Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Glutton for punishment.

So I just wandered over to SpouseBuzz, for whatever reason, only to be disgusted. About a week ago a blog post was posted by the wife of a double amputee about IVF and VA coverage and whatnot. She apparently was working off of months' old information because the VA will cover IVF for soldiers suffering from fertility-threatening wounds. So it was a little irritating, because you would think the post was a year old. I wish more hospitals would get with the program and distribute accurate information. Her husband recovered elsewhere, so I guess urology there isn't as up-to-date as it is here. I digress. I won't get into the blog post itself because SpouseBuzz isn't about facts and posts what people write. The title is "I Want To Have A Baby But The VA Won't Pay", which is incredibly misleading and already implies that the author feel entitled- which isn't the case. No matter how the post was written, there is no reason for the pounds upon pounds of ignorance displayed in the comments. I had no idea SpouseBuzz was so popular with trolls.

So many people seemed to think that having children only pertained to the wife, and since it didn't benefit the soldier then the VA shouldn't cover a dependent in this regard. You can't touch this kind of stupid. Others went on about taxpayer money and more than a few decided that soldiers get what they deserve because they volunteer for the military. This was said by not crazy liberal people who think war only exists because people fight and soldiers are murderers (I've never met these people but I am aware they do exist), but by the kind of backwoods "patriot" that thinks soldiers are great but aren't entitled to anything, either. One repeated point was about Vietnam vets' benefits versus today's benefits; you can see where that's going. Someone else pointed out that the wife asked for a medical test, not the husband so... I don't know? She overstepped her bounds? People have no idea what it means to be a caregiver and advocate for someone severely wounded unless they have been there.

SpouseBuzz has never really grabbed me anything other than the occasional "WTF. OMG." because the writing has never floored me, nor do the articles tend to pertain to me. Definitely don't now. Things don't seem to get too crazy over there, so it stuns me that it took a woman writing about how she and her husband can't have kids because of war injuries to make the crazies come out. Nearly 300 comments and the majority are rude, nasty, and ignorant. Or ignant, as they say back home.

I don't know why I still visit spouse support sites. I'm not a military spouse anymore. Yes, technically I am but it just doesn't fit who I am. I am definitely a caregiver, and I like the name "warrior wife" because I am right beside him, ready to help him fight any obstacle in the way of recovery, or even advocate for him. But that's us. And in less than a year, the Army will be behind us. Enough crazy happens on the regular for me to know that we'll get along just fine out there in the regular world.

1 comment:

  1. SpouseBuzz is a site for trolls and kool aid drinkers. It's all about link baiting. I can barely relate, yet I too check once in awhile. I got sucked into a comment thread only because people, service members, STILL don't realize that there are different systems for EVERYTHING for active duty, Guard, Reserves, and sometimes even AGR. Army of one my ass. People just don't know the system unless they've navigated it. Even Tricare. I know people who think it's wonderful. Those are the same spouses who after 20 years of service, I know more about how Tricare works because we need to use the services more than they ever did. All they ever needed was the usual stuff - having babies, colds, flu, etc. Things like speech therapy, OT, pediatric specialists, and pain management were nowhere on their radar.

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