VA NY Harbor Healthcare System

Oscar Castaneda, Iraq US Marine Corps Veteran and his wife Suzie Kim

Oscar Castaneda, an Iraq US Marine Corps Veteran who served in the Reserve and was deployed overseas after 9/11, suffered traumatic brain injury (TBI) in 2002. Since then, he has experienced multiple health symptoms and in addition to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), he is also coping with binocular visual dysfunction.

His PTSD symptoms are linked both to pre-Iraq deployment and to combat service in Iraq, where he served as an infantry mortar man and administrator. He candidly described his experience with PTSD as “intrusive thoughts, hyper-vigilance, a lot of anxiety, lack of sleep, and a lot of anger.” Castaneda declines to go into more detail about his intrusive thoughts. ”I’d rather not talk about that, especially when I’m holding my daughter.”

His 16-month-old daughter, Laura, is a great source of joy. His wife, Suzie Kim, who has known him since childhood, along with his family, have been exceptionally supportive in his struggle to regain independence and become empowered.

Castaneda has made tremendous strides psychologically. He is motivated to discuss his healing, “so that it will help other Veterans.” He is open and eager to share, making it hard to imagine that not very long ago, things were remarkably different. “I would not talk," he confided. "I was hiding under a rock.”

Depressed and experiencing suicidal ideation, he credits his psychiatrist, Dr. Marion Eakin, Director of the New York Campus Mental Health Clinic, and PTSD Social Worker, Sharon Morrison, with helping him turn away from harming himself. “They saved my life," he said. Castaneda said he will also always be thankful to Stacy Pommer, Visual Impairment Services Team (VIST) Coordinator, for giving him hope. “When she said she was visually impaired, I did not believe it," recalled Castaneda. “She is very compassionate and understands my frustration. Stacy is an angel in human form,” he said.

Ms. Kim, who has put her career on hold while caring for her husband and baby, is also very grateful to VA experts for helping her husband with recovering his former personality. “He was very social, very popular in the Marines,” she said.

Castaneda feels extraordinarily fortunate that his VIST Coordinator has referred him to a specialized six week blind rehabilitation residential program at VA West Haven (Conn.) Eastern Blind Rehabilitation Center. The training he received there was designed to manage his TBI-related binocular vision disturbances, involving a lack of coordination between the vision in both eyes that also caused dizziness and nausea. While at West Haven, he alsoreceived training with rehab therapist Sherry Glinsky to manage his loss of peripheral vision and learn techniques for home safety while cooking and doing the laundry, as well as managing other activities of daily living.

This program provides treatment tailored to each Veteran’s needs and also includes a three-day training for caregivers. The experience impressed his wife. After recently completing this program, VA continues to support Castaneda’s continued vision therapy for TBI-related binocular dysfunction at SUNY College of Optometry in Manhattan.

These days, in addition to family life and ongoing treatment for his physical and psychological symptoms, Castaneda is also grateful for assistive technologies provided by VA; these include issuance and training on a white folding cane in order avoid bumping into walls subsequent to his peripheral vision loss, books-on-tape on “every topic under th sun," and an optical character recognition device which allows an individual to scan text with audio feedback.

"Politics and novels, I hear it all,” said Castaneda, who feels he is moving every day toward a fuller recovery. He also plans on returning to West Haven for the computer acces training program in order to be trained on accessible software.