Well, It Has Been A Year Since I Went Off The Deep End...and Things Truly Are Much Better.

[Sludge]

Just wanted to give a quick thanks to the gang here for helping me though this mess.

It was a year ago this week I geeked out so bad that my poor wife had to call in the local PD for help. I was obscenely drunk, well armored and prepared to load and lock. Miraculously, no one got shot (specially me!), the family didn't leave, and I still have my house.

I have come a long way since then- now a somewhat functional member of society, a full-time student, and proud owner of a well trained if not somewhat ridiculous little service dog. This is in no small part thanks to the gang here that this is true. When brown bags of pills, endless parades of brain-pickers, and my family couldn't help, the gang here saved my ass more times than I can count by simply listening and discussing how to deal with the beast.

This is bad-ass. Thank you!

 

[JarHed]

Hey Buddy

Glad to know you're doing better than a year ago. Here's a picture for ya', that I think you'll like.

 

[Sarg]

My dog eats those things for lunch. If you put it on loose enough to keep him from strangling, he slips it and attacks. Last time the Vet said to make sure he keeps it on or he'll pull out his staples. He slipped it, tore it to pieces and wore his staples like Lt. bars.

Dachunds can be mean little muthas. I took him in last week to have the Vet check the growth in his gums. I told her I'd hold his mouth open "cause I'd rather he bites me than you", he bit the shit out of me, then the Vet sees the blood, freaks and starts grabbing gause and alcohol and I'm saying, It's O.K., it's just a pin prick, christ, I thought she was gonna call the EMTs.

Now, back on thread track. Sludge, there's damn few "thank you's" in what we do. All of us volunteer our time to help our new Vets and most just kind of fade away after they're confortable in their own skin again. Then once in a great while someone says thanks. Thanks are always welcome, but I personally get so much reward from hopefully helping the new guys avoid the pitfalls we Nam Vets fell into, that's all the thanks I need.

I'm thrilled we helped. I'm thrilled you're in a better place all around. I'd like to see all of us in a better place but know full well some of us have fought with the beast for so long, we don't know any other way. Survival is the only norm we know.

All the best, Sludge. Thanks.

Sarg

 

[Ned]

OK. Sludge I am very glad to see what you wrote here. And I know that will encourage and give hope to a lot of other people. Well done for saying it, and well done.

 

[Sludge]

My dog eats those things for lunch. If you put it on loose enough to keep him from strangling, he slips it and attacks. Last time the Vet said to make sure he keeps it on or he'll pull out his staples. He slipped it, tore it to pieces and wore his staples like Lt. bars.

Dachunds can be mean little muthas. I took him in last week to have the Vet check the growth in his gums. I told her I'd hold his mouth open "cause I'd rather he bites me than you", he bit the shit out of me, then the Vet sees the blood, freaks and starts grabbing gause and alcohol and I'm saying, It's O.K., it's just a pin prick, christ, I thought she was gonna call the EMTs.

Now, back on thread track. Sludge, there's damn few "thank you's" in what we do. All of us volunteer our time to help our new Vets and most just kind of fade away after they're confortable in their own skin again. Then once in a great while someone says thanks. Thanks are always welcome, but I personally get so much reward from hopefully helping the new guys avoid the pitfalls we Nam Vets fell into, that's all the thanks I need.

I'm thrilled we helped. I'm thrilled you're in a better place all around. I'd like to see all of us in a better place but know full well some of us have fought with the beast for so long, we don't know any other way. Survival is the only norm we know.

All the best, Sludge. Thanks.

Sarg

As the man said: "No, thank YOU."

Sometimes when I look back on all the Nam vets I grew up with (family, hunting partners, teachers, Scout leaders) I think that one of the issues with the way they are/were treated is that there were no thank yous. Lots of f*ck yous, but no thank yous...

Personally, I didn't ever truly appreciate what ya'll went through let alone comprehend it until years later when my father (the lucky bastard whose number never got called) was called upon by friends and neighbors to get over to so-and-so's house and talk them down from a bad stint with the beast. Even then, little of that registered until on that night last year, who is on the horn talking down yet another broken down vet with a gut full of booze and a pocket full of shells? My dad, the civilian trying to talk his own son down before the worst happens.

We've discussed the whole situation a few times since then. Good thing too, as I honestly was so damned boozed up I barely remember any of it. Nothing like a serious ass-chewing from the old man. Mostly he was pissed off that his son the "genius" let himself slip so far off the deep end.

How he summed it up:

"Yu'ns know you smarter than that. Y'uns otta use that internets thingy to talk with thems that has the same troubles 'stead of looking at the porno all day. Can't helps much, me. Um jus' a old drunk lucky enough to not have to do that sorta shit...jus' half ta put up with all ya'll that did....an thats hard 'nuff."

Funny, he was right...just took me a while to find this crowd.


So, to use the vernacular, I say again, thank yu'ns.

 

[Sludge]

Hey Buddy

Glad to know you're doing better than a year ago. Here's a picture for ya', that I think you'll like.

View attachment 686

<laughing>


He thinks the cone is bad, wait till he notices his nuts are gone!