Fellowship, Support and Services Help Survivors Navigate the Journey Ahead

2021-05-27T15:05:27-04:00

The pain of losing a loved one to a service-related injury or disability can be unbearable. Yet grieving survivors are expected to plan memorial services, care for dependents, fill out benefit paperwork and undertake myriad other responsibilities. They must do this while trying to stay healthy and well themselves and not succumbing to despair.

Survivors need not absorb these duties on their own. On Memorial Day, we call your attention to the recent Veterans Experience Live Survivors Together online event, where representatives of organizations convened to help survivors navigate journeys of loss — from the mournful early days to the years ahead. And we thank the 422,000 members of our network for tuning in to ask questions, offer resources and share advice based on their experiences as caregivers and survivors.

Here’s a summary of the online conversation, with links to resources offered by public and private partners during the live event:

Memorial services. Service members, Veterans and their family members can apply for U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) benefits to pay for a burial or memorial service in a VA national cemetery. They can also access important information and resources to prepare for the passing of a loved one, including topics such as discussing final wishes, planning a burial and accessing a VA Survivors Pension.

Navigating the details that accompany a loved one’s death can often feel overwhelming. The VA Caregiver Support Program (CSP) can assist families in connecting to services and support they are eligible for at VA and in the community.

According to Leah Christensen, clinical program coordinator for VA CSP, a CSP team available at every VA “can assist a family in system navigation.” In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, CSP teams also provide virtual support using VA Video Connect, online modalities and individual/group support.

Another virtual option for survivors is the Veterans Legacy Memorial, an online memorial space managed by the National Cemetery Administration (NCA). The NCA, which manages more than 150 national cemeteries, extends memorialization of the 3.7 million Veterans interred in those cemeteries to this digital page, providing a virtual memorial space for each service member. Visitors can submit a tribute, memento, biography, milestone and a historical document to a Veteran’s page.

Details: Find resources at these links:
 Review the “Planning Your Legacy VA Survivors and Burial Benefits Kit”: https://rly.pt/3oZMM7A.

 Find your local CSP team: https://rly.pt/2QZyLdp.

 Explore the Veterans Legacy Memorial: https://rly.pt/3hYq4LF.

Peer support and counseling. Caregivers and survivors can experience isolation and disconnection, but it’s important to remember that there is a robust support system in place to provide comfort, care and resources during challenging times. Maj. Bonnie Carroll, president and founder of the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors (TAPS), noted that TAPS offers a 24/7 national peer support network and grief and trauma resources at no cost to surviving families and loved ones.

“TAPS also conducts regional survivor seminars for adults and youth programs at locations across the country,” she added.

Nancy Menagh, president of Gold Star Wives of America, recommended reaching out to other survivors, particularly for assistance with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) diagnoses.

“Sometimes just being with others that ‘get’ what you have gone through will help — finding your community,” she said. “We look outward and try to channel our grief through service to others. If you think you need professional help, please seek it — many VA centers provide PTSD help for surviving spouses.”

Expeditions with the Travis Manion Foundation are another way to top into a support network. According to Lt. Cmdr. Hugo Lentze, the foundation’s chief strategic partnerships officer, these trips are a “a great opportunity for survivors to connect with other survivors and honor their fallen hero through a service project in the local community that we travel to.”

Additional VA programs are available to support survivors and caregivers.

Vet Centers, located at 300 community-based locations or virtually, provide a wide range of counseling and psychological services to family members of service members who died on duty.

Another service, available at every VA facility, is the Program of General Caregiver Support Services (PGCSS), which offers coaching, skills training, individual one-on-one support, education and support groups, and peer support mentoring. No application is required for PGCSS.

“We encourage caregivers providing care to Veterans across the care continuum to reach out to their CSP team for more information and to enroll,” said Christensen.

Details: Find resources at these links:
 Connect to counseling in your community and help navigate benefits and resources with TAPS: https://rly.pt/3c0ijB6.

 Find assistance and support from fellow military spouses who’ve experienced loss: https://rly.pt/3wGCzQc.

