[Blindvet-talk] Blind Soldiers Never Die, But Sometimes, You'd Never Know It
NABlindVets at aol.com
NABlindVets at aol.com
Fri Nov 16 20:57:42 CST 2007
Brad and All,
We the members of the NABV need to be seeking the locations where the
Military is keeping our Brothers and Sisters with eye injuries and doing our best
to visit them before they get too depressed and tell them that we are there
for them. I wish you all could be at Washington Seminar and perhaps we could all
go to Walter Reed to Visit Vets who have serious eye injuries. What do you
all think about that. I am willing to stay over until Friday to make such a
visit.
Perhaps Joann and John at National headquarters could help us facilitate
that. I am copying them on this mail.
Dwight
In a message dated 11/15/2007 9:41:58 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,
beloos at neb.rr.com writes:
We need to discuss what we, the Blind Veterans Division of the National
Federation of the Blind, can do about the attitudes of these veterans and
people dealing with these veterans, including their families.
As I said at Convention when we were organizing, the Veterans Administration
may be there for technology and medical treatments, but I didn't get
positive attitude from the Veterans Administration. I got that from the
National Federation of the Blind. We need to offer that to the people in
this article.
What can we do about this?
Brad Loos
>
> Blinded by war: Injuries send troops into darkness -
> By
> Gregg Zoroya
> , USA TODAY
>
> ARLINGTON, Va. - Two days before a 10-mile race here, Army 1st Lt. Ivan
> Castro is explaining how he will run tethered to another soldier - one who
> can see.
>
> As he speaks, his wife lovingly extends her right hand to Castro's face,
> fingers outstretched. But Evelyn Galvis pauses inches away.
>
> "I used to be able to reach out and touch him, caress him, without telling
> him first, 'I'm going to touch your face,' " she says. Now, "if I just
> reach
> out and touch him, he'll startle."
>
> Castro, 40, a paratrooper with the 82nd Airborne Division, is one of more
> than 1,100 veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan - 13% of all seriously wounded
> casualties
> - to undergo surgery for damaged eyes. That is the highest percentage for
> eye wounds in any major conflict dating to World War I, according to
> research
> published in the Survey of Ophthalmology.
>
> It's a reflection of how eye injuries have become one of the most
> devastating consequences of a war in which roadside bombs, mortars and
> grenades are the
> most commonly used weapons against U.S. troops. Brain injuries and
> amputations have long been the focus of the damage such weapons are
> inflicting, but
> the Army has acknowledged in recent weeks that serious eye wounds have
> accumulated at almost twice the rate as wounds requiring amputations.
>
> FIND MORE STORIES IN:
> Iraq |
> Army |
> Va |
> Castro |
> Department of Veterans Affairs |
> Airborne Division |
> Ophthalmology
>
> Body armor that protects vital organs and the skull is saving lives. But
> troops' eyes and limbs remain particularly vulnerable to the blizzard of
> shrapnel
> from such explosions.
>
> Each explosion unleashes large metal shards and thousands of fragments,
> says Army Col. Robert Mazzoli, an ophthalmological consultant to the Army
> surgeon
> general. "Those small missiles are generally innocuous if they hit the
> (protected) forehead, face (or) chest but are devastating when they hit
> the eye,"
> he says.
>
> Surgical facilities are kept close to the fighting, so troops can be
> treated in minutes. Partial or total vision has been restored in most
> cases involving
> eye injuries, military statistics show. But hundreds of troops have been
> left with impaired vision, and dozens have been blinded.
>
> Troops in Iraq routinely wear protective eyewear, but it doesn't always
> work. When a roadside bomb in Baghdad blew a hole through the heavily
> armored vehicle
> carrying Army Sgt. Luis Martinez last April, the force from the blast
> stripped off his helmet, headset and goggles. After the dust settled,
> Martinez, 38,
> could see nothing out of his left eye and only streaks of blood in his
> right. He waited for help, terrified about the damage to his eyes.
>
> "That was the first thing I asked" hospital personnel, the National Guard
> soldier recalls. " 'Am I going to be blind?' "
>
> Surgeons later restored vision to his right eye, although bits of glass
> are embedded there. He remains blind in his left.
