I wasn't taken serious.

Well, the thing about dealing with

the clinicians at the VA in Rochester,

there weren't too many Iraq era veterans

who came to the VA.

There were more Vietnam era veterans.

So when I came there, they thought,

okay well, this, your
father must be a veteran,

or your mother must be a veteran,

or you just may have this benefit.

And I would have to tell them,

"No," you know, "I'm 20,

"even though I'm 23-years-old,

"I went to Iraq when I was 19,

"and I was shot when I was 20-years-old."

And the fact that I
come from the inner city

and I have this, I have these
gunshot wounds in my leg,

and at the time, I didn't know
how to speak professionally,

I didn't know how to tell my story

in a way that everyone could understand.

I wasn't taken serious.