[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 4]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages 4750-4751]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]


                            INVISIBLE FAMILY

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. TIM HUELSKAMP

                               of kansas

                    in the house of representatives

                         Monday, March 24, 2014

  Mr. HUELSKAMP. Mr. Speaker, the following speech has been delivered 
to audiences at various veteran service organizations and veteran 
events in Kansas by a brave young lady named Kristin Stowers who lives 
in the Big 1st District of Kansas that I represent. After hearing 
twelve-year-old Kristin Stowers deliver her remarks on her family's 
experience with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, I wanted to share it 
with my colleagues in Congress. We could all learn a tremendous amount 
about sacrifice, commitment, and perseverance from this young lady's 
remarks.

                            Invisible Family

               (By Kristin Stowers of Hutchinson, Kansas)

       It is hard to realize that these amazing people that gave 
     up their lives to save and protect our nation and its people 
     are gone. . . . It makes you see that life is not just a 
     fairy tale ending that we were taught as children, we were 
     taught that it was going to be okay in the end. We now 
     realize you can't win every battle you enter. Some don't make 
     it home to their families, but you have to say to yourself. 
     We were put to the test to complete life a way that we see 
     fit and once you have completed your mission, you wait 
     patiently in your favorite place that you have always found 
     comfortable. Where you wait to see your family that has not 
     yet completed their missions. I know it is hard to coop with 
     what you are going through I had to deal with it, but in a 
     different way.
       My mother had a brain tumor and had to have surgery on my 
     first day of kindergarten and had a stroke later on. Our 
     house caught on fire in my fourth grade year and we had to 
     live in a hotel for three months. My father was diagnosed 
     with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and we as a family have 
     to deal with the others sufferings each day. In the last few 
     months we have discovered many other things have gone wrong 
     in our relationship with each other causing more pain than 
     intended. We have not gotten the chance to talk to each other 
     about our problems at home and since the VA does not 
     implement family counseling in their facilities, but they do 
     have spouse counseling. Having said that, I would like to say 
     that the injuries affect the whole family not just the 
     spouse.
       PTSD is like a black hole, you get sucked in without even 
     knowing what is happening around you. Your hoping that 
     tomorrow will be better than today, but still hoping that 
     when you come from school or work that the stress has not 
     overcome them and they are laying in their chair. . . . 
     Silent. . . . Dead. With the help of the VA it is still 
     progressing, but still worse than before. It makes me think 
     that he is floating away in a bubble, but God will not leave 
     him without a fight. To this day he is in a battle with PTSD 
     and the prize of the battle is him and us. . . . His family 
     and friends. We are hoping that he wins, but you never know 
     what the outcome will be. That is why we are all here. Every 
     person in the world with PTSD is in a battle. Some lost and 
     some still lead victorious and I trust him to be victorious.
       All I ever wanted is for the pain to end and many of you 
     may be thinking the same thing, and I know this is over used 
     but it will heal with time. I will promise you that it will 
     get better even if it doesn't look like it. Just think they 
     want you to carry on with your life even if it is looking 
     grim at the moment. It takes guts to take that chance that 
     you will never see your smiling family that on the inside is 
     torn from your choices, but know that they are the right 
     ones.
       It makes me realize that I will not have a perfect life and 
     no one ever will with our missions, and the people that 
     finish theirs when you're not ready to let go of the memories 
     that you had together. The memories that will and have 
     impacted your world and will leave a crater that you have to 
     live with and have to move on even if you can't. The thoughts 
     and the people will ever be imprinted in our minds and will 
     never leave because the pain will always be demanding. People 
     always think that war is just a thing that can be stopped on 
     the spot, but they don't know the aftershock of the explosion 
     that is a death or an injury that is fatal.
       The people that saved us from ourselves and different 
     countries that are or was threating us. They saved us and our 
     nation from danger and the problems of life. Heroes and 
     Inspirations are these people that risked their own life to 
     save the people that are going to change a million lives or 
     just a few. Humans like this are my inspiration and I hope to 
     be just like them; they changed a thousand people; a thousand 
     points of views on life; and a twelve year old girl that is 
     striving to be an inspiration just like them later on in 
     life.
       Many young people have their favorite bands and/or actors 
     as their people to look up too, and sure I have my own but I 
     have many leaders in my life some I can't name but they 
     changed my life no matter what they did to protect me, my 
     family, and my neighbors. They will be remembered as the ones 
     that grew up as the kids that were big hearted and the ones 
     that were strong and brave. The reason we are here is these 
     people wanted to save us and that is what they did and they 
     bought us time.
       Time to spend thinking of ways to buy us more time. These 
     warriors spent their lives saving their family and friends 
     and their generations and so on. These are the people that 
     are my heroes and my saviors at the time of need and always 
     will be.

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