Victory worker. [volume] (Seattle, Wash.) 1942-1943, 1943-08-20
Help For Dis
Abled Soldiers

The readjustment and happiness
OF wounded soldiers and sailors
with conspicuous physical disfig-
urements or disabilities or nerv-
Gus manifestations will depend in
large measure on the way their
families and friends and the pub
lie at large behave toward them
This was stated today by the Of
flee of War Information in a re-
lease which also summarized the
rehabilitation and employment ia
cilities provided for servicemen
disabled in combat.
Thanks to modern therapy ma
ny of the men suffering from even
the severest wounds will be rehab-
ilitated and enabled to lead lives
of normal activity, engaging in
industry, business or professions.
But the most modern medical and
psychiatric care, the finest surg
cry and appliances, expert rehaDil-
itatiOn, vocational training and
employment opportunities are far
from being all that is needed by
the men who have suffered dis
figurements or disabilities. Much
of the work can be undone or Will
remain incomplete if the mems
families and friends and the pub
lie at large fail to behave with
restraint, intelligence and consid-
GRAFTON. The OWL passes along a
number of suggestions, made by
the Surgeon General of the Army,
concerning everyday behavior on
the part of friends, family and ac-
quaintanCes most calculated to
lessen the inevitable difficulties of
adjustment of disfigured and dis
abled veterans.
If a formerly able-bOdied young
man returns from combat with a
Disagreement or other serious dis
ability whether deafness, blind
ness, a shattered jaw, an ampu-
tation or burns-he is almost GER
tain to be emOtiOnally disturbed.
In other cases the wound he
brings back may be mental,
In his disturbed state the man
has his own idea of whatra cripple
is-an idea which all too often APP
proaches a popular conception
arising from ignorance.
A soldier who finds himself
without legs, for example, may
well think of himself in the stu
alton of the legless beggar he used
to see pushing himself along on a
little cart on the crowded side
walks downtown - and he may
think that is how others think of
him, too. He does not yet know
of the vital and interesting work
being done-and done perfectly
by men with amputations in indus
try and in offices. A greater pro-
portion of employed handicapped
persons are in professional and
managerial jobs in this country
than in any other kind of employ
ment.
A man who is newly blinded
may associate blindness with a Ii
mited, futile, kind of existence -
selling shoelaces or chewing gum
in a subway station. He has never
had occasion to know about the
hundreds of blind persons who are
doing invaluable work in many
kinds of war notwithstanding
delicate precision instruments, in
specting parts by touch, etc.
1t is only natural that manned
young men should think bitter
thoughts, lose their self-confi-
dence. 1t is the exceptional man
who does not.
And yet, in case after case,
manned young men have been
freed from their black thoughts
and bitterness, and have had their
self-confidence restored, by the
professional, expert-and difficult
rehabilitation treatment they
have received, as soon as possible
after injury, in Army and Navy
hospitals and in the hospitals of
the Veterans Administration. Dis
abled merchant seamen are cared