Military deployments hard on local families

dtarrant@dallasnews.com


Stephen Stewart, 4, talks on the phone with his father, veteran Jeffrey Stewart, who now works as a contractor in Afghanistan, at Conder Park in Killeen. Stewart and Robyn Schultz, with Stephen's brother, Tristan, 1, divorced last year; the boys live with Stewart's parents in Alvin, Texas.
Starting when Gwendolyn was 4, her dad, Sgt. Glenn Roberts, has gone on three deployments in eight years – twice to Iraq. Each time, he has been gone a year.


Gwendolyn Roberts likes to draw. Her dad appears in many of her sketches. He and Gwendolyn hold hands, and she wears an ear-to-ear smile. But in one drawing, Gwendolyn watches as her father leaves home. Her eyes are wide, her mouth is turned down and a big teardrop sits on her cheek.

Her dad went on his last deployment to Iraq in December 2007. Gwendolyn, then 10, did not handle his leaving well.

"She was withdrawn, quiet and very worried," said Gwendolyn's mom, Martha Roberts, from her family's home near Fort Hood. "She worried a lot about her dad. She wasn't talking very much. She would just start crying because she missed her dad so much."

Parents, educators and policymakers have all expressed concern about military children whose parents deploy to a war zone. Yet there has been little research done on the effects of combat tours on their performance in school and social well-being, said Anita Chandra, a behavioral scientist at Rand Corp., testifying before Congress in March.

Advocates know that children in military families – especially those who have gone through long deployments – are experiencing problems. But they lack essential data, including basic information such as where military children live and what schools they attend.

Mary Keller, president of the Texas-based Military Child Education Coalition, estimates that Texas has 100,000 military children. But even that guess might be too low.

"They are the invisible children in the state of Texas," Keller says.

Collecting that data would enable support organizations to know where and how to target their services, Keller says. "We have to have information that's precise. That way we can also understand where to target programs and which ones work the best."

In one of the few studies of its kind, Rand Corp., with Chandra as the lead investigator, found that children in military families reported more symptoms of anxiety than children in the general population.

The study, published in December in the Pediatrics medical journal, also found that children whose parents had been deployed for longer periods over the past three years experienced more difficulties in school and at home. This was especially true for older boys and girls, the study reported.

Two years ago, Scott & White Healthcare opened a clinic in Killeen to serve Fort Hood military families. The hospital surveyed its primary care physicians. Those doctors reported seeing an increase in anxiety-related physical ailments among children.

"There wasn't anything really physically wrong, but the kids were having chronic headaches and tummy aches," said Maxine Trent, a counselor and coordinator for Military Homefront Services. "Those of us in behavioral health care know that's often [emotionally] related."

With more than 20 years of military service, Glenn Roberts was eligible to retire. He had promised Gwendolyn he would do so by the time she turned 11. But he still had one last tour to complete. This deployment was extra hard on the family because there was a newborn in the house. Gwendolyn's younger brother was named Glenn after his father.

A friend told Martha Roberts about the free counseling offered for Fort Hood families at Military Homefront Services. Gwendolyn started seeing a therapist there in summer 2008, about halfway through her father's deployment.

Gwendolyn talked about her fears to her counselor. Drawing became part of her therapy, another way to express her feelings. She mailed many of her drawings to her father – "pictures of me and him holding hands," she said.

"When your dad is deployed, you miss out on some of the father-daughter stuff," Gwendolyn said. Like bowling. Or playing video games, especially the Wii. "We usually would relax by watching TV together."

She particularly loved when her dad could make it to her dance recitals. But during his last deployment, she grew sad when she learned he wouldn't be able to attend.

The Friday night of the recital, she was getting ready in her room when her mother told her she had to leave the house to pick up a package. When her mother returned, she asked Gwendolyn to come to the kitchen. There, on leave from Iraq, stood her father.

"And she walked in and her face just lit up," Martha Roberts said.

"I was really happy," Gwendolyn said. "I couldn't stop smiling."


FIND ANYTHING IN HOUSTON

Alex may effect Gulf oil production ..

HOUSTON (Dow Jones)--Tropical Storm Alex, expected to become a hurricane Tuesday, seems to be headed on a path away from the bulk of the U.S. Gulf of Mexico's oil and gas production and refining infrastructure. But some production impact will be felt as one of the largest energy producers in the Gulf said Monday it was shutting down several platforms as a precaution.

