In 1968 I was drafted into the U.S. Army. My whole service tour consisted of basic training, advanced infantry training and 13 months in a godforsaken country called Vietnam. For 25 years I have been haunted by that 13-month experience. I’ve had terrible nightmares, countless nights where I was afraid to even go to sleep because of them, a very serious alcohol problem, periods where I was unable to retain gainful employment, the break-up of three marriages and now problems in a fourth.

Through all of this I was determined never to ask good ole Uncle Sam for any help; I was determined I could make it on my own. Then last summer my physical health started to deteriorate to the point where in January of this year, I could no longer do any physical work. I applied for SSI and SSD along with both service and non-service disability. Within 60 days, I was approved for both SSI and SSD, but the very same country that I was willing to lay down my life for turned me down for both service and non-service disability.

What is wrong with this picture? SSI and SSD had to use my medical records at Togus to come to their conclusions, yet the same records were used to turn me down by the country I was willing to die for. They say the best way to judge a country is by the way they treat their veterans; well, this is one veteran who is not quite as proud as he once was. I never enlisted in the Army, I was drafted, but I did everything asked of me and more. Ray Perkins Bangor