The following testimonial is from the father-in-law of an SGB scholarship recipient — a veteran who served 14 years as an Air Force EOD technician (the role portrayed by Jeremy Renner in The Hurt Locker) across multiple deployments. He was also the only Air Force EOD tech to become an Army Ranger, finishing first in his Ranger class.
"About 1 minute after meeting up with him in the recovery room, one of the staff came to check on him. Then she left. He looks at me and said loudly and with a look of bewilderment, 'For the first time since I can remember, I did not get a massive shot of adrenaline and anxiety from talking to her.' He said it always felt like he was literally drowning and he couldn't get air. Basically it was horrible... with every encounter."
"He went on to say this happens with every single human encounter, even with his kids and my daughter. He had a ton of trouble processing that the adrenaline and anxiety was absent. He could not make sense of the 'normal' feeling. This goes back to when his Mom committed suicide over 20 years ago when he was 14."
"Toss in the multitude of concussive forces he endured in EOD while deactivating various bombs, and he has serious TBI from hundreds of concussive forces."
"3 days later and he is loving life. He feels he can actually be present. He now has incredible optimism about his life. He is now applying for a better engineering position with a different defense contractor at about a $100K raise."
"He just finished his master's in engineering and business from Purdue, but his TBI affects him quite a bit. His undergrad was in physics and math. 4.0."
"I thought you should know how life changing this is for him and his family. It's a miracle. I am eternally grateful. He never would have spent his own money, feeling himself not worthy of the expenditure."
— Father-in-law of SGB scholarship recipient, U.S. Air Force EOD / Army Ranger veteran with full TBI disability