Why I Am Paranoid of the V.A.

One would think that a vet would never be paranoid of an agency named after veterans which has spend uncountable dollars of singnage proclaiming dedication to administrering veterans' needs. But, based on what happened to me in a sequence of worsening mistreatments, a bureaucratic culture of denial and retribution clearly exists in at least the Richmond Hunter Holmes V.A. Medical Center. Sadly, it must be universal in the system.

1. Twice, the blood-takers denied me immediate treatment, kicking me down the line with "I'm not doing him" until the last one said, begrudgingly, "Sit down." Would you want your blood taken by such technicians.
2. The patient advocate/ombudsman who said "We don't do that" when I immediately after my treatment denial went to the office to complain.
3. The technician who was rude to me in the commissary.
4. The emergency room doctor who chose to lecture me on being a better V.A. patient rather than first treat my leg pain. Having had the leg pain previously a year earlier, the difference between the second time and the first time was quite different.
5. The delay of treatment in the E.R. until a security guard showed up.
6. Blindsided by cutting my medication prescription without notice and refusal to renew it despite almost ten years and two doctors of V.A. prescription.
7. Gulagized when I complain.

Taken altogether, the mistreatment warrants paranoia for self-survival:

1. denied treatment,
2. begrudged treatment,
3. rudeness,
4. "propaganda" of being a better veteran,
5. marginalized as security threat,
6. lost benefits, and
7. sovietized into mental case,

would you not be paranoid?

Would you go some place where the people in charge have someone with a gun shadow your actions? A person who is basically a nightwatchman?

Letter to head of mental health department (140410)