This was not too bad. It was somewhat embarrassing but nothing serious. Life went on, we handled the Mayaquez situation and made our trip to Australia with little difficulty. On our way back to Japan, however, another complication showed up. I began to get very strong pains in my lower back, on either side and noticed changes in the frequency of bowel and bladder activity. The pains were so bad that on a couple of occasions I had to call my relief early for Officer of the Deck duties. This was an extreme measure and not taken lightly by myself or the command. A Destroyer in peacetime does not carry a doctor.

Medical duties are handled by a very capable Corpsman. Our Corpsman was well trained and very experienced. He had a lot of experience diagnosing various sicknesses, prescribing and dispensing appropriate medicines and even performing minor repairs to various body parts. During battle he would even man a small operating room and perform surgery as necessary. The best he could come up with was that I could be having trouble with kidney stones. He prescribed Valium and bed rest for me. What I didn’t know at the time was that I had an allergy to Valium and would spend the next several hours in very strange hallucinations.

Since we were in company with an Aircraft Carrier it was decided that a Medevac was in order. A helicopter was dispatched and I was hoisted from the helo deck to one of the carrier’s helicopters. After landing on the deck of the carried I was escorted to the ship’s hospital. As I recall it was an eight-bed ward as a part of a well-equipped, thoroughly modern hospital. Staffed with three doctors, including a surgeon and a staff of male nurses or corpsmen. This was well before women were allowed on ships, let alone warships.

They ran a complete suite of tests, but came up with nothing conclusive. Gradually the pain either subsided or I became less aware of it and I was returned to my ship and to my duties. We were soon home in Japan, but my problems did not abate. I soon noted that I had no sense of balance.

I was given time to have the Naval Hospital Yokosuka do their evaluation. A complete Urilogical evaluation turned up nothing. As a last ditch effort they decided to try a Pneumoencephelogram.

As I understand it, this procedure is no longer in use, having been replaced by such things as MRIs. Be very thankful for that. I was given a description of what the test involved, and the dangers involved and allowed to discuss it with my wife before deciding if it was worth it to go through the procedure. The actual procedure doesn’t take long, but the recovery is very difficult. Once they are ready to run the test you, the patient, is strapped to a tilting table. An air bubble is injected into the spinal column. Once the air has been injected x-rays are taken of the area containing the bubble. Then the table is tilted to move the bubble along the spinal column. X-rays are taken as the bubble is moved along all the way to the brain stem. After all of the X-rays are taken the patient is to lie as still as possible until the bubble is absorbed. The pain is excruciating and goes on for hour after hour.

After a recuperation period at home I was called into the Doctor’s office where he discussed what they had found and what it meant. They had found areas where the myelin, the insulation on the wiring of the spinal chord had been damaged. This was good evidence of Multiple Sclerosis, but if the diagnosis was MS it would be the end of my career. By avoiding the term MS the reports could legitimately written with all of the details but allowing my career to continue. Since I had recently had such wonderful turns in my career as the successful NTPI and qualification for Command that I requested that the report be written not mentioning the possibility of MS. The Doctor agreed and those in my chain of command agreed that I would continue.

I was removed from the normal watch schedule with the explanation to the other officers that this was my reward for having qualified. I would continue to do all my duties as Weapons Officer, continue acting as Senior Watch Officer scheduling all of the other officers watches and coordinating all of the enlisted watches, and continue to Con the ship during special ship handling evolutions.

Additionally, since I had fulfilled all of the requirements of a Department head’s tour of duty and was in a bit of a sensitive situation with the ship’s Executive officer I would be short toured. Normally when a family is moved to an overseas station such as Japan the officer will server two duty tours totaling about three years. Normally, I would have expected to have finished my tour on the Bausell and then moved to a larger ship or the squadron level. Instead I would return to the United States after my tour on Bausell. There I would be "banked".

I was in line for command of one of the new Perry class Frigates, which had not even been built yet. In the mean time I would be assigned to teach at a NROTC units at one of universities spread across the US. After that I would attend the Naval War College in Newport and Prospective Commanding Officer School. At that point I would have enough time to command and the ships would be coming off the builders ways.

NROTC units are also a good place for officers with a medical question hanging over their head. The duty allows maximum use of the Officer’s experience while offering minimum stress and allowing time to resolve any problems one way or the other.

I was assigned to duty as the Senior Navy Officer on the staff of the NROTC Unit at Virginia Military Institute. We left Japan late on one Thanksgiving day and landed in San Francisco some 13 hours later still on Thanksgiving. The position carried the academic rank of Assistant Professor of Naval Science. During my leave time my military promotion to Lieutenant Commander came through and upon reporting for duty I was promoted.

