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When the wounded soldier first met physical therapist Kerrie Golden (’89), he had already struggled two years with injuries from one terrible day in Iraq.

Sgt. Maj. Robert Haemmerle had been unable to move his shoulder since October 2006 in Ramadi, a violence-wracked town in Iraq’s Sunni Triangle. A blast from an improvised explosive device had knocked Haemmerle off a 10-foot wall, and he banged his shoulder and knee. Later that day a rocket propelled grenade hit the building he was in; he got a big blow to the head, resulting in lingering problems with concentration.

Doctors initially didn’t find any permanent problems, so Haemmerle remained in Iraq and didn’t have his injuries treated. There were others who needed more help than he did, he says. But he could no longer raise his arms to pull his body armor over his head – he had to wriggle into it, left arm first, his head buffeted by the ceramic plates.

“It was not fun,” he says.

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