>
> "At least God was kind enough to protect me, to keep my right eye and see
> my family," says Martinez, of Vega Alta, Puerto Rico, who is married and
> the father
> of three.
>
> Formidable challenges await troops who return home blind or with serious
> eye injuries. In the most severe cases, they will struggle to cope
> emotionally
> and financially.
>
> About 70% of all sensory perception is through vision, says R. Cameron
> VanRoekel, an Army major and staff optometrist at Walter Reed Army Medical
> Center
> in Washington. As a result, the families of visually impaired soldiers
> wrestle with a contradiction: The wounded often have hard-driving
> personalities
> that have helped them succeed in the military. Now dependent on others,
> they find it difficult to accept help.
>
> Because the Pentagon has no rehabilitation services for the blind, the
> path to recovery often leads directly to the Department of Veterans
> Affairs. The
> VA operates 10 centers across the country for blind rehabilitation that
> teach visually impaired veterans how to function in society. The centers
> have 241
> beds, and it takes an average of nearly three months to get in. Iraq and
> Afghanistan casualties go to the front of the line, says Stan Poel, VA
> director
> of rehabilitation services for the blind. So far, 53 have enrolled in the
> blind rehabilitation programs, the VA says.
>
> The department plans to open three more centers beginning in 2010, Poel
> says.
>
> 'He has no light in his life'
>
> Even now, more than a year after her husband's return from Iraq, Connie
> Acosta is taken aback to find her home dark after sunset, the lights off
> as if no
> one is there.
>
> Then she finds him - sitting in a recliner in their Santa Fe Springs,
> Calif., house, listening to classic rock. Sgt. Maj. Jesse Acosta was
> blinded in a
> mortar attack 22 months ago. He doesn't need the lights.
>
> That realization often makes Connie cry. "You kind of never get used to
> the fact that he really can't see," she says. "He has no light in his life
> at all."
>
> The tiny piece of shrapnel that blinded Acosta, 50, an Army reservist,
> father of four and grandfather of three, was precise in its destruction.
>
> On the morning of Jan. 16 last year, Acosta led soldiers on a 3-mile
> fitness run across Camp Anaconda in Balad, Iraq. Suddenly, insurgents
> attacked the
> camp with mortars.
>
> Acosta remembers that he stopped, turned to yell at his soldiers and then
> dived for cover.
>
> "Bam! That was it," he recalls. "Lights out."
>
> An explosion about 60 feet away sent a piece of shrapnel - perhaps
> three-quarters of an inch long - through his left eye. It struck his brain
> and came out
> his right eye.
>
> "It was a perfect hit," Acosta says.
>
> Rushed to the Air Force Hospital at Anaconda, he spent seven hours in
> surgery. Army Maj. Raymond Cho, an ophthalmologist, removed Acosta's right
> eye and
> carefully reassembled his left one.
>
> "I didn't want him waking up missing both eyes and wondering for the rest
> of his life, 'Gosh, could they have saved at least one?' " Cho says. "So
> he knows
> that we did everything we could."
>
> Acosta regained consciousness as he was being returned to the USA. In
> Germany, a doctor told him that his right eye was gone and his left eye,
> although
> stitched together, likely would never see light.
>
> "He said, 'You're going to have to start a whole new life from here on,' "
> Acosta recalls.
>
> "I go, 'So I won't be able to see my kids? My grandkids? Nobody? I won't
> be able to see blue skies?'
>
> "He said, 'Nope.'
>
> "I just sat there. What could I do?
>
> "A lot of things went through my mind," Acosta says. "Am I going to be
> accepted this way? Am I going to be rejected? I was pretty independent all
> my life,
> and I did everything. So it was pretty tough."
>
> VA plans more clinics
>
> Pentagon doctors can rebuild eyes, reconstruct eye sockets and nurse
> casualties back to health, but soldiers with serious vision problems who
> want to learn
> how to adapt into civilian life must rely on VA centers that also serve
> the elderly and other veterans.
>
> The VA plans to invest $40 million this fiscal year to create 55
> outpatient clinics across the nation, providing rehabilitation for
> veterans learning to
> cope with partial vision, says James Orcutt, the VA's director for
> ophthalmology.
