April 2024 Newsletter

Monday, April 15, 2024

7 JOURNAL PROMPTS YOU CAN USE TO MANAGE STRESS OR HEAL FROM MST

Writing can be a healing exercise. Try these journal prompts to help you manage your stress or begin/continue the healing journey from MST.

1. Reflect on Resilience: Think about a moment during your service when you felt particularly resilient. How did you navigate that situation, and what strengths did you discover about yourself? Reflect on how these strengths can help you in your current journey of healing and stress management.

2. Visualizing a Safe Space: Envision a place where you feel completely safe and at peace. Describe this place in detail in your journal. How can creating or visiting a similar space in your everyday life support your healing process?

3. Letter to Your Past Self: Write a letter to yourself at the time you were experiencing the most stress or when you encountered trauma. Offer compassion, understanding, and the insights you’ve gained since then. How does it feel to extend such kindness to yourself?

4. Identifying Stress Triggers: Reflect on the past week and identify moments when you felt stressed or triggered. What were the situations, and how did you respond? Consider strategies you could use to ease or manage these stressors in the future.

5. Gratitude for Your Service: Sometimes, when you're in the middle of a challenge, the positive aspects of our service can become overshadowed. Write about three aspects of your military service that you are grateful for and how they have contributed to the person you are today.

6. Setting Boundaries for Healing: Reflect on your current healing journey and consider if there are boundaries you need to set with others to support your healing. These could be emotional, physical, or time boundaries. How can establishing these boundaries improve your stress management and healing process?

7. Envisioning the Future: Imagine yourself a year from now, having developed strategies that effectively manage your stress and support your healing from MST. What does your life look like, and what steps did you take to get there? Use this prompt to set goals for your healing journey.

Funniest Quotes of All Time

“Before you marry a person, you should first make them use a computer with slow Internet service to see who they really are.” —Will Ferrell

“Behind every great man is a woman rolling her eyes.” —Jim Carrey

“Friends are God’s way of apologizing to us for our families.” —Anonymous

“You are only young once. After that you have to think up some other excuse.” —Billy Arthur

“If you can’t be kind, at least be vague.” —Judith Martin

“Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain—and most do.” —Dale Carnegie

“Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go.” —Anonymous

“We use 10% of our brains. Imagine how much we could accomplish if we used the other 60%.” —Ellen DeGeneres

​“According to most studies, people’s number one fear is public speaking. Number two is death. Death is number two. Does that seem right? That means to the average person, if you have to go to a funeral, you’re better off in the casket than doing the eulogy.” —Jerry Seinfeld

VARIETY OF RESOURCES

SHORT STORY TOLD BY A VETERAN

Does this story make any sense to you?

​At 0600 hours, our veteran initiated her daily PT, hitting the deck for a high-intensity interval training session, turning her living room into a makeshift FOB for fitness. Post-workout, she Oscar Mike'd to the BX for a resupply run, ensuring her six was covered with a shopping list that was strategically planned like an op order. By 1300, she was back at the FOB, boots on the ground, prepping meals with military precision, her kitchen operations a textbook example of logistical efficiency.

VA CLAIMS CORNER

Lifestyle Impact Claims

A lifestyle impact claim is a secondary disability claim that focuses on mental health. It is filed when a primary service-connected physical injury leads to significant negative impacts on your life, causing mental health issues like depression due to reduced mobility or chronic pain. For example, if a knee injury from service affects your ability to exercise or sleep, it can lead to mood changes or body mass issues, and this can form the basis of a lifestyle impact claim.

Eligibility and Filing:

To be eligible, you must have an existing primary service-connected disability, even if it's rated at 0%. This primary disability should result in a mental health issue, either causing or aggravating a condition due to the limitations it imposes on your daily activities. Common scenarios include tinnitus leading to insomnia and depression, or a back injury causing immobility, which then leads to obesity and further depression.

Key Steps for Filing a Successful Claim:

Secondary Claim Submission: Lifestyle impact claims must be filed as secondary to an existing service-connected disability. It requires a medical diagnosis of the secondary mental health condition, evidence of a service-connected primary disability, and medical nexus evidence linking the two.

Medical Diagnosis: Obtain a medical diagnosis for the mental health condition that is secondary to your primary disability and affects your lifestyle.

Nexus Letter: Secure a nexus letter that connects your mental health or lifestyle impact to the service-connected disability. This letter is a crucial piece of evidence and should be prepared by a medical professional.

C&P Exam Preparation: Most lifestyle impact claims will require a C&P exam. Be prepared to discuss how your service-connected disability causes or aggravates your mental health symptoms. It’s important to be honest and thorough in explaining your daily challenges.

Understanding VA Ratings for Lifestyle Impact Claims:

The VA uses the same ratings criteria for lifestyle impact claims as for all mental health conditions. These range from 0% for no symptoms impairing social or occupational functioning to 100% for total occupational and social impairment requiring constant hospitalization or supervision.

Conclusion:

Lifestyle impact claims can help in getting the compensation you deserve by acknowledging the broader effects of your service-connected disabilities on your mental health and overall well-being. Each claim is unique, and success depends on clearly establishing the link between your primary disability and its impact on your mental health. If you’re considering filing a lifestyle impact claim, ensure you have the necessary medical documentation and understand the intricacies of the process to improve your chances of success.

* Content adapted from VA Claims Insider Blog.

JUST JOKING AROUND

You know you're in the military when...

- your idea of a morning jog involves more people than most folks' family reunions.
- 'making the bed' involves a ruler, and the threat of redoing it is scarier than any horror movie.
- you've eaten more meals out of a bag than a plate, and you're oddly okay with that.
- you consider 5 a.m. wake-up sleeping in.
- you've mastered the art of sleeping with your eyes open during briefings.
- you refer to a 10-mile run as a 'warm-up'.
- you can iron a shirt to perfection but can't figure out a civilian washing machine.
- your wardrobe has more camouflage than a nature documentary.
- 'travel the world' means seeing the inside of more tents than hotels.
- you instinctively wake up before the alarm, ready to go, but then you remember it's the weekend and try to go back to sleep—except now you're too trained to fall back asleep.

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Hi, I Am Carma Connor

CEO Of Women Warriors Connect

This is the place to learn about new resources for veterans. We keep it fun, light hearted and packed full of value.

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