Here's a new blog written by someone who identifies themselves as a veteran receiving treatment inside the scandal-plagued Walter Reed Army Medical Center. In an intro post he published a few days ago, he says, "I have been called a patriot, and treated like a criminal. I have been called a Soldier and treated as the enemy." Snip from a post titled "Pills and PTSD."

But today, it is about the pills. A pill to keep me focused. A pill to keep me more sociably acceptable. A pill to keep the rage from spilling over into my everyday life. A pill for the pain. A pill to help me sleep. A pill to help the dreams. A pill to make this life seem like less of a dream. And my daily vitamin.

I don't like them. Never have. I don't even like taking Tylenol, but here I have to. They help me be that automated Soldier that Walter Reed requires. Wake up, go to formation, don't bitch and gripe. Don't point out other peoples shortcomings. Don't stay up late. Don't wake your neighbor up in the middle of the night because you have had a bad dream.

Don't give up your freedom by checking yourself into Ward 54. Just take the damn pills.

I haven't always been this way. That's what my family has told me. I wasn't even this way in theater. I was no super-hero, dodging IEDs and ambushes. Foot patrols were not existent for me. My only strife came from watching it all unfold on a tactical map, listening to the radio/MTS, and reading the daily reports. My action outside the wire involved women, children, and old men.

The stress has come from being here. From being inside these four-gated walls. From seeing what becomes of the broken Soldiers. We go from being the team leader to just a Specialist. We go from being convoy commanders to being just another Sergeant. We are broken down by our name, rank, and sex; sometimes even our injuries. And that is the sum of who we are. We are what has been cropped from the canvas. We are the cost of war.

Previously on BoingBoing: