10th Cav. Soldier recovers from blast with Family support

Photo By Sgt. 1st Class Benjamin Crane | Sgt. Kristie Edwards, a native of Radcliff, Ky., who serves as a personnel section...... read more read more

Photo By Sgt. 1st Class Benjamin Crane | Sgt. Kristie Edwards, a native of Radcliff, Ky., who serves as a personnel section non-commissioned officer with Troop D, 4th Squadron, 10th Cavalry Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, attached to 2nd BCT, 101st Airborne Div., Multi-National Division – Baghdad, sits at her desk in front of pictures of her family in her office at Camp Liberty, Oct. 13, 2008.  see less | View Image Page

BAGHDAD, IRAQ

10.17.2008

Story by Spc. Benjamin Crane 

Multi-National Division Baghdad

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By Spc. Benjamin Crane
Multi-National Division - Baghdad

BAGHDAD – American Soldiers work diligently during their deployments. Even when they are faced with adversity, they find ways to work through difficulties and get their various jobs done.

Sgt. Kristie Edwards, of Radcliff, Ky., who serves as a personnel section non-commissioned officer, Troop D, 4th Squadron, 10th Cavalry Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, attached to 2nd BCT, 101st Airborne Div., Multi-National Division – Baghdad, is a good example of overcoming adversity.

Early this year, on Jan. 29, 2008, Edwards, a mother of two, was searching Iraqi females at a check point in Baghdad.

"We were at check point 11A doing female searches. I was supervising the Daughters of Iraq doing the searches on the Iraqi women," said Edwards. "The [improvised explosive device] was placed inside the sandbag wall where we were standing."

When the IED blew up, Edwards was knocked to the ground and things went silent for her.

"After the blast, you don't hear anything; you don't see anything," she said. "It's all just white dust everywhere. I started freaking out because it just dropped me straight where I was standing, face first. It was like I couldn't move and everything was going in slow motion."

After reaching for something to stabilize her but finding nothing, Edwards laid on the ground. Her first thought was that she was missing some extremities due to lack of feeling in her body.

"I thought my leg was gone because I couldn't feel it and I was thinking, 'Oh my God!'" she said. "A couple minutes later some one came up and pulled me around to the other sand bag wall where I saw two other guys who were hurt. It seems so unreal but you could hear the gun shots close by and I was thinking, 'Do I need to get my weapon and am I going to shoot somebody? What's going on?'"

With members of her unit hurt and bleeding around her, she realized that she still had all her limbs but had yet to discover that she was injured beyond nearly being knocked out.

"I got shrapnel in my ankle but I didn't know it. I just thought I twisted it when I fell," she said. "I tried to grab some litters to help the other guys to the Bradley [fighting vehicle] and I didn't know my ankle was hurt until I took my boot off and there it was."

Edward's husband, Staff Sgt. Rodney Edwards, who serves in the same unit, reacted as most husbands would upon receiving news that their wife was hurt or wounded.

"My first reaction was panic," he said. "I just ran out of the motor pool non-stop until I made it to my wife's side. They tried to stop me when I got to Riva Ridge [aid station] but I busted right through the doors."

Edwards was sent to Qatar for a couple weeks after she left the combat support hospital in Baghdad while her wound healed, and it wasn't long before she was back in the saddle with her unit.

There were no fatalities in the blast that was only ten feet away from Edwards and her fellow Soldiers. Each one of the wounded was awarded the Combat Action Badge and Purple Heart Medal for their involvement by Lt. Col. Monty Willoughby, commander of 4th Squadron, 10th Cav. Regt.

Edwards now works in the orderly room at her unit's headquarters at Camp Liberty. The near-disastrous experience is something that she says she will always carry with her.

"I am fine now but I can tell there is a difference in how I think or how I act. I am really, really sensitive now," she said. "If I start talking or thinking about something that's sad, I will just start crying, really crying, and I wasn't like that before."

Edwards's physical wounds have healed now and she is lucky enough to have her husband nearby to support her, and the love of her two children, Rashawn, 13, and Raciona, 4, to look to for strength.

"I have tried to comfort her in every way possible," said Edwards. "I have been encouraging her to continue to do her best and don't let the injury bring her down emotionally and physically."

They say that time heals all wounds, and though that may be true, perhaps a better way to express those sentiments would be to say that time, along with the love of a supportive family and the support of friends, heals all wounds.

In the example of Sgt. Kristie Edwards, such is proving to be the case.