Royal Dutch Shell PLC (RDSA) said it had pulled 700 workers from its Gulf operations, and some 835 workers remained offshore. The company is shutting in production from its Western and Central Gulf of Mexico assets to prepare for the potential full evacuation of personnel Tuesday. The company started pulling workers from the Gulf over the weekend. The company didn't specify how much production would be shut or how many platforms were being evacuated.

At 11 a.m. EDT, Alex was located about 85 miles west-northwest of Campeche, Mexico, in the western Gulf of Mexico, and was heading towards southern Texas and northern Mexico. Most U.S. offshore oil and gas platforms are located in the eastern part of the Gulf, far from Alex's forecast path.

Alex "is not likely to have a major impact on production or refining in the U.S.," Doug MacIntyre, senior analyst at the Energy Information Administration, told Dow Jones Newswires Monday. "Alex's current path appears to avoid most of the oil and gas production platforms and any of the major refining centers."

Energy markets Monday seemed to take the storm in stride. Light, sweet crude for August delivery ended 61 cents lower at $78.25 a barrel a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Natural gas for July delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange settled 2.96% lower at $4.717 million British thermal units.

Gulf producers Apache Corp. (APA), Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM), and Anadarko Petroleum Corp. (APC) also said Monday they have started evacuating non-essential workers from the offshore facilities expected to be in the path of the storm but none have so far reported any impact to their production.

BP PLC (BP, BP.LN) said Monday it pulled non-essential personnel from three offshore facilities in the the Gulf, and that production was not affected. The company evacuated workers from Atlantis, Mad Dog and Holstein platforms.

Alex may delay BP PLC's plans to increase the amount of oil collected from a leaking well in the Gulf by a week, a company official said Monday.

While the storm's winds are expected to stay far to the west of the Deepwater Horizon spill, high seas are likely to become an issue this week, said Kent Wells, a senior vice president with BP, in a press briefing. Waves up to between 10 feet and 12 feet would prevent BP from hooking a third rig up to an underwater containment system, a process that needs three days of good weather, Wells said.

Two rigs, the Discoverer Enterprise and Q4000, are already collecting between 20,000 and 25,000 barrels of oil a day from the well, which has gushed ever since a rig working at the site caught fire and sank in April.

Chevron Corp. (CVX) and ConocoPhillips (COP) said that they have not evacuated workers, but that they are closely monitoring the forecast for Alex.

A hurricane watch was issued for parts of the south Texas Gulf coastline area and parts of northern Mexico, the National Hurricane Center reported Monday on its website.

The NHC, in its advisory, also said Alex likely will become a hurricane Tuesday and has increased in strength, now with winds of 60 miles per hour.

The watch area for the U.S. extends from south of Baffin Bay to the mouth of the Rio Grande in Texas, with Mexico issuing a hurricane watch from the Rio Grande to La Cruz.


-By Isabel Ordonez, Dow Jones Newswires; 713-547-9207; isabel.ordonez@dowjones.com

(Brian Baskin and Angel Gonzalez contributed to this article

CLICK HERE TO GET STARTED!

FIND ANYTHING IN HOUSTON

Alvin man breeds Capybaras - as pets.

By LINDA LOMBARDI

The Associated Press
It's one thing to get a goldfish because your daughter begs for one. It's quite another to end up with a hundred-pound rodent who has more than 2,700 Twitter followers.

Caplin Rous is a capybara. Related to the guinea pig, the capybara is the largest species of rodent. Though they're native to South America, Caplin was born in Texas and lives in the town of Buda with Melanie Typaldos, who never expected this animal to take over her life quite the way he has.

Typaldos says it all started on a trip to Venezuela, when her daughter Coral got to hold a young capybara and "fell in love."

"After we got back, she pretty relentlessly pestered me about getting one for a pet," Typaldos says. "Since Coral lived in an apartment and was planning on spending a year in Asia, she couldn't have a pet capybara herself so, she felt, it was up to me to fulfill her capybara vision."


Young Capybara Water pigs (Hydrochoerus hydrochaeris) pictured with their mother in the zoo of Zurich, Switzerland, Thursday, Augsut 16, 2007. Last August 11, in the zoo were born six waterpigs, but one died. Water pigs (Capybara) are no pigs but rodents.