>
> The department also is taking part in two clinical trials focusing on
> artificial vision, says Ronald Schuchard, director of the Atlanta VA
> rehabilitation
> research and development center. The trials involve implanting silicon
> chips in eyes. The chips act as receptors that can transform light into
> electrical
> signals that can be transmitted to the brain. It is cutting-edge research,
> Schuchard says.
>
> However, Orcutt says, "I think we're a long way from a practical use of
> some of these."
>
> At the VA's rehab centers for the blind, specialists teach orientation and
> mobility skills. Visually impaired veterans learn to use a white cane,
> public
> transportation and perform daily routines. They also are offered computer
> instruction and the use of special scanners for reading text. They are
> assessed
> and treated, if necessary, for psychological readjustment to their sight
> loss.
>
> The VA does not provide guide dogs, but it helps link veterans with
> guide-dog schools that commonly provide a dog and training virtually free
> to veterans,
> Poel says.
>
> Iraq veterans sometimes find the VA blind rehab programs, which cater
> largely to elderly veterans, to be a poor fit for a younger generation.
> Army 1st Lt.
> Castro says he felt somewhat out of place during rehab at a VA facility in
> Augusta, Ga.
>
> After the Army sent Jesse Acosta to a VA center for the blind in Palo
> Alto, Calif., for rehabilitation in January 2006, he and his wife became
> unhappy with
> the facility, describing it as having a "nursing home" atmosphere. It is a
> five-hour drive from his home.
>
> "It did not fit my needs," Acosta says.
>
> He left the VA after a few months and was accepted, free of charge, into
> the Junior Blind of America rehab program near his home in Santa Fe
> Springs. Last
> month, he completed training with his new guide dog at The Seeing Eye
> school in Morristown, N.J., and now has Charlie, a German shepherd.
>
> All that is left, Acosta says, is figuring out the rest of his life.
>
> He has fought a medical discharge from the Army until his medical care is
> complete. Ultimately, he will earn disability income for his wounds.
> Acosta was
> an energy technician with Southern California Gas before he was called to
> active duty.
>
> He is still with the company, though unpaid, and a different job awaits
> him - one tailored to his disability, Connie Acosta says. It's unclear
> whether Jesse
> will want it, she says.
>
> "We're hoping for the best," she says. "He's the type that constantly has
> to be kept busy. We always have an agenda. I have a calendar going
> constantly
> with things happening."
>
> It begins when they wake, and he wants to know the weather and the color
> of the sky, she says. Nothing in the house can be moved; he's memorized
> the location
> of every chair and table.
>
> He has his routines and chores, including weightlifting in the backyard or
> fiddling with the fuel pump on the 1969 Dodge Dart. (He fixed it.)
> Daughter Brittany,
> 14, is mustered into duty to operate the computer for her father until she
> pleads for a break.
>
> "Taking care of Jesse has been an experience," Connie Acosta says. "He's a
> sergeant major in the Army, and they're tough people. He's a tough person
> to
> live with and then, worse, being blind.
>
> "Sometimes, he can be demanding. And I deal with it. I'm used to making
> sure that everything's in line. That he's got everything. And that's
> basically all
> I've got to do."
>
> 'I want to feel productive'
>
> Castro thought he knew how his life would play out.
>
> A former Army Ranger who had worked his way out of the enlisted ranks to
> earn an officer's commission, Castro commanded a scout reconnaissance
> platoon and
> dreamed of becoming a Special Forces team leader.
>
> Instead, the last thing he would ever see was the colorless expanse of an
> Iraqi roof in Youssifiyah, Iraq.
>
> A mortar round landed a few feet away from him there on Sept. 2, 2006. The
> blast killed two other soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division and sent
> shrapnel
> tearing into Castro's left side. The explosion damaged a shoulder, broke
> an arm, fractured facial bones and collapsed his lungs. Doctors amputated
> part
> of a finger.
>
> The blast also drove the frame of his protective eyewear into his face.