We arrived in Virginia as a family and picked up a car that I had bought before leaving Japan. We drove some 30 miles north through the Shenandoah Valley. After over a year in Japan the whole family would oooh and ahhh with every turn in the road. We had completely forgotten how big and beautiful land could be. We soon found and purchased a lovely home on a half acre of land. It had a large old apple tree on one corner of the front yard and a living room with a thirteen-foot ceiling. I just had to find a Christmas tree to fill that. We had actually moved into our new home before our household goods arrived from Japan.

During our short stay in Lexington we enjoyed that house. We learned just how much fruit a big old Apple Tree can produce. We modified the kitchen, master bathroom and bedroom, insulated the house and discovered a hidden attic space above the living room. We grew potatoes and sunflowers. We learned a lot of history, especially about the Civil War. We learned about the beauty of our country and the glory of the area of the Shenandoa Valley.

I had had plenty of experience in school administration from my tour as Assistant Director of Officer Indoctrination School. I had also been trained in teaching and had some experience in the classroom so reporting to VMI in the middle (December) of the school year was not a problem. My duties in the unit were primarily administrative. Academically and militarily I was between the XO and the instructors.

The Commanding Officer, a Marine Colonel, was the Professor of Naval Science. The Executive Officer, an Marine Lieutenant Colonel, and I a Navy Lieutenant Commander (equal to a Marine Major), shared the academic title of Assistant Professor. Our instructors all held the academic title of Associate Professor and were mainly Navy Lieutenants and one Marine Captain. My duties were mainly administrative, coordinating class assignments and curricula with an occasional chance to teach a class. Since we were under the command of Marines, physical fitness was emphasized and time was set aside each day for physical training. Every Friday there is a parade on the main parade grounds. All of the staff attends in full dress uniform, including swords.

The physical fitness efforts were probably the worst thing I could do in combination with my MS short of excessive psychological stress. I stubbornly refused to accept the fact of my MS. Each day I would work out on the track or in the weight room. My condition was deteriorating steadily. Initially my right leg became more and more unmanageable. It was almost like I had had a stroke, although it was mostly confined to my leg. My right leg constantly felt like it was going to sleep, what we called felling like it was being stuck with pins and needles. My right arm was beginning to show a bit of weakness. The biggest problem now was a combination of my leg problem with my lack of balance. I was falling to the ground repeatedly and ordinary stairways were beginning to become obstacles that my right foot was having trouble climbing them.

During the summer I was assigned to the Naval Academy for ROTC Instructors. My lack of stability and problems with bladder control became a real problem. I completed the course and returned to begin VMI for the remainder of the summer and for the new academic year. My condition, however, had become much too obvious to hide and I was sent to the Naval Hospital at Bethesda.

This is the hospital used by Presidents with ties to the Navy and has close ties with all of the National Health organizations. I was there for over a week during which I was tested, evaluated as having Multiple Sclerosis, and run through a Physical Review Board. The unanimous decision of the board was that I be retired to the Temporarily Disabled Retirement list as 100% disabled due to un-employability. This would allow me up to five years to have my condition reviewed.

Once the decision was made things moved fast and I found myself retired with the statement that I was unfit for employment at 32. Fortunately, the staff at VMI did a good job of making the transition as smooth as possible, including giving me the time to choose a retirement destination. They also set it up with the Veterans Administration so that I was immediately eligible for Veteran’s assistance. This meant that the Veteran’s Administration would handle all of my medical needs and by foregoing my Navy retirement pay, which would be taxable, I would be paid by the Veteran’s Administration a monthly paycheck that would be tax free. This would be to my advantage since my retirement would be based upon my rank and years of service (10.5 years).

I checked in with the VA hospital in Roanoak, about 30 miles south of Lexington and was issued a cane, and to my dismay, a wheelchair. The doctor said I better take it I would need it shortly. I took the chair, folded it up and put it in the trunk of my car. I would use the cane.

One evening I was sitting in my living room reading a book when part of the page just disappears behind a dark spot. I soon found my self staring at the working end of a laser as the cauterized bleeding vessels on the back of my eye. I still have ‘floater’s ‘ small blood clots floating around in my eye and the back of one eyeball is partly collapsed.

We soon sold our house in Lexington and decided on making our final move at Navy expense to Merritt Island, Florida. There I began a new life.