"I really had a hard time wanting to even be here. They told me last month I have chronic post-traumatic stress syndrome so I meet once a week with a psychologist. It helps to talk to someone. Basically I just can't sleep. I literally only get maybe 3 or 4 hours of sleep a night. It's a very restless sleep. It's strange because I wear myself out. I do as much as I can physically and probably too much emotionally. I'm just never tired. I'm tired. I just can't sleep.

When I got to Walter Reed, there were support groups for all the soldiers who got injured in Iraq. I was the only female. It started off people really talking about their injuries, and it just became a woman bashing scenario. I was very uncomfortable. I felt very let down. It would be nice to say that everyone is nice and treats you as equals, but they don't.

Someone asked me the other day, how does it feel to know that you were going over there and one of your missions was to find WMDs and how does it make you feel to not have found any? It's disappointing. You go in with a mindset as a soldier that you have a mission. We found Saddam that was amazing. The fact that we haven't found any weapons that's upsetting. So here my brother's gone over there in January, so now what's the mission?

Being part of the United States, what our main goal always seems to be is going in and proving that we're a super power. Why are we trying to prove that?

All I really want out of this is to be able to walk again, to run again. I went from the star athlete to not being able to do six repetitions. It's a very slow process, but I'm dealing with it. I don't need a medal or any kind of badge or award that says who I am because I know who I am. I'm not a hero. I'm a survivor."