Shock Wave: Troops who served in Iraq may have undiagnosed brain injuries

Shock Wave: Troops who served in Iraq may have undiagnosed brain injuries
Like many, Lacey man returns from war -- but not to himself
By CAROL SMITH
P-I REPORTER

LACEY -- The only outward sign of something amiss at Garry Naipo's household in this community of well-tended homes south of Fort Lewis is the ragged, yellowing lawn.


"It used to be like Safeco Field out there," Paoakalani "Paoa" Naipo said of the lawn his father no longer trims every three days. Before, Garry Naipo would forgo watching football on the weekend until the grass was cut. Once he started so early on a Saturday morning, his wife, Alii, rushed out, as she put it, "to save him from the neighbors."

Then Garry Naipo, a grandfather of three, went to Iraq -- boomeranging from cul-de-sac to combat and back in 15 months, a journey that would change his life -- and that of his family -- in subtle, corrosive ways.


Naipo, 51, is one of thousands of National Guard citizen soldiers who have left established jobs and families to answer a call and come back altered men and women. On the outside, they look fine, the same even. They blend in at work, in the grocery line, at their children's soccer games. People tell them they're lucky. They're not dead.
go here for the rest
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/345712_guardsmanmain02.html