> When Castro regained consciousness days later at the National Naval
> Medical Center
> in Bethesda, Md., his wife, Evelyn, sat at his bedside. She told him his
> right eye was gone, but doctors hoped to salvage vision in his left.
>
> The surgeons later removed one last piece of shrapnel from that eye. When
> they took off his bandages and flashed a light for Castro to see, he
> thought the
> eye was still covered. "That's when he told me, 'Ivan, you're not going to
> be able to see again,' " Castro recalls. "I swore (it was like) I was
> standing
> between the World Trade Center and the two towers had just come down on my
> shoulders."
>
> From that moment on, through convalescence and rehabilitation, Castro
> would struggle to regain a measure of independence.
>
> Castro has become an advocate of rehabilitation funding for the blind,
> visiting members of Congress. After the 10-mile race in October, he ran
> the Marine
> Corps Marathon three weeks later, finishing in 4 hours and 14 minutes.
>
> He concedes that he needs his wife's help. Evelyn Galvis gave up her
> career as a bilingual speech pathologist in Fayetteville, N.C., to help
> her husband.
> She supervises his medical care and drives him around.
>
> She guides him through crowds, keeping him aware of raised edges in the
> walkway and steps. She reads his menu in restaurants and tells him where
> the food
> sits on the table. She watches him memorize his hotel room, starting from
> the doorway and circling within the four walls to keep account of beds,
> the tables,
> the wastebasket, the bathroom.
>
> "My husband used to be a very independent individual," she says.
>
> Castro hopes to stay in the military.
>
> The Army has let several amputees stay in the ranks as well as one blind
> captain, who will be an instructor at West Point Military Academy after
> completing
> post-graduate education. Castro awaits word on his future; the Pentagon
> won't comment on his situation.
>
> "There's a world in front of me I can't predict or envision because I
> haven't been there yet. I haven't lived this yet. I haven't lived blind,"
> he says.
> "All I ask is to stay in the Army and finish out my years . I want to feel
> productive."
>
> The only good news for now is when he sleeps, Castro says.
>
> "I've had dreams where I know I'm blind and, guess what? I've regained my
> vision," he says. Reality floods back each morning.
>
> "There's not a night that I don't pray and ask God, when I wake up, that I
> wake up seeing."
>
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-------------- next part --------------
Brad and All,
We the members of the NABV need to be seeking the locations where the Military is keeping our Brothers and Sisters with eye injuries and doing our best to visit them before they get too depressed and tell them that we are there for them. I wish you all could be at Washington Seminar and perhaps we could all go to Walter Reed to Visit Vets who have serious eye injuries. What do you all think about that. I am willing to stay over until Friday to make such a visit.
Perhaps Joann and John at National headquarters could help us facilitate that. I am copying them on this mail.
Dwight
In a message dated 11/15/2007 9:41:58 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, beloos at neb.rr.com writes:
We need to discuss what we, the Blind Veterans Division of the National
Federation of the Blind, can do about the attitudes of these veterans and
people dealing with these veterans, including their families.
As I said at Convention when we were organizing, the Veterans Administration
may be there for technology and medical treatments, but I didn't get
positive attitude from the Veterans Administration. I got that from the
National Federation of the Blind. We need to offer that to the people in
this article.
What can we do about this?
Brad Loos
>
> Blinded by war: Injuries send troops into darkness -
> By
> Gregg Zoroya
> , USA TODAY
>
> ARLINGTON, Va. - Two days before a 10-mile race here, Army 1st Lt. Ivan
> Castro is explaining how he will run tethered to another soldier - one who
> can see.
>
> As he speaks, his wife lovingly extends her right hand to Castro's face,
> fingers outstretched. But Evelyn Galvis pauses inches away.
>
> "I used to be able to reach out and touch him, caress him, without telling
> him first, 'I'm going to touch your face,' " she says. Now, "if I just
> reach
> out and touch him, he'll startle."
>
> Castro, 40, a paratrooper with the 82nd Airborne Division, is one of more
> than 1,100 veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan - 13% of all seriously wounded
> casualties
> - to undergo surgery for damaged eyes. That is the highest percentage for
> eye wounds in any major conflict dating to World War I, according to
> research
> published in the Survey of Ophthalmology.
