Murray bill would extend benefits for family caregivers of vets

War leaves permanent scars on service members and also puts a strain of spouses who are left to pick up the pieces when their loved one comes home. A bill in Congress looks to extend more help for the family caregivers.

In 2011, Pam Busenius and her husband Joe hit bottom. When Joe returned from deployment in 2005, he was different. Pam said the family struggled for six years. Joe had post traumatic stress and couldn’t keep a job. Busenius said they were a prime example of financial instability.

“We became homeless. I had considered giving my sister custody of our two children,” Pam Busenius recalled. She was a full-time caregiver for her husband.

Senator Patty Murray, D-Wash., said family caregivers of veterans need more consideration. A RAND study, the largest of its kind, finds there are 5.5 million military caregivers in the U.S. And many, said Murray, are struggling.

“Caregivers’ health is often worse, they have a much higher rate of depression and divorce, they have trouble with employment, trouble keeping health care.”

Murray introduced the Military and Veteran Caregiver Services Improvement Act, a bill to expand benefits for the Department of Veterans Affairs caregiver program to cover people who care for veterans with PTSD and Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI). Veterans like Brandon Hasson, whose wife is also his caregiver.

“When I do get a TBI occurrence, like a really nasty migraine, she’s the one who massages my head and she’ll come from work,” said Hasson. “Yeah, it’s money out of our pocket but she’d rather come home from work to take care of me.” Murray’s bill would provide a stipend to help family members care for ex-service members.

Thanks to support from the VA and other organizations, Pam and Joe Busenius are stable again. In an event in Seattle Monday, Murray said expanded benefits will help Brandon Hasson’s wife help her husband.

“I know that caregivers do not ask for what they need for several reasons,” explained Murray. “They don’t want their spouse or the person they care for to feel like a burden, so we have to ask.”

This bill is personal for Senator Murray, whose mother cared for Murray’s World War II veteran father. Her bill would remove some restrictions on who is eligible for VA caregiver benefits, it would provide child care, financial advice and legal counseling and would also extend caregiver support services to pre-9/11 service members.

“I think the biggest hurdle we face is a lot of Americans think that our troops are home and we don’t have to worry about these issues anymore. For our wounded warriors and our caregivers, this is not something that went away when the last soldier comes home, it is with them for the rest of their lives.”