Military caregivers getting assistance as awareness of their struggle grows

http://www.thenewstribune.com/2014/04/15/3149838/military-caregivers-getting-assistance.html?sp=/99/296/331/354/



Pam Busenius of Lacey receives thanks from Sen. Patty Murray after a news conference Monday in the Seattle offices of the Wounded Warrior Project. Busenius talked about her struggles caring for her husband, Joe, and Murray touted her bill that would expand Veterans Administration benefits.

Military caregivers getting assistance as awareness of their struggle grows
By ADAM ASHTON
April 15, 2014 Updated 23 hours ago

Facing homelessness, Pam Busenius gave her Iraq War veteran husband an ultimatum: Call the Department of Veterans Affairs and get help for post-traumatic stress disorder, or Pam would take their two kids and leave him.

Today, Pam smiles when she says her husband, Joe, made the “wise decision” to keep their family together.

“It was just a tremendous moment for us. ‘I don’t have to split up my family,’” she remembered thinking.

Busenius, 45, now is working to keep other military families from facing the dire choices she and her husband confronted six years after he came home from Iraq.