>
> It's a reflection of how eye injuries have become one of the most
> devastating consequences of a war in which roadside bombs, mortars and
> grenades are the
> most commonly used weapons against U.S. troops. Brain injuries and
> amputations have long been the focus of the damage such weapons are
> inflicting, but
> the Army has acknowledged in recent weeks that serious eye wounds have
> accumulated at almost twice the rate as wounds requiring amputations.
>
> FIND MORE STORIES IN:
> Iraq |
> Army |
> Va |
> Castro |
> Department of Veterans Affairs |
> Airborne Division |
> Ophthalmology
>
> Body armor that protects vital organs and the skull is saving lives. But
> troops' eyes and limbs remain particularly vulnerable to the blizzard of
> shrapnel
> from such explosions.
>
> Each explosion unleashes large metal shards and thousands of fragments,
> says Army Col. Robert Mazzoli, an ophthalmological consultant to the Army
> surgeon
> general. "Those small missiles are generally innocuous if they hit the
> (protected) forehead, face (or) chest but are devastating when they hit
> the eye,"
> he says.
>
> Surgical facilities are kept close to the fighting, so troops can be
> treated in minutes. Partial or total vision has been restored in most
> cases involving
> eye injuries, military statistics show. But hundreds of troops have been
> left with impaired vision, and dozens have been blinded.
>
> Troops in Iraq routinely wear protective eyewear, but it doesn't always
> work. When a roadside bomb in Baghdad blew a hole through the heavily
> armored vehicle
> carrying Army Sgt. Luis Martinez last April, the force from the blast
> stripped off his helmet, headset and goggles. After the dust settled,
> Martinez, 38,
> could see nothing out of his left eye and only streaks of blood in his
> right. He waited for help, terrified about the damage to his eyes.
>
> "That was the first thing I asked" hospital personnel, the National Guard
> soldier recalls. " 'Am I going to be blind?' "
>
> Surgeons later restored vision to his right eye, although bits of glass
> are embedded there. He remains blind in his left.
>
> "At least God was kind enough to protect me, to keep my right eye and see
> my family," says Martinez, of Vega Alta, Puerto Rico, who is married and
> the father
> of three.
>
> Formidable challenges await troops who return home blind or with serious
> eye injuries. In the most severe cases, they will struggle to cope
> emotionally
> and financially.
>
> About 70% of all sensory perception is through vision, says R. Cameron
> VanRoekel, an Army major and staff optometrist at Walter Reed Army Medical
> Center
> in Washington. As a result, the families of visually impaired soldiers
> wrestle with a contradiction: The wounded often have hard-driving
> personalities
> that have helped them succeed in the military. Now dependent on others,
> they find it difficult to accept help.
>
> Because the Pentagon has no rehabilitation services for the blind, the
> path to recovery often leads directly to the Department of Veterans
> Affairs. The
> VA operates 10 centers across the country for blind rehabilitation that
> teach visually impaired veterans how to function in society. The centers
> have 241
> beds, and it takes an average of nearly three months to get in. Iraq and
> Afghanistan casualties go to the front of the line, says Stan Poel, VA
> director
> of rehabilitation services for the blind. So far, 53 have enrolled in the
> blind rehabilitation programs, the VA says.
>
> The department plans to open three more centers beginning in 2010, Poel
> says.
>
> 'He has no light in his life'
>
> Even now, more than a year after her husband's return from Iraq, Connie
> Acosta is taken aback to find her home dark after sunset, the lights off
> as if no
> one is there.
>
> Then she finds him - sitting in a recliner in their Santa Fe Springs,
> Calif., house, listening to classic rock. Sgt. Maj. Jesse Acosta was
> blinded in a
> mortar attack 22 months ago. He doesn't need the lights.
>
> That realization often makes Connie cry. "You kind of never get used to
> the fact that he really can't see," she says. "He has no light in his life
> at all."
>
> The tiny piece of shrapnel that blinded Acosta, 50, an Army reservist,
> father of four and grandfather of three, was precise in its destruction.
>
> On the morning of Jan. 16 last year, Acosta led soldiers on a 3-mile
> fitness run across Camp Anaconda in Balad, Iraq. Suddenly, insurgents
> attacked the
> camp with mortars.
