Falsely claiming PTSD for VA benefits?

Interesting claims you have. I have a friend who has been unknowingly dealing with PTSD since 91/92. Even when it was brought up to him several times, he denied it. Lately he has been having “bad days” where he weeps uncontrollably with no idea as to why. It embarrasses him. He don’t want no one to know he weeps. It’s not manly. He overeats, causing excessive weight gain and a host of other medical problems. He has been drinking more, at least every night. Whiskey is his preferred choice. He’s prone to anger issues. He’s like a light switch, never can tell when he’s going to cry, rage or be in a joyous mood. He can’t work with other people. Prefers to work alone.He says Stupid people piss him off. His longest employment was 4 years, most employment last for less than 2 years. Sometimes he feels like a failure. Isn’t where he wants to be in life. He claims that what he did and what he saw in combat wasn’t bad. Wasn’t what the other guys went thru so he shouldn’t complain. He can’t talk to others because they wouldn’t understand. He even had a job as a paramedic after coming out of a combat zone. He tells me of the suicides he experienced both prior to combat, where fellow service members committed suicide and he witnessed the aftermath. He tried suicide once. He called it a lark. He had the gun in his mouth, and was pulling the trigger and stopped. He has flashbacks of that as well as other flashbacks. People see those flashbacks and it embarrasses him. He finally reach out for help last week. Made an appointment with the Mental Health division off his VA hospital. That friend is me. I’m finally going to get help. It’s not for us to judge other people. You are not them. You didn’t walk in their boots. This person can still be acting out. Maybe it’s his way of dealing with what he saw. You don’t have to fire a weapon at someone to have PTSD. You don’t have to kill someone to have PTSD. Please don’t belittle or disbelieve people who claim they have it. It’s for the Mental Health workers who are trained to detect, treat and help people. My son has PTSD. Claimed he never fired a shot, never left the base. I found that out not to be true. He did engage. He was trying to hide also. My final words to this is get help, don’t wait. And don’t let others tell you that you are faking it. It’s not their place.

I worked for the VA for 16 years, but I were a disabled veteran first. Let me clear up the misconception that just because a veteran provides a stressor statement of what caused his/her PTSD that it is blindly accepted. With the exception of service members awarded combat medals, of which that medal verifies a stressor, we DO investigate the incident before we ever send a veteran for a compensation mental exam. The stressor must be corroborated first. So, it doesn't matter that the veteran misrepresented his/her military service to family or friends.

There's not enough information about what else may have happened while deployed in combat. Simply because he didn't fire his weapon doesn't preclude him from other potential combat circumstances. That said, the fact that he threatened to kill his fellow guard members needs to be addressed. Doesn't that call for a dishonorable discharge? This would disallow a pension, as well as preventing him from obtaining a firearm.

Wow. He does not sound ideal, but its only a matter of time before the VA changes rules, as they do. When that happens, his luck runs out.

I just read the beginning topic here and haven't really read all of the comments on here so please understand if I say something that has already been covered in the comments. I'm going to start with your saying that the member was in combat zone and didn't fire his weapon, I'm not a mental health professional but I do know that being directly engaged by enemy combatants is not the standard for making a decision on whether or not the member can have PTSD, there are a lot of things that can cause PTSD some environmental factors others could be something as simple as just being outside of one's own comfort zone for a year and constantly worrying about getting killed and even if the member didn't leave the FOB for his whole overseas tour there's still the possibility of being killed by rockets, mortars or even a third world national whom works on the post and one day decided to blow him/herself up to go to paradise.
Now for the thought that the member fraudulently enlisted in the national guard because of hiding his PTSD, it's possible but it's also possible that upon getting his orders to go overseas again he just broke and realized that he couldn't handle it again and decided to get treatment for PTSD to avoid having to go deal with it again.
Now as for his embellishing his military career he probably does that because he didn't have an exciting combat deployment and wants people to think he did because then it would make more sense to people that he has PTSD, people who haven't had to deal with combat deployments don't understand that not just combat can cause PTSD.
Now for him saying his PTSD is cured to his family that could be because of the other concern you mentioned, he could be telling people that because he's tired of people asking him what is he doing owning guns if he has PTSD.
I can tell you from my own experience that I didn't try to get treatment for traumatic brain injury or PTSD while I was in the Army because I didn't want to get kicked out, so the only reason I ended up getting treatment is because I had a seizure and was found by my chain of command, at which time I tried again to hide it but was unsuccessful. After leaving the Army and receiving treatment for TBI, I still was hesitant about getting treatment for PTSD because I was concerned that I'd lose my right to own firearms which really bothered me because I collect guns and love to shoot, but after a lot of research and talking to a lot of people I found out that a person can't lose they're right to own guns simply because they have PTSD and are in treatment for it. The are my opinions and not meant as advice, I'm just trying to answer some of your questions with my experiences of things dealt with myself and other soldiers I know or are friends with. I'm just giving you things to think about before you get someone investigated for fraudulently claiming benefits. I'm of the opinion that if this member didn't have anything wrong with him he probably wouldn't have been able to get the benefits in the first place but again I'm not a professional.

PTSD is a complex set of responses to traumatic circumstances. It is not just combat related, nor military related. As a result, let the professionals make the decisions. Personally, I would rather see people who do not deserve the rating be granted it than have one truly deserving veteran be denied the benefit. I have known Viet Nam vets who were ignored and denied for decades whose lives changed dramatically when they were finally approved. Lets not get so caught up on the few cheaters that we deny the overwhelming number of really deserving folks their benefits.

There will always be persons who will 'game' the system. This one sounds fishy but I am in no position, given the limited facts, to say definitively.

Those veterans also defraud the DMV for travel pay. So now it's more complicated to get travel pay because no longer use kiosk.

Some people defraud the VA. And the veterans that need it have to fight like hell to get benefits for physical trauma service related. But if you play the pstd card you're more likely to get 100%. That's not fair either.

Sound's a little strange to me !