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Casualties Of War: Meet Sgt. Mike Buyas

Mar-23-2005 » Filed Under: 1/25 SBCT

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By Anna Song, KATU News

Washington, D.C. - Going into war, Sgt. Mike Buyas often thought about whether he would be willing to die for his country, but what he did not really consider is what it would be like to live with a sacrifice for the rest of his life.

Buyas lost both of his legs while in Iraq and now must come to terms with a different type of life than he might have imagined for himself.

"My ultimate goal is to put pants on and go out to a public place and just walk regular," he says from the Walter Reed Medical Center in Washington, D.C.

Buyas lost his legs just before Christmas, 10 miles south of Mosul, Iraq.

"We were getting mortared every day," he recalls. "Boom, boom, everywhere around us, AK-47s coming in, people shooting rockets at us and stuff."

As if there were a bubble around their Stryker vehicle, the soldiers incredibly never got hit.

That is, until they came across a roadside bomb. [...]

Buyas now has a quiet acceptance of his new reality, which he holds onto by keeping in mind that the outcome could have been much worse.

"If you look around here, there's always someone worse, so I'm actually very fortunate because I have two good arms and my head still works," he says. "Now I've joined the amputees. It's a very expensive club to join. It costs you an arm or a leg."


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