>
> Acosta remembers that he stopped, turned to yell at his soldiers and then
> dived for cover.
>
> "Bam! That was it," he recalls. "Lights out."
>
> An explosion about 60 feet away sent a piece of shrapnel - perhaps
> three-quarters of an inch long - through his left eye. It struck his brain
> and came out
> his right eye.
>
> "It was a perfect hit," Acosta says.
>
> Rushed to the Air Force Hospital at Anaconda, he spent seven hours in
> surgery. Army Maj. Raymond Cho, an ophthalmologist, removed Acosta's right
> eye and
> carefully reassembled his left one.
>
> "I didn't want him waking up missing both eyes and wondering for the rest
> of his life, 'Gosh, could they have saved at least one?' " Cho says. "So
> he knows
> that we did everything we could."
>
> Acosta regained consciousness as he was being returned to the USA. In
> Germany, a doctor told him that his right eye was gone and his left eye,
> although
> stitched together, likely would never see light.
>
> "He said, 'You're going to have to start a whole new life from here on,' "
> Acosta recalls.
>
> "I go, 'So I won't be able to see my kids? My grandkids? Nobody? I won't
> be able to see blue skies?'
>
> "He said, 'Nope.'
>
> "I just sat there. What could I do?
>
> "A lot of things went through my mind," Acosta says. "Am I going to be
> accepted this way? Am I going to be rejected? I was pretty independent all
> my life,
> and I did everything. So it was pretty tough."
>
> VA plans more clinics
>
> Pentagon doctors can rebuild eyes, reconstruct eye sockets and nurse
> casualties back to health, but soldiers with serious vision problems who
> want to learn
> how to adapt into civilian life must rely on VA centers that also serve
> the elderly and other veterans.
>
> The VA plans to invest $40 million this fiscal year to create 55
> outpatient clinics across the nation, providing rehabilitation for
> veterans learning to
> cope with partial vision, says James Orcutt, the VA's director for
> ophthalmology.
>
> The department also is taking part in two clinical trials focusing on
> artificial vision, says Ronald Schuchard, director of the Atlanta VA
> rehabilitation
> research and development center. The trials involve implanting silicon
> chips in eyes. The chips act as receptors that can transform light into
> electrical
> signals that can be transmitted to the brain. It is cutting-edge research,
> Schuchard says.
>
> However, Orcutt says, "I think we're a long way from a practical use of
> some of these."
>
> At the VA's rehab centers for the blind, specialists teach orientation and
> mobility skills. Visually impaired veterans learn to use a white cane,
> public
> transportation and perform daily routines. They also are offered computer
> instruction and the use of special scanners for reading text. They are
> assessed
> and treated, if necessary, for psychological readjustment to their sight
> loss.
>
> The VA does not provide guide dogs, but it helps link veterans with
> guide-dog schools that commonly provide a dog and training virtually free
> to veterans,
> Poel says.
>
> Iraq veterans sometimes find the VA blind rehab programs, which cater
> largely to elderly veterans, to be a poor fit for a younger generation.
> Army 1st Lt.
> Castro says he felt somewhat out of place during rehab at a VA facility in
> Augusta, Ga.
>
> After the Army sent Jesse Acosta to a VA center for the blind in Palo
> Alto, Calif., for rehabilitation in January 2006, he and his wife became
> unhappy with
> the facility, describing it as having a "nursing home" atmosphere. It is a
> five-hour drive from his home.
>
> "It did not fit my needs," Acosta says.
>
> He left the VA after a few months and was accepted, free of charge, into
> the Junior Blind of America rehab program near his home in Santa Fe
> Springs. Last
> month, he completed training with his new guide dog at The Seeing Eye
> school in Morristown, N.J., and now has Charlie, a German shepherd.
>
> All that is left, Acosta says, is figuring out the rest of his life.
>
> He has fought a medical discharge from the Army until his medical care is
> complete. Ultimately, he will earn disability income for his wounds.
> Acosta was
> an energy technician with Southern California Gas before he was called to
> active duty.
