“Of all the things I had to deal with, telling my parents I had been wounded in action was the hardest of all,” she said.
The phone call came from her parents three hours after she awoke from surgery. It was an emotional moment, she said.
“How could it not be? I had to tell them, ‘I’m coming home, but I’m not coming home the same way I left and I’m not OK.’”
She said all she wanted at that moment was to be home with her family.
On July 23, 2003, Pfc. Loftus was providing security on a two-vehicle convoy conducting route reconnaissance outside Baghdad International when a blast from a roadside explosive device and rifle fire hit her Humvee shattering glass and tearing metal.
Ms. Loftus was hit in the face and upper lip by shrapnel fragments and lost three teeth. Her comrades, all medics, rushed her to an emergency treatment station at the airport.
“She has undergone several surgeries and still has the prospect of more surgical procedures . . . ,” said Col. Walters. “The fact that Pfc. Loftus is a medic and was wounded highlights the dangers combat medics endure to ensure the quick availability of lifesaving medical care.”
