A Time To Heal

Recuperating From The Physical And Emotional Scars

(CBS)  At Fort Hood, Texas, the soldiers of the 4th Infantry Division are training for an eventual return to Iraq. "My job now is to get all my guys trained up and ready to go over," says Cpl. Michael Potter.

Potter will go with them, but first he’s getting used to using his hands again. "The recovery for my hands was a very long and painful process," he says.

Both of Potter's hands were severely burned. "I couldn’t open up a soda bottle," he remembers.

For now, he's simply glad to be alive. "I learned to appreciate life more, not, you know, take as many things for granted. It could happen again, you never know," he says.

But one soldier isn’t ready to rejoin his comrades. Sgt. Justin Farrar, like many soldiers who serve in Iraq, suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder. He's having a hard time recovering emotionally from the attack.

"It's not my fault, and I've been told by all kinds of people and everybody, but before we left, I mean...," he says.

"You felt like you should have been closer to Capt. Funkhouser?" Katie Couric asks.

"I felt like I should have protected him better," Farrar says.

"But he told you to fall back a little, didn't he?" Couric asks.

"Yeah. He was still my primary mission," he says.

Back at home, Farrar says he can't put his uniform on. "I look at it everyday and it's hard," he says.

Asked what he is afraid of, Farrar tells Couric, "I don't know. I think I'm afraid of the whole thing, the whole experience to get coming out again."

Fortunately, Farrar has other things to live for now — his wife, and his infant daughter. "There was times when I was sitting on the ground in Iraq and it hurt so bad I wanted to quit. I wanted to give up. And when I closed my eyes, that was who I seen.I mean that's why I opened my eyes again. You know, her, my baby and my wife, that's what got me home."

Staff Sgt. Nathan Reed, on the other hand, is getting back in shape, so he can return to active duty at Fort Knox, Ky. "For the most part, I mean, I cherish every day like it was my last day," he says.

"How’s your wife doing with all this?" Couric asks.

"She’s doing good," Reed replies.

"She’s happy to have you home and alive," Couric says.

"Yeah, she’s happy to have me alive, safe, back home," he says.

Last summer, Kimberly Dozier began to learn to walk again, too, slowly and painfully.

Asked what it was like walking for the first time, Dozier tells Couric, "To take the first few steps with, first, a walker, it was devastating and depressing. I couldn't believe that I couldn't walk. Then I would look down the hall and see guys who had lost limbs, who had horrible brain injuries and I'd think, 'I can deal with this... they have a lot more to get through.'"

[sting_21]

To Sgt. Justin Farrar, I lost my Aircraft Commander, Co-Pilot and Flt. Engineer in a classified helicopter operation over the ocean. I broke my back in 4 places and told I would never walk again and then told the search for my crew was called off the same day. That was 23 years ago and just 4 years ago I got help for PTSD. I left the hospital 23 years ago and walked out and went back to my unit and put on my flight suit and went to work but was not allowed to fly. The people in my unit had said their goodbys to my crew 4 months prior and didn't want to bring it up again. I had been in a VA hospital as active duty and no one to hear me tell my feelings. A year ago I went to the widows of my crew and told them how I felt and they told me that they thank God that I survived to tell them of the last moments of their husbands and not left in the dark wondering. It was the best medicine I have ever got.I have made a memorial to my crew to remember them and honor them and not sit and think of what I could or should have done differently. Remember your Capt. and be proud of him, but press on. It will eat you up as it did me for 19 years. Forward March and don't retreat.

[sting_21]

Have tried to make a comment on the show "Flashpoint" of Kimberly Dozier. The comment button will not work.
I relate to the feelings of Kimberly and the soldiers. I was medicaly retired from the military and in the past 4 years have finally got help for PTSD. I lost my Helicopter crew in the ocean and they were never found. I have survivors guilt. I have discovered I am not at fault and the widows have expressed that without me, they would have never known what happened to their husbands and are greatful I survived to tell them. I found the story however very anti war in its speaking of all that have died. Freedom is not free. We are a nation that fights for freedom for others as we fought for ours. Our religion has its radicals such as Jonestown and David Korish? in Waco, TX. We are not in Iraq to change their religion but to allow them practice it freely and not be under the thumb of a tyrant. We have the best military, best trained, best eqiuped. Let them do their job. If a soldier does something wrong, that soldier will be policed by his/her own. The media brings it into the living rooms and people want prosecute them in public court. People do not know of the justice that the military will bring upon that soldier without public opinion. Some polictian will use the situation for a steping stone for their own career. Soldiers are warriors, so let them do their job and take off the restraints and they will show progress and come home faster and less lives will be lost.