For me, this is a particularly heart-wrenching disaster…
On the evening of September 19, 2010, I was moving across the battlefield in Kandahar, Afghanistan narrowing in on a high-value target. As a bomb tech, it was my job to clear the way for the rest of our team by finding and disposing of any improvised bombs.
That was the night I discovered the last explosive device I ever found by stepping on it. I remember every moment of the explosion, down to my teeth rattling so hard I wasn’t sure that they were still in my mouth. The only reason I am alive today is because when that bomb went off, my fellow soldiers ran towards the danger. They saved my life.
The next thing I knew, I was in Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. I looked down to the end of my bed where my feet should have been sticking up, but they weren’t. Every day since when I wake up I am reminded of my time in Afghanistan. The remnants of this war are going to last me the rest of my life, but I am one of the lucky ones—I made it home.