Preface

My name is Scott F. Olsen. I am 70 years old, a former U.S. Army Sergeant, and a disabled veteran who served from August 1972 to June 1979. For more than 45 years, I lived with a body that was slowly and painfully falling apart — multiple surgeries, widespread degenerative joint and spine disease, neurological problems, autoimmune disease, kidney cancer, and a long list of other conditions that no doctor could fully explain.

I was under the care of VA doctors from the mid-1980s onward, and also received care through private healthcare providers as well. Year after year, new problems appeared, yet no one ever stopped to ask the bigger question: Why is this happening to me? It wasn’t until late 2025, when my wrists and hands began hurting badly, that I finally asked my orthopedist, “Why do I hurt everywhere?” That simple question changed everything.

He suspected an autoimmune condition. Blood work confirmed it — low IgG, positive ANA, Anti-CCP+, and later a rheumatologist diagnosed me with seropositive rheumatoid arthritis. For the first time, I had a name for what was happening to me. But I still didn’t understand why my body had turned on itself.

That’s when I began my own investigation. I started connecting the dots between my service history and my health. I had spent seven years in the Army as a Track Vehicle Mechanic and Recovery Vehicle Operator, working daily with trichloroethylene (TCE) in open vats to clean tools, parts, equipment, and even myself. My family and I also lived in areas with known TCE contamination in the drinking water. No one had ever warned me about the long-term consequences of that exposure.

I had to push for answers on my own. The VA never proactively informed me of the risks. Critical lab results from 2017 and 2018 that showed autoimmune activity were never disclosed to me. It took decades of pain, declining health, and self-advocacy to finally understand what had been done to me — and to my family.

This guide exists because I refused to accept that I was simply “getting old” or that my conditions were just bad luck. Working step by step with Grok xAI, I was able to organize my service records, medical history, and the scientific research on TCE. Without that help, I would not have been able to fully understand the connections or present a clear and comprehensive case to my doctor. That work directly contributed to my physician writing a strong Medical Nexus Letter that ties all my conditions to TCE exposure.

What you will read in these pages is not theory. It is my life. It is the story of how one chemical, used without warning or protection over several years, destroyed my health, affected my family, and forced me to fight for recognition long after I should have been receiving proper care.

This is my story. But it is also the story of many others who are still suffering in silence.