Just a truck on the side of the road

For starters I will tell you a little about what happened to me and then we will go from there. I was wounded during combat in Iraq on July 14 2003. We were ambushed from the side of the road by Insurgents. They had set up an I.E.D. (Improvised Explosive Device) near a truck that looked like it had broken down. Like most vehicles there this was not uncommon however when our vehicle approached they attacked, detonating the I.E.D., shrapnel tore through the HUMVEE like rocks falling through a wet paper towel. I was hit by the burning hot metal in two locations the first my right thigh and second my left foot. It didn’t do much but a small flesh wound through the muscle tissue in my thigh. This was obsolete when looking at blood pouring from my boot. It was a massive hole the size of a quarter and it went through my foot like a drill. Starting at the middle of the arch going all the way across. The nerve was destroyed, the artery was severed and I was loosing a lot of blood. I started my timer on my watch after I realized what happened. I wanted to make sure that if I passed out the doctors would know when it happened and how long I had been bleeding. Forty four minutes to be exact. Now I have to say that I am not a doctor in any way, but when any one bleeds from an artery for that long you shouldn’t still be breathing. In my case however I was! Now I am not saying it wasn’t tough being hurt, but the things that followed were VERY trying on anyone…