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I always knew I had a problem, but I didn't know the VA was there.

Louis Bickford, US Navy 1967 - 1978, talks about why he didn't ask for help with his PTSD right away.

Transcript

I never knew what VA had available.

And the real truth of it is, coming back from Vietnam,

there was nothing much available.

They didn't know we had PTSD.

They didn't know what it was.

And unfortunately, and this is the hard thing I have

to tell you is that probably when you came back from Vietnam,

you found out the same thing I did.

VA didn't even want to talk to you.

You were unwelcome.

Not only were we unwelcome at home,

when we came home nobody wanted to talk to us.

You certainly didn't tell anybody you were a Veteran

from Vietnam if you went

for a job interview cause they wouldn't hire you.

So I guess I always knew I had a problem,

but I didn't know the VA was there

or that there was an answer.

And probably there wasn't an answer

at that time, but there is now.

The VA changed completely.

It's a whole new world.

There is help.

They do care.

They are Vet-friendly.

The fact is most of those guys in VA are us.

[laughs] You know the ones working there are us,

they're our age, they went through it with us.

So it's changed completely from back in the '60s and '70s.

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