Should Veterans feel bad about being awarded and receiving VA disability compensation for non-combat related injuries?

This may be a little off topic. I'm service connected for PTSD due to combat and a leg injury. Bc of my leg injury I do have a handicap plaqucard I don't always use it bc sometimes I feel like people stare at me when I get out of my vehicle bc I look normal like nothing's wrong with me. I had a police officer one time ask me if he could see my paperwork for it to make sure it was mine and I laughed a bit. I showed it to him and he's like okay you just don't look like anything a wrong with you, as I rolled my eyes. Not all disability is visible. We deserve what we get for disability not one should ever feel bad. We served our country with honor, courage and commitment!

No! It doesn’t matter if your service broke you during war or training for war. Combat Related Special Compensation is the way to go if you want only combat related compensation for injuries. Do not take anything away from veterans.

I don’t know anyone who is disabled who doesn’t feel bad. I think that is the point of going through the disability rating assessment...

I think the people who should feel bad are the egomaniacs and shitbags who injury shame their battle buddies and brothers and sisters who need some empathy and support for recovery and a realistic plan to return to fully mission capable status.

Seriously I hope every shitbag “leader” and service member who ego trips when someone gets hurt ends up as a paraplegic who has to beg to have their asses wiped. I also hope malingerers and cowards who fake injuries to get out of training and operations stub their toe and break their necks when they trip and fall and both of those types of shitbags end up in the same hospital for recovery together.

I also hope for a reasonable recovery for both of those types. Unless they choose to keep being shitbags. Then I don’t care anymore.

I think I’m losing compassion for people who just choose to be shitbags and refuse to help others and help themselves. Does that make me a hardass? Or too hardcore?

Well, I VOLUNTEERED for combat, but wasn't selected! I WAS sent to places where the dangers were real, none-the-less! However, I did NOT volunteer to go to Clark AB, RP, in the early '90s, when we were literally locked up on base, and Americans were targeted regularly, by the Communist militant group NPA. Being too smart, or maybe just very lucky, I was never shot by these commie bastards, but, I WAS part of rescue and recovery operations from the Mt Pinatubo eruptions, that ultimately ended American military operations at Clark and Subic. In addition to an MSM, and an AFCOM, I left Clark with a bad case (50% VA Disability) of PTSD, and an abhorrence to bad weather, especially storms, earthquakes, and yes, volcanic activity, no matter where it occurs! In addition, during my other 18+ years of active duty, I have been run over by a bomb lift truck, blown my knees out crawling under F-4s, and picked up bombs dropped on the ramp during an ORI! All in all, with all my Service Connected ailments, my VA Disability Rating is up around 250%! Also, some of the chemicals I was routinely exposed to, BEFORE we had MSDS paperwork and any consideration for the environment, wreaks havoc with my lungs and sinuses! Now, I could have waited to be drafted (my notice came when I was in my 3rd week of Basic Training), and just went to Vietnam, and maybe killed. But, I guess I would have been in Combat, and, therefore worthy of the 100% rating I have, but, Agent Orange is not the ONLY chemical the military has used that's deadly...

The way I see it, as long as you are serving you are standing by to go into combat at a moments notice whether you ever do or not and therefore you deserve just as many/all benefits as anyone who does go into combat. The fact is you are ready at a moments notice to make the ultimate sacrifice for the country and therefore the country should be ready to make the ultimate sacrifice to you.

No veteran should feel bad. From personal experience running 6-10 miles every other day and hard combat training in between over almost a decade can destroy a body. 2 years after I was in the injuries starting coming. Now at 46 I’m falling apart and my dad is 71 with 21 years in the navy and no medical issues at all. Don’t ever feel bad about getting what is owed to you! You already feel bad enough being hurt.

Simply put, no. I am a veteran of 20 years of active duty as a military policeman. All of my accumulated injuries which resulted in my V.A. rating came from the time I was on active duty. When I entered the Army in 1973 I did not have these as pre-existing injuries. They are directly attiributable to time in the Army. I have heard some say that statement about no-combat far too often as an excuse to exclude people such as myself. I will not allow anyone in or out of uniform to diminish my time in the Army. In reality I was on-duty during the Viet Nam era and as well during the first foray into Kuwait and the Middle East. I volunteered to go to both locations in 1973 and as well in 1991. I was not given the opportunity to go to either. You cannot seek to say that my 20 years of service count less because I happened to not serve in combat. My service injuries are directly connected to both my active service and any and all training, assignments, and preparations done in accord with being ready to serve or deploy. That is no different than what is expected of those who actually deployed. I did not control the time frames I served and I salute my brothers and sisters whom served in a given theater of conflict. I do believe that those who attempt to cast aspersions upon vets like myself are either envious or solicitous of acknowledgement they are not deserving of in either case. Recognition for the sacrifices of all military members have given is the metric, not the complaining of some limited groups.

Veterans, listen up, you volunteered to serve this country. You trained hard, and played hard, we should expect this nation to work hard to take care of us.
As a retiree, we are subject to recall if our nation needs us! Any compensation you receive is an earned benefit, be sure to spend some of it on wellness, physical fitness and eating healthy; you owe yourselves a good life, so the sacrifice you made isn’t wasted. So Live Well and Enjoy! Some of our brothers and sisters didn’t make it back!

You deserve it. The federal government wastes so much of our, the tax payers, money. I'd rather see my taxes go to someone who deserves it for protecting our great nation!

I didn't have to go to combat to have a shipmate brutally rape me. 15 years of PTSD, anxiety, and other mental health issues to the point it affects my current life and relationships....

Damn straight I deserve my disability.