Posted on 10/29/2006 2:26:34 PM PST by SandRat
Army Spc. Claudia Carreon has a 2-year-old daughter, but cannot remember being pregnant or giving birth.
She has two brothers and two sisters, but doesn't know who they are without nametags. She sometimes can't recall what she ate for breakfast, or where she put things when she cleaned up. "My mother found the toaster in the refrigerator," said Carreon, 32, an Iraq War veteran left with a brain injury that wiped her memory clean.
The Tucson woman now lives in a discombobulated world, where conversations often don't make sense, hallucinations come without warning and relationships must be reconstructed daily from videos and photo albums. There are some bonds that can't be mended. Carreon said she and her husband of three years are divorcing. But, for a few hours a week, the wounded soldier's troubles seem to melt away at a ranch on the Northeast Side.
Carreon is one of the first participants in a new horseback riding program for sick and injured veterans, said to be one of a few of its kind in the nation.
The program was set up recently by Therapeutic Riding of Tucson, also known as TROT, a local nonprofit that's been helping people with disabilities for three decades. TROT's usual clients are people with autism, hearing or vision loss, Down syndrome or spinal-cord injuries. The request for a veterans program came from staffers at the Southern Arizona VA Health Care System, and is being funded by private donations, said Mary Vardi, the agency's program director.
Vardi said she lived in Israel for 20 years and ran a riding program there that included Israeli soldiers wounded in bomb attacks.
Veterans get physical and psychological benefits from horseback riding, she said. They improve their balance and muscle tone and gain confidence that comes from accomplishment. The horse's gait is comforting, like the rhythm of a heartbeat. And to Vardi, the beasts exude compassion, sensing the need to be gentle with the troubled souls in the saddle.
"There is a magic in these animals, and I feel privileged to witness it," Vardi said. "To see the bond that develops between the horses and riders is really incredible." Carreon clearly is smitten with Thunder, a 25-year-old gray speckled quarter horse.
"You're a good boy. You're beautiful," she murmured, kissing him on the forehead and leaving a lipstick mark on his brow after a riding session on Friday morning. Up in the saddle, surrounded by mesquite trees and mountains, "I feel happy and relaxed," Carreon said. "It's a great feeling to be able to do something I was told I'd never be able to do."
Small triumphs are now a big deal now to Carreon, who has had to reinvent herself in ways that are hard to imagine for those not in her shoes.
A native of Nogales, Sonora, Carreon joined the Army National Guard in 2000, the same year she obtained U.S. citizenship. She doesn't remember joining the military. Her mother told her she did it "because I wanted to say thank you to the country that gave me an opportunity to be here," Carreon said. By June 2003, she was in Iraq with the Guard's 2222nd Transportation Company, working on fuel-transportation convoys.
She was injured in a head-on collision between an Iraqi truck and an Army vehicle, she said. When she awoke, her world began to come unglued. Without memory, friends and relatives seemed like foreigners.
She's been absent for much of her daughter's short life, with long stretches spent at a veterans hospital in Palo Alto, Calif., that specializes in treating troops whose brain wiring has been scrambled by bomb blasts or accidents overseas. "There was a little girl who called me Mommy. But I didn't feel the love that a mother has for her child," said Carreon, who has since managed to reclaim some connection to daughter Sandra by studying photo albums and watching home movies of the tot.
Carreon, who lives with her mother and daughter on Tucson's South Side — she is not able to parent her child alone — now documents in writing or on videotape everything her youngster does. Otherwise, she said, she won't be able to recall her daughter's early years as time passes.
"The notes and the pictures, those are my memory. When I look back, that's how I can tell what's real."
To help her recall who her siblings are, Carreon writes their names on family photos and keeps them on her nightstand, scanning them each evening before bed to see which names and faces go together.
Carreon is still a member of the military — now attached to a medical-hold Army Reserve unit in Washington state. A panel soon will review her case to see if she should be discharged, she said.
Besides memory loss, she has other problems: fainting spells that have robbed her of the ability to drive and hallucinations that startle her. She'll see someone creeping down the stairs or people darting in front of moving vehicles — when there's actually no one there. "It's difficult, but you have to be positive and learn how to live with this," Carreon said. "You have to go forward and go on."
Vardi, TROT's program director, said that six weeks into the riding program, she's already seeing progress in Carreon's cognitive abilities.
"Claudia seems very happy on the horse, and it does seem to be helping with her memory skills," Vardi said. For example, she said, Carreon now is able to remember from week to week the riding instructions she received in earlier sessions.
Rene Suarez, a 31-year-old Navy veteran who suffers from rheumatoid arthritis and also is in the new riding program, said it's easy for people who are sick or disabled to get depressed and lie around all day. Horseback riding keeps veterans connected to the community by getting them out of the house for fresh air and fun, he said.
"If you start feeling down about yourself and your condition, you tend to withdraw. This forces you to be around people, and that in itself is a big boost."
* Contact reporter Carol Ann Alaimo at 573-4138 or at calaimo@azstarnet.com.
Because she can't remember names including those of her own family members, Army Spc. Claudia Carreon, holding her daughter, Sandra, 2, looks over photo albums every day to refresh her memory. Carreon suffered a brain injury in Iraq in a head-on collision with an Iraqi truck. She can't even recall giving birth.
david sanders / Arizona Daily Star
More Photos (3):
Claudia Carreon in Iraq with part of the wing of an Iraqi aircraft that was shot down.
God Bless her and keep her and her family in His loving grace.
In sickness and in health, 'til death do us part??
God bless and keep her, indeed.
The horseback riding program sounds like a good idea. And sometimes time and effort can make new synaptic connections in the brain.
She has my prayers.
Sad isn't it. Let's hope the nation remembers , we owe her.
Regards.
I thank God for her service, and for her resilient spirit.
If it might be Your will, Father, would You heal this woman even as You have healed the woman who touched the hem of Your Garment? You are God - and You can do anything. I ask it in Jesus name...
Prayers....
There was some movie in the past 2-3 years with this as its theme...
She is a lovely woman.
Prayers for her recovery.
If only life were that black and white.
That was "50 First Dates" with Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore. I liked it - I thought his efforts to help her with her own memory loss were very touching.
"Hi, I'm Tom!" :-)
Prayers up for her and her family...
Guy Pearce, very versatile Australian actor.
He was looking at old pictures and found one of my husband, and for some reason, remembered him. He called to see if MGD could help him remember more about the time they knew each other.
I pray that this woman will find a memory which will link to more and more and that she recovers.
Brain injuries are a tough one - yes in sickness and health - but it's not ever like it is in movies.
There are two that I recall. "50 First Dates", with Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore, a well-done comedy, and another one, the title of which escapes me right now.
The premise of both movies is a persons' inability to make new memories, and so they must write down, photograph, tatoo, or somehow record everything that happens, so-as to learn it again --- over and over.
The second movie was rather chilling as I remember, but I watched it late, after a hard evening of freeping... Memento! I think that's it. Can't recall who starred in it...............FRegards
(Note to self: read all posts before posting!)..............FRegards
Bingo!
You know who I'm talking about.
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Iraq war casualty Claudia Carreon kisses Thunder, the quarterhorse she rides at Therapeutic Riding of Tucson as part of her therapy.
With letters of appreciation and certificates from basic training and her service in Iraq, which she cannot remember, Claudia Carreon enjoys time with daughter Sandra at home on Tucson's South Side. She wears her Army boots, which she loves, though she can't recall her service."