Even capybaras that are bred in captivity like Caplin are not domesticated animals, so early handling and contact is critical for them to be comfortable living with people. Typaldos got Caplin when he was only 11 days old, and took him to work every day for the first three months. Then, "someone complained there was a furry, piglike animal in the building," and she took a month of vacation and stayed home with him.

Caplin Rous is now 2 and a half. The second part of his name, which Typaldos pronounces like "rose," stands for "Rodent of Unusual Size" (a reference to the movie "The Princess Bride"). He's also a rodent of unusual abilities. He can walk on a leash and even do some tricks, but Typaldos says it's important not to exaggerate any similarity to a dog doing tricks.

"Dogs have thousands of years of being trained to be subservient to people," she says. "A capybara will not do a trick just to make me happy. The quality of the trick is very dependent on the quality of the treat."

Most people who keep capybaras keep them as farm animals, like a sheep or goat, but Caplin basically lives indoors with Typaldos (he eliminates in a pan of water in her bathroom). Outdoor space is necessary as well for grazing and swimming in his pool; in the wild, capybaras are semi-aquatic, diving into rivers to escape predators. Somewhat ponderous on land, capybaras are surprisingly graceful in the water.

"On land he's not very active," she says. "When he's in the water he's like another animal. That's where he's really the happiest."

There's no way of knowing how many private individuals own capybaras, but Justin Damesta, a breeder in Alvin, Texas, says that he sells five to 10 of them a year as pets.

Damesta recommends that a pet capybara be raised indoors for the first few months and then kept outdoors with sturdy fencing, a heated shelter and a pool. Potential buyers who contact him are usually fairly well informed, but, he says, "I have and will turn down people I don't consider qualified or capable."

Some other pet capybaras also can be followed on the Internet, such as Dobby in Seattle. But Typaldos is probably unique in the way she has made the capybara her mission: She spends a couple of hours a day updating Caplin's Internet presence on a blog and social networking sites.

When asked how much time it takes to care for a capybara, she says, "I spend all my time with him, but that's a matter of choice."

Caplin's Web activities are partly fun -- such as interactive games of "Rodent Jeopardy" -- with a serious educational purpose, too. "When I was thinking of getting him, there was nothing on the Web about getting a pet capybara," says Typaldos. "That was a large impetus for the blog. They're not the right pet for most people."

Typaldos has a background in biology, and also keeps horses and reptiles. Her property is big enough that Caplin can graze and swim, and she lives in a climate appropriate for a tropical animal.

On her blog, she's honest about the problems in caring for a capybara. When people ask her about getting one, she tells them first to read her whole blog, including the entries about when he has bitten her.

But Typaldos also sees Caplin as an ambassador of sorts.

"People don't like rodents," she says, but many rodents make good pets. Her children had pet rats when they were young. "If someone says something bad about rats, on the blog or Facebook, he'll always step in and say something.

FIND ANYTHING IN HOUSTON

Disbarred Manvel lawyer no stranger to death

June 1, 2010 11:58 am Greg May wrote:

Shawn Roberts

The Texas Rangers and other authorities are investigating the deaths of four people close to disbarred Manvel attorney Shawn Roland Roberts.

Roberts, who was disbarred last year for professional misconduct related to drug use, was at the scene of each death, according to police.

He's being treated as a witness in the April 14 death of his wife, Amanda Linscomb, who police believe died of an overdose.

The Texas Rangers are assisting with the case and also probing the deaths of Tara Sganga, a girlfriend of Roberts whose body contained numerous drugs when she died in March 2007; Steven Blackshear, Roberts' roommate who died from acute toxicity in March 2009; and Roberts' mother, Sandra Roberts, who shot herself in August 2009.

Roberts is in the Harris County jail on several drug charges, including a charge of delivery of a controlled substance via injection related to Sganga's death.

A Brazoria County grand jury reviewed the deaths of Blackshear and the mother, but found no evidence of foul play.

Harris County prosecutors filed the delivery charge in August 2009, after a grand jury declined to indict Roberts on a murder charge.

Roberts' attorney, Mark Bennett, said that prosecutors have no evidence that Roberts injected Sganga with drugs.

“The (drug) charge is driven in part by a very upset family who wants Shawn held responsible for their daughter's death,” Bennett said.

As far as Roberts' involvement in the other deaths, Bennett said people involved in drugs will likely have people around them die. Asked if that meant Roberts was a drug user, he said, “I don't have an answer for that.”

FIND ANYTHING IN HOUSTON