WASHINGTON (KELO/AP) — When the Iowa nonprofit Midwest Honor Flight brings veterans to the memorials of northern Virginia and Washington, the schedule is packed and the day is active. Jerry Raabe of Volga, S.D. was among the 85 honored veterans brought by the organization on May 6 to the National Mall and its Vietnam Veterans Memorial, where John David Hamilton Jr.’s name can be found.
“When I look at the wall today, I see his name up on the wall and my reflection at the same time,” Raabe said at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport a short time later.
Hamilton and Raabe went to Vietnam together. The wall includes more than 58,000 names of people lost in combat or missing in action. Even though he personally opposed the war in Southeast Asia as a conscientious objector, Raabe was drafted and served as a medic in the Army, earning a Bronze Star Medal for heroism in ground combat.
“I tried my best as a medic to save people, and hopefully I saved some people along the way,” Raabe said.
While in Vietnam, he was exposed to Agent Orange, a herbicide widely used by American forces during the Vietnam War. Raabe says the Department of Veterans Affairs identified the defoliant as the cause of his Parkinson’s disease: a disorder of the brain which impacts movement, balance and coordination.
“I’ve been doing speech exercises probably four or five times a week,” Raabe said. “It helps with, also helps with the facial expressions and the swallowing, so because that’s another symptom of Parkinson’s, is that you’ll have a softer voice, loose your ability to speak and also loose your ability to swallow.”
He’s also mindful of his mental health. There is no cure for Parkinson’s.
“I got involved with a mindfulness or cognitive behavioral therapy because, again, as this disease progresses, I know that I’m going to face anxiety and depression because of it,” Raabe said.
His son Ryan Raabe, who served as his dad’s guardian on the trip, marvels at his father.
“It’s just so hard for me to wrap my head around what he had to go through and what he had to sacrifice and for him to be able to live the life that he does the way that he does, giving to other people, caring about other people, giving us the best life that you could imagine, it was just, so proud to have him as my dad,” Ryan said.
