I served in the U.S. Army infantry for four years before transitioning to civilian life. These days, I’m studying Business Administration at Columbus State Community College, working toward a future that combines leadership, discipline, and purpose.
I wrote “Invisible Battles” for every soldier who’s fighting the kind of war no one sees—the one inside their own mind. Many of us leave the military carrying invisible wounds like TBIs, PTSD, depression, and anxiety. I wanted to remind them they’re not alone and that the same grit, patience, and resilience that got us through our military service are the same qualities that can get us through healing.
No matter how lost you may feel right now, you can rebuild. The fire you once had isn’t gone, it’s just waiting for you to uncover it again. When people picture military injuries, they usually think of what they can see: scars, wheelchairs, prosthetics. But some of the hardest battles are fought invisibly.
My invisible battle was a traumatic brain injury (TBI).
On the outside, I looked fine. Inside, I was fighting to hold onto memory, clarity, and focus. Some days I could work or study without much trouble. Other days, information slipped away almost as quickly as I learned it. Conversations blurred. Pages of text became mazes. The hardest part was the unpredictability—I never knew which version of myself I would wake up to.
In the Army, discipline could hold a unit together. After my TBI, I realized discipline was the only thing holding me together.
Invisible Battles
Surviving Through Structure
When the injury first hit, discipline wasn’t optional—it was survival.
I built rigid structure into my days. I woke up at the same time, broke tasks into smaller pieces, and leaned on systems to catch what my memory couldn’t. I tracked assignments, reminders, and appointments with a precision I had never needed before.
It didn’t make the TBI vanish. But it gave me a way forward. Without structure, the day controlled me. With it, I could control the day.
For years, I lived this way. Discipline wasn’t about ambition or improvement—it was a crutch. Every small win—a conversation remembered, a math problem solved, a task completed—wasn’t just progress. It was survival.
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The Quiet Isolation
One of the hardest parts of a TBI is how invisible it is.
If you lose a leg, people understand immediately. But when you lose pieces of memory or focus, there’s nothing for others to notice.
I often heard, “But you look fine.” I would smile and nod, even while inside I felt like I was suffocating. That invisibility creates isolation. It makes you feel like you have to fight alone.
But I wasn’t alone. Thousands of veterans carry invisible injuries—TBIs, PTSD, depression, anxiety. Too many just carry them in silence.
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Structure in the Civilian Workforce
That same discipline carried into my civilian work at Retronix, a contractor for Intel. I joined a thirty-person logistics team where only a handful consistently pulled their weight. I refused to accept that.
I volunteered for everything, learned quickly, and within days I was training the same people who had started alongside me. Management promoted me to Team Leader within a month, and that’s when I transformed our logistics department.
It wasn’t easy. My TBI meant I had to rely on notes, reminders, and constant structure to stay sharp. But what once felt like a crutch became my advantage. Those very tools allowed me to see inefficiencies clearly, build order out of chaos, and lead a team that others had written off.
By the time I left, our team was running smoothly, deadlines were being met, and deliveries that once delayed million-dollar projects were happening on time. What looked like a weakness—my reliance on structure—became the very reason my team succeeded.
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Rebuilding as a Student
Eventually, I returned to school. My old transcripts told the story of someone unfocused and inconsistent. I worried my injury would only make things worse.
But again, I leaned on structure—the same survival system I had built in the Army and refined at Intel.
In calculus, I struggled constantly. The material felt like quicksand—every step forward sank me into more confusion. But I refused to quit. I stayed in office hours, asked questions, and treated each problem like another rep in the gym. By the end, I earned an A.
In history, I asked so many questions that my professor and I often steered the class together. It wasn’t about showing off—it was survival. Silence never helped me learn.
Thirty credit hours later, I have a 4.0 GPA. Each “A” wasn’t just a grade—it was proof that the discipline I’d built could carry me forward.
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Five Years Later: From Discipline to Passion
Now, five years after my TBI, I can say with confidence that I’ve recovered 80–90 percent of what I once had. My memory is sharper. My focus steadiear. My ability to learn stronger than I believed possible in those first dark years.
But the discipline never left me.
The difference is passion.
I don’t use structure today just to survive. I use it to pursue the things I care about: excelling in school, leading at work, and building a future. Discipline got me through the injury. Passion drives me beyond it.
That’s the gift my TBI gave me: it forced me to build habits I might never have developed otherwise. Now that I’ve healed, those same habits have become the foundation for my ambition.
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A Message to Other Veterans
I share this not for sympathy, but for solidarity.
There are veterans right now carrying invisible injuries that don’t show up on medical charts or in the eyes of strangers. TBIs. PTSD. Depression. Anxiety. Injuries you can’t point to, but that shape who you are every single day.
My message is simple: recovery is real.
It isn’t quick. It isn’t perfect. And it isn’t easy. But it is possible.
Five years ago, I measured success by whether I could get through a page of a book without losing my place. Today, I measure it in A’s on my transcript, in the teams I’ve led, and in the passion I carry into my future.
If you’re fighting an invisible battle, know this: the tools you build to survive can become the strengths you use to thrive. Discipline may carry you through the darkest moments in your life. But when recovery comes—and it can—you’ll discover something even more powerful.
Passion.
