WASHINGTON — The power of love and family are critical in the
healing of Wounded Warriors, especially when a solider is fighting for his or
her life.

On Friday at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, caregivers were
honored for their relentless service to their loved ones.

It was the first time the “Warrior Transition
Brigade” held a caregiver appreciation ceremony. The brigade helps Wounded
Warriors heal and transition back into active duty or back to civilian life.

The caregivers are in the fight of their lives — fighting for the lives of
their loved one. For them, this is a no fail mission.

Caregivers such as Claudia Avila were celebrated for their unsung service and
their steadfast devotion to their soldier.

She says her husband Luis Avila, 43, was so severely hurt in an IED
blast in Afghanistan in 2011 that doctors wanted to take him off life-
support. He’d suffered two heart attacks, a stroke, lost his left leg high
above the knee and suffering a head injury that stopped oxygen from getting to
his brain.

“Luis went into a very long coma with no hope to survive.”

But she refused to give up hope. “We were always talking in his ears, playing
video games.”

On Jan. 12, 2012, the doctors pulled her aside and said her husband was not
going to make it. She says he looked at them and said, “You gotta have the
faith. Forty days later, Luis started to twitch his mouth.”

In February, 2012, Luis amazingly woke up. Claudia says it’s been a long
journey, but after three years her husband continues to improve and is
talking again.

Brigade surgeon Col. Gregory Winn says getting more people who know about the
brigade and how it works to help families help their solider is huge. He says
the brigade staff helps wrap their arms around the families so the
families can help their loved ones.

Winn says, “Medical healing and spiritual and mental health has to be
restored within the solider and the family.”

He says the Brigade is set up to help those soldiers that are wounded in any
way, shape or form.