treating VA psychiatrist provided the Expert Medical Opinion.
Both were prepared and completed at no cost to the veteran.
Both made a significant impact on his VA Disability Compensation Evaluation and Decision.