Workingitout,
I wish you and your husband well as you gear up for this...

The Army-Ups, as I call them, are very fluent in the language know as Double Talk. It may have refined to TripleTalk by now.

Short add-in, it took me awhile to apply because of the death of my first husband from his wounds and then I tried to drink and drug away war memories and the devastation of his death.
When I was finally able to apply for benefits, I was informed that the records of almost 5,000 female military personnel were lost. Lost???
It took nearly ten years to "find" close to 3,000 of them.

I won but a tiny battle with them then told them FU.
It was not accepted that nurses were subject to PTSD. I didn't go for disability on that...it was my wounds from the baby-boomer incident.

My plea is for you not to give up. You'll wander the halls of the bureaucracy but you will find your way and then zone in on what is owed to your husband...

Cap