1 in 10 prisoners are veterans.

The Guardian is not a paper of choice for me, however I have seen a well written article. It talks about how ex-service personnel that have serious physiological problems have been left without help and as a result ended up in prison.

>>LINKY<<

As we all know, the MOD treat service personnel with contempt let alone ex service when it comes to health care and welfare. It f**ks me off because the people who have the power to do anything about this have no idea what the service personnel go through on the battlefield and the transition into civvy Straße, and don't seem to care.

 

[Parky]

I saw a piece about this on the breakfast news. It is absolutely shocking that there is a distinct lack of care provided by the Government, but is there a case to say that mabye the families and friends of these unfortunate veterans should be doing more to help them? Mabye by getting them to see a G.P. for referal to appropriate help?

I have yet to read the full thread but this post is one that I have some personal experience with.

Upon being medically discharged following a nervous breakdown (A whole other story), I had the full support of my family dispite my sometimes foul mood swings.

The day I was discharged from the forces was the day I lost my Psychologist at Catterick who I was making good progress with. I was then put into the NHS system and told that they would see me once every six weeks, this was of course only if the consultant was not on leave or sick. So this six weeks turned into twelve weeks. As a result of that I was then told after my second appointment that I had not been Referred to a Psychologist yet and that I was now on an 8 month waiting list.

That 8 months extended to 3 years by the end of which time I had managed to regain enough health to start back to work and eventually for want of a better phrase "Get my act together" and no longer required the assistance of drugs or Therapy.

Long and the short of it is Ex forces means **** out here in Civvy street, there may be a few jobs where they prefer us but that is mainly because we have proved ourselves to be reliable and also that generally we work harder than the skiving malingerers I have had the mis fortune of working with.