His superiors put him in a cage, blew cigar smoke on him and pounded him, he said. By the time training was over, Roy said he would rather take his chances in 'Nam than stay where he was — not that he had a choice.

When Roy first arrived in Vietnam in 1968, he remembers seeing the blank faces and eyes "full of horror" of Marines who had made it through their 13-month tour alive.

He was now in a place where he was told the people wanted his help. But when he boarded a bus with bars on the windows, "I knew that, hey, this place isn't as friendly to us as it had been represented to us during training."

On his first night in "the bush," Roy's unit was on its way to set up an ambush when it was attacked. He was walking behind a man who "took one" through the hip. "It didn't take me long to realize this is life or death — and it's going to be their deaths, not mine," he said.

He never talks about the hand-to-hand combat, multiple situations during which his unit was being overrun.

"I've never discussed that, not even with the VA," he said. "I've had a hard time with it — it brings back too many memories."

His wounds in Vietnam left him with permanent injuries to his arms, legs and back, and he has trouble with short-term memory.

"I live with pain every day," he said.

After spending more than nine months in hospitals, Roy was considered at least partially disabled. But there was more, hidden away in his head.

"I knew there was something wrong with me, that I wasn't the same person" he said. "They didn't recognize PTSD at the time — they totally discarded it."

Not until 2000 was Roy officially diagnosed with PTSD. Today, he is considered 100 percent disabled.

Roy described himself before Vietnam as a kind, gentle, athletic person. He was a strong, sturdy young man who was reared on a cattle ranch in Idaho. After Vietnam, "I'm not able to be around people," he said. "I do not have friends."

Today, Roy's disabled status means that all of his ongoing hospital visits and therapy sessions and medication are fully covered by the federal government. His income now consists of checks he gets from his disability benefits and from Social Security.

Roy estimates that since Vietnam he's held about 60 jobs. Once he worked as a logger in Idaho until he felled a tree that ended the lives of some baby squirrels — but he was tired of killing, even if it was only the collateral damage of logging.

"It hit me hard," he said. "I had to walk off of that job."

As his four children grew up, he was always angry and "in their face." His children's friends didn't want to come over because they feared Roy. Everyone knew to leave Roy alone when he was in his office with the door closed.

"I became a cold bastard after Vietnam," Roy said.