Page 988 - Total War on PTSD

CHAPTER 30 - DO NOT PET
Abby the Rottweiler - Steve: My wife is indispensable as both my spouse and my full-time caregiver, and we are looking into applying for Caregiver Support through the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). Without my wife I don't know what I would have done. She's awesome too! In August of 2018 I had to have total knee replacement surgery and she actually had four or five cases in court and she totally rearranged all of that and also took off five days so that she could be there for me during recovery.
I served in the military from August 1988 to May 2007...a good 20 years. I was in the good old Marine Corps (O311 Infantryman and O321 Reconnaissance) from 1988 to 1991 (Active) and 1991 to 1993 (Reserve). I then followed on with U.S. Army (Airborne, 88N Transportation Coordinator; 92Y Supply; 19K Tanker) from 1993 to May 2007.
I served one year in the 1st Armored Division in Bosnia in 1995; was the first in the area and served one year in Kosovo; and was convoy security for one year in Iraq. We handled one-day turnarounds between missions. I did 22 combat missions, of that we had 10 of the convoys hit and five of which involved my own truck. The first time I got hit it was 10 feet from my truck. The second time it was behind my truck. The third was to the right of my truck. The fourth hit my fuel tank and the fifth hit is the one that put me in the hospital for 14 months. I felt like an IED magnet. The 22 missions included places like Mosul, Ramadi and the Triangle of Death. Even though my deployments were lengthy, I would still be more comfortable over there because of being used to the high operational tempo.
988 of 1042