You aren't allowed to earn disability from the VA and get paid for drills/active status both at the same time. That's why they told us after our deployments we should wait for any filing until we discharged or were med boarded out. But always keep a copy of any injury report while on duty.

Quicksandy is correct. It's stated in the first few pages of the disability paperwork that you cannot receive both disability compensation and active/reserves/guard drill pay at the same time and that you have to waive one or the other. My husband is a disabled veteran, I'm helping my father with his claim, and I intern at a VA. Also if you are found to be 100% unemployable and you get a job, you will have to pay back all compensation you received.

Yup. I had disability from active duty but joined the National Guard. It eventually caught up with me and I had to pay back the pay as well as forgo any future pay from the National Guard. I ended up working for them for two years with no pay. Gotta love the military

We don't have tribunals for this. Often the military in the United States will try any way possible to **** you out of money. Kinda why I got out...

My best friend's dad, also my dad's best friend, was disabled in the line of duty more than 20 years ago. They have fought tooth and nail and haven't seen a dime from the VA, even when it became so bad he couldn't work at all. The VA is a joke. They're more there to say that help is available than to actually help.

It's a serious joke, we are trying to help get my grandfather his payments for agent orange and they say they've "lost him" and he's not the only person they've lost! It's ridiculous how do you lose someone who served on the front lines for 18 months? The VA is nothing but a joke and I have nothing nice to say about them

FYI: contact with agent orange is not reason enough for benefits. There needs to be a condition that resulted from contact with agent orange to substantiate disability benefits. But you're right...VA drags its feet and fights tooth and nail regarding such things.

Are you from the DC Area? There was a huge news story about a lot of peoples' cases getting "lost" and the VA office only came clean after quite a few years. Some of the veterans DIED before the VA got around to contacting them back (as such it was the widow/widower/child/etc who got the call or they just couldn't reach the person.. you know... them being dead and all... sometimes from medical conditions/etc that SHOULD have been covered by the VA... it's really really sad. Veterans typically either have to have a real supportive family whom can cover costs or get lucky with a charity to get the real help they need right when they need it. I mean... health care is a joke in the US for everyone but you'd think after all vetetans did for our country, our government would have their backs in their times of need... but NOPE. I guess it's not like we pump a lot of money into the defense department budget which /should/ include military benefits... oh wait. we do :|

It's so horrible watching the people that laid their lives on the line go through this. They risked their lives and they were never the same, and the government they were fighting to protect throws them by the wayside. It makes me so angry.

Not only US, we had an instructor that was extra salty (not many were close to nice anyways), turned out he wasn't being paid for 2 months.

Yes you can get both my mother and brother have done it

@23 no, no you can't. If you get VA benefits, it's for disability. If you get those benefits, how are you able to still do drill, etc? I have been told multiple times that I can't do reserve our anything else because of those "benefits"..

Yeah, ydi for thinking you could get away with serving in the military. How dare you.

By continuing to not use lube. Yes. I'm not sure everyone would agree that's a love you want lol