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If you don't do it with love it means nothing! Contact me if you bought the book or have a hard time finding it. You can also contact me if you just want to talk about what you are going through. Namguardianangel@aol.com
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For the Love of Jack by Kathie Costos
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On any given night, even this night, there are over 300,000 homeless veterans in this country. Men and women no different than those who serve this Nation today in war. Jack could have been one of them. He was one of the lucky ones. I was lucky too that I knew him, knew his character, before his life was taken over by PTSD. It was a choice for him to serve but others were forced into service. It was my choice to fight the battle he could not fight. I thank God that I was able to do one of the hardest things a person could be asked to do. I stayed.
Read our story and maybe you will look at the men and women who serve this country through our eyes. Jack saw the world through the eyes of a warrior and I saw the world when he was a warrior no more. Wars do not end when the guns are silent, they end when the ghosts are. The price of war is not paid in full by legal tender, it is paid with the lives of those who serve.
After you know what happens to some veterans and their families maybe your heart will be moved to help them. Donate to the shelters and adopt a veteran. Write to your elected officials and tell them to start supporting those they sent to serve. When no veteran is left without a place to rest is the day Americans can honestly say we honor our veterans.
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I did it all because I loved him. I remembered him. I knew him. PTSD tried to take away all that I loved about him. Vietnam wanted him back to finish killing him. I couldn't let him go. Through faith and love I stayed and fought my family who couldn't understand what mental illness was, fought the government who tried to deny him the help he needed and fought him to get the help he didn't think he deserved.
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For the Love of Jack by Kathie Costos was written to help other families like ours. The hardest part was feeling alone, without hope or understanding. We are not alone. Our loved ones do not suffer alone. Together we can change the way mental illness is looked at in this country and the way we look at each other.
Jack and I started out looking at each other with love. The same love that got us through more tragedy than any family should ever have to face got us through almost 22 years now. I watched him change over the years and came so close to giving up on him more times than I want to admit. Understanding PTSD helped me cope with his illness. It helped me to understand that the things he did, the way he acted had nothing to do with me or the world around us. It had to do with the world he left behind in Vietnam. The war was the reason for his suffering, and mine. Through the years I also understood that it doesn't matter if it was a war or another tragic event. The reasons may be different but living with and coping with mental illness are common ground. It does not have to be terrible although it is hard. It does not have to be the end of a relationship because it can be the beginning of a new kind of one. You just have to remember who the person is inside. They are still there under all the pain they carry. With help from good doctors and meds healing is possible. We are living proof that miracles happen. We are still together. We just found our own kind of normal.
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This statue is called MOTHER CRYING OVER THE WORLD By Albin Polasek 1942 and was used with permission of the Albin Polasek Museum, Winter Park, FL. 32789
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The book is no longer for sale, it is free. The people I wrote it to help have a hard enough time putting food on their table and have enough to deal with without shelling out $20 for a book. Email me for a free copy in Adobe. Namguardianangel@aol.com. The only thing I ask in return is that you take a look at my web page www.Namguardianangel.org and see the number of homeless veterans in your state. Make a donation to the shelter in your state in the name of my husband Jack, who could have been one of them. We came that close to him being among the homeless veterans in this country.
Read about what happened during the 18 years of our life together and if my book does not put a human face on the figures of the homeless, nothing will.
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When they are warriors no more, who will hear their cries? When they are warriors no more, who will help them find peace?Who will lift their voice to be heard above their whispers and suffering silence?
The men and women of our military should never have to go to war, but they do. They should never have to heal wounds, but they do. They should never have to watch a comrade die, but they do. They should never have to worry about a place to call home when they are warriors no more, but they do. On any given night in America, thousands of those who answered the call of this nation, walk the streets because they are homeless. Our nation has forgotten them when their duty is done and we as a people refuse to see them. The people who run the New England Shelter For Homeless Veterans in Boston, MA refuse to let them remain alone. They are there when the rest of us forget them. They are there to give them a bed to sleep in, a meal to feed them, comfort and support when we have all forgotten them. There are homeless veterans in this nation with half a million at one time or another become homeless during any given year and over a quarter of a million of them are homeless every night. Men who made a choice to protect and serve this nation, walk the streets while we still remain safe in our beds. As bad as that is that one veteran would be homeless, there are also women who served and are homeless. Even more, there are women veterans of this nation with children and no place to call home.
Check out your state and see how many there are in your state alone. Go to The National homeless veterans site. Check out the shelter's site in Boston MA. If you are not moved to help them, then may God have mercy on this nation that asked so much of them yet was willing to do so little for them in return.
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Member of
National Writers Union
Association Of Traumatic Stress Specialists
Disabled American Veterans Auxiliary
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PTSD can strike for many reasons.
War- seeing someone die
seeing a dead body
seeing suffering from a person who was close to where you were
being near an explosion
being near gunfire.
Any time that your life was being threatened can be a route cause.
Violence battery by domestic violence
assault and or battery by someone you know or stranger
rape
animal attack.
Abuse mental, physical, sexual and verbal
Catastrophe accidents with injury or fatality
natural disasters
terrorism
5.2 million people suffer from PTSD and other mental illness because of PTSD.
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http://www.usnewslink.
com/uscasualties.htm THIS IS A LIST OF THE FALLEN FROM IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN. IF YOUR LOVED ONE DIED AS A RESULT OF THEIR WOUNDS, YOU MAY NOT FIND THEIR NAME HERE. MAKE SURE THEY ARE COUNTED IF THEY WERE NOT KIA. THEIR DEATHS STILL SHOULD MATTER.
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It can happen in any family and to anyone. When you think of the word mental illness, you need to face that it is an illness in the brain. Like any organ of the body, it is an illness. In the case of PTSD it is an emotional illness which changes the chemical balance of the brain. Why is it so hard to finally place this illness within the ranks of any other illness? There is help and there is healing. It is waiting for you but you have to seek it to get it.
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Places to go on the web
National Coalition for Homeless Veterans
http://www.nchv.org
Disabled American Veterans
http://www.dav.org
Association of Traumatic Stress Specialists
http://www.atss-hq.com
Vietnam War Center
http://www.namcenter.com
New England Shelter for Homeless Veterans
http://www.nesch.org
Please support the Homeless Veterans shelter in your state. They need you to support them with more than words.
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EMAIL ME FOR A FREE COPY OF THIS BOOK
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