>
> He is still with the company, though unpaid, and a different job awaits
> him - one tailored to his disability, Connie Acosta says. It's unclear
> whether Jesse
> will want it, she says.
>
> "We're hoping for the best," she says. "He's the type that constantly has
> to be kept busy. We always have an agenda. I have a calendar going
> constantly
> with things happening."
>
> It begins when they wake, and he wants to know the weather and the color
> of the sky, she says. Nothing in the house can be moved; he's memorized
> the location
> of every chair and table.
>
> He has his routines and chores, including weightlifting in the backyard or
> fiddling with the fuel pump on the 1969 Dodge Dart. (He fixed it.)
> Daughter Brittany,
> 14, is mustered into duty to operate the computer for her father until she
> pleads for a break.
>
> "Taking care of Jesse has been an experience," Connie Acosta says. "He's a
> sergeant major in the Army, and they're tough people. He's a tough person
> to
> live with and then, worse, being blind.
>
> "Sometimes, he can be demanding. And I deal with it. I'm used to making
> sure that everything's in line. That he's got everything. And that's
> basically all
> I've got to do."
>
> 'I want to feel productive'
>
> Castro thought he knew how his life would play out.
>
> A former Army Ranger who had worked his way out of the enlisted ranks to
> earn an officer's commission, Castro commanded a scout reconnaissance
> platoon and
> dreamed of becoming a Special Forces team leader.
>
> Instead, the last thing he would ever see was the colorless expanse of an
> Iraqi roof in Youssifiyah, Iraq.
>
> A mortar round landed a few feet away from him there on Sept. 2, 2006. The
> blast killed two other soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division and sent
> shrapnel
> tearing into Castro's left side. The explosion damaged a shoulder, broke
> an arm, fractured facial bones and collapsed his lungs. Doctors amputated
> part
> of a finger.
>
> The blast also drove the frame of his protective eyewear into his face.
> When Castro regained consciousness days later at the National Naval
> Medical Center
> in Bethesda, Md., his wife, Evelyn, sat at his bedside. She told him his
> right eye was gone, but doctors hoped to salvage vision in his left.
>
> The surgeons later removed one last piece of shrapnel from that eye. When
> they took off his bandages and flashed a light for Castro to see, he
> thought the
> eye was still covered. "That's when he told me, 'Ivan, you're not going to
> be able to see again,' " Castro recalls. "I swore (it was like) I was
> standing
> between the World Trade Center and the two towers had just come down on my
> shoulders."
>
> From that moment on, through convalescence and rehabilitation, Castro
> would struggle to regain a measure of independence.
>
> Castro has become an advocate of rehabilitation funding for the blind,
> visiting members of Congress. After the 10-mile race in October, he ran
> the Marine
> Corps Marathon three weeks later, finishing in 4 hours and 14 minutes.
>
> He concedes that he needs his wife's help. Evelyn Galvis gave up her
> career as a bilingual speech pathologist in Fayetteville, N.C., to help
> her husband.
> She supervises his medical care and drives him around.
>
> She guides him through crowds, keeping him aware of raised edges in the
> walkway and steps. She reads his menu in restaurants and tells him where
> the food
> sits on the table. She watches him memorize his hotel room, starting from
> the doorway and circling within the four walls to keep account of beds,
> the tables,
> the wastebasket, the bathroom.
>
> "My husband used to be a very independent individual," she says.
>
> Castro hopes to stay in the military.
>
> The Army has let several amputees stay in the ranks as well as one blind
> captain, who will be an instructor at West Point Military Academy after
> completing
> post-graduate education. Castro awaits word on his future; the Pentagon
> won't comment on his situation.
>
> "There's a world in front of me I can't predict or envision because I
> haven't been there yet. I haven't lived this yet. I haven't lived blind,"
> he says.
> "All I ask is to stay in the Army and finish out my years . I want to feel
> productive."
>
> The only good news for now is when he sleeps, Castro says.
>
> "I've had dreams where I know I'm blind and, guess what? I've regained my
> vision," he says. Reality floods back each morning.
>
> "There's not a night that I don't pray and ask God, when I wake up, that I
> wake up seeing."
>
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