 Explore upcoming expeditions with the Travis Manion Foundation: https://rly.pt/3uvUnM4.

 Locate a Vet Center or VA facility near you: https://rly.pt/3fsp3tC and https://rly.pt/2OZCary.

 See how the CSP was expanded as part of the Mission Act: https://rly.pt/3yHGsWO.

Health care. Managing end-of-life care, planning burial services and supporting grieving family and friends can be all-consuming — sometimes to the detriment of a survivor’s own health. The Civilian Health and Medical Program at VA (CHAMPVA) is a health care program offered to the spouse and children of 100% service-connected Veterans. It is also available to surviving family members when a Veteran’s death is attributed to their military service.

According to Rear Adm. Ann Duff, director of the Office of Survivors Assistance, CHAMPVA covers community health care and medication, and may cover outpatient mental health services for eligible individuals.

Details: Find resources at these links:
 Learn about CHAMPVA caregiver benefits: https://rly.pt/3c1nHUy.

 Assess your eligibility for CHAMPVA outpatient mental health coverage: https://rly.pt/3bYAxCQ.

Education for children. Survivors may find it daunting to figure out how to pay for a child’s higher education. Help is available through the Children of Fallen Patriots Foundation, which provides college scholarships and education counseling to children who have lost a parent in the line of duty.

Kylie Willis, enrollment coordinator for the foundation, said the organization encourages caregivers to enroll all students in the family regardless of age or college status. Once enrolled, the family is assigned a scholarship administrator who walks them through the enrollment process step by step.

“Now more than ever, it is important to ensure that our students leave college with a meaningful experience and free of debt,” said Willis.

Details: Enroll your student in the Children of Fallen Patriots Foundation at https://rly.pt/3i0FhvK.

Spouse employment. The loss of a spouse can potentially lead to reduced household income, placing the survivor in the position of navigating a new career search. AARP brings together free resources, timely programs and important information so that military family members have employment options after a loved one has died. Members can find potential employers on the AARP job board, submit their resume for review by an AARP resume adviser and participate in online career expos. And active-duty service members, retired military and Veterans receive up to 30% off an annual AARP membership.

Details: Review AARP services for survivors: https://rly.pt/3bWps5a.

Access other resources. Don’t miss these other resources for survivors covered at VetXL:
 How to navigate the journey from caregiver to survivor: https://rly.pt/2RS0WeS.

 How to be a caregiver during the COVID-19 pandemic: https://rly.pt/3vBOD5a.

 How to obtain additional education resources for children of survivors: https://rly.pt/3vxpHeP.

 How to get hired as a recent graduate: https://rly.pt/3oZJ7qu.

Learn more

More links to services are available at the event page: https://rly.pt/33Rm3As.

3oZMM7A.

Response by PFC Donald Faulkner made Jun 18 at 2021 12:27 AM

2021-06-18T00:27:02-04:00

The hud-vash nightmare

In September of 2019, I was living in a house in Greene Ohio and the landlord didn't tell me that the toilet was leaking in the crawl space for some time with the Last Tenant and code enforcement got tired of messing with the guy and they condemned the house giving me 7 days to move. I went to the HUD office in Xenia and I saw a poster on the wall that said hud-vash homelessness prevention and homeless assistance. I went home and got online filling out the application and got an interview pretty quick. The guy that was handling the hud-vash at the Dayton VA hospital is Barry Wideman and when I did the interview they told me that I qualify for the voucher but in order to get it I need to be homeless. I said no that's not correct and they wanted to argue about it but I only had seven days to find a place to live, which turned out to be 12dsays because code enforcement in Xenia gave me 12 days so they understood it wasn't my fault. So I had to go with the SSVF, St. Vincent de Paul veterans and family first program and they introduced me to a landlord that they had been dealing with for a while and I looked at a place and it was dirty and need a lot of repairs but the guy showing us the apartment said that by the time I moved in in 2 weeks it would all be repaired and cleaned up. So I signed the lease that day not knowing that there were 16 code enforcement violations already on that house. Two weeks later when I moved in I had to clean the whole place because none of the repairs or cleaning had been done so I went on the maintenance portal and reported all the issues that I saw. Within a week and a half, one of the code enforcement violations was loose basement stairs and no handrail. I was going down to get clothes out of the dryer so I could go to Xenia municipal court for the last slumlord landlord episode when the stairs came off the wall and I fell breaking my arm. When I got back from the hospital I called Midwest Acquisition and property management and I told the guy that answers the phone that one of the maintenance issues that I reported on the portal had caused me to break my arm and immediately and that's when the nonstop retaliation campaign started. Bradley Milward was the guy that answered the phone and he's the CEO of the company. He showed up two days later with a notice to terminate my lease and a three-day notice. A week later 6 guys, one of them armed, tried to force their way into my apartment. They didn't get in so they left another 3-day notice. December of 2019 they held onto my rent check for the whole month and then returned it in January along with the notice to go to court for a non-payment of rent eviction. I notified my caseworker at the VA hud-vash section and the SSVF supervisor just like I had told them every little thing whenever some kind of retaliation happened and nobody ever did anything and then when the eviction notice came nobody did a single thing about it. They didn't try to find me another place, they didn't get me any kind of legal help for a situation that they had caused. and I'd also called the attorney general for Ohio and was contacted by the Ohio Division of real estate licensing investigator letting me know that they're an unlicensed real estate company. I went to court eventually because of the covid-19 it was postponed but I was evicted in the middle of a worldwide Pandemic. So, and I was finally homeless living in a motel for 150 days waiting for the hud-vash voucher. I had made multiple complaints on the Washington DC veterans hotline several online complaints Veterans Affairs never heard anything back from Veterans Affairs and the people on the Washington DC hotline turn it back to the people I'm having the problems with and all they have to do is tell Veterans Affairs it has been resolved and the complaint is closed. Veterans Affairs does nothing close to being in compliance with President Trumps' VA accountability Act. Instead of handling the complaint they send it back to the very person causing the problem and caught one of them, Edith Thompson, HUD-VASH supervisor at the Dayton VA Medical Center adding False stuff into my medical progress notes, saying that I was getting aggressive and stuff like making unreasonable demands. It's a damn good thing that I went in there and pulled my file and looked at it because they were trying to make it look like there's a reason to throw me out of the hud-vash program. I was evicted last June and this June had to go to court for the second part but I'd already blasted everybody on Earth who could or should help with the fact Midwest acquisition and property management was under investigation by multiple agencies on how the eviction is real estate transaction fraud, and about the email hijacker used by a collection agency hired even before the case was over, and this is still going on 1 year. But I had spent every spare moment wallpapering the internet that this was fraud upon the court and when I got into court on June 10, 2021, their attorney couldn't wait to offer to throw it out. W
What started as a helping hand ended up being a total disaster piece. It has ruined my health, ruined my finances, and now I have an eviction on my record. Just a whole bunch of ridiculousness because of the unlawful way that the Dayton VA was administering the HUD-VASH program. And you can't find any law enforcement or legal help, The VA knows this is a problem and there's a lot of fraud going on. So my advice is when you join any of these programs make sure you desperately need it because they are going to drive you into the ground financially. Living in a motel for a hundred fifty days is very expensive even though they were paying for the room, everything is more expensive for you living there because you can't cook your meals, doing your laundry all that stuff it all adds up. It devoured any money for vehicle maintenance and my pickup truck is sitting outside on jacks because it doesn't run because it didn't get maintenance at all. I lost a bunch of stuff and a bunch of stuff got ruined in storage and the entire financial disaster and I didn't cause any of it and the people who did cause it couldn't care less about it. WHERE ARE THE VETERANS RESOURCE THAT CAN MAKE ME WHOLE AGAIN? How do I get back to where I was before the DEPARTMENT of VETERANS AFFAIRS started trying to make money off my situation?