‘I escaped mental torture over blast thanks to charity’
AFORMER soldier has spoken of the trauma of being involved in a blast after his vehicle struck a roadside bomb in Afghanistan.
Mike Matthews, 30, from Cardiff, was knocked unconscious during the explosion, which happened when he was three months into his deployment at a base attached to Camp Bastion.
Mike, a former Lance Corporal in 2nd Battalion The Royal Welsh, had been driving the lead vehicle in a convoy in Afghanistan when it struck a roadside bomb.
“You know the risks, but you never think it will happen to you. It was a surreal situation,” he said.
“I realised that some of my passengers were missing. But you can’t just jump out and help them. The risk of secondary devices is huge as that’s what they are expecting you to do.”
It took 15 minutes for help to arrive following the blast. They swept the area for more devices and treated casualties who were then airlifted to Camp Bastion.
“I was completely shellshocked. I remember phoning my mum back at base and just blurting out that I’d been blown up, but not to worry as I still had my legs and arms and I was still breathing. She’s never really forgiven me for telling her like that.”
Mike refers to the explosion as a “bad day at the office”.
When he returned to the UK and collapsed during an exercise, an MRI scan revealed he had fractured two vertebrae during the explosion. He received treatment for his injury at MOD facility Headley Court, where two years later he was diagnosed with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
“I knew something was wrong all along, I just didn’t want to admit it”, he said.
Medically discharged from the Army, Mike continues to suffer severe back pain, but the rugby-loving Welshman loves riding his bike, playing wheelchair rugby – for which he has taken part in the Invictus Games as part of the GB squad – and developed a love of poetry.
Mike has opened up about the role Help for Heroes played in helping him for a video to celebrate the bond between the charity’s beneficiaries and its supporters.
The footage captures an exchange between Mike and passionate fundraiser Dorothy Garrett, 72, who has helped raise around £40,000 for the charity.
Mike said: “Because of people like (Dorothy) I was able to have a bike, and because I was able to have a bike, I was able to escape my mental torture. They funded my sports recovery by buying me a specialist bike. They also introduced me to art recovery where first the time in my life I wrote poetry – not my normal thing really, but to be able to take moments of your life and write it down is exhilarating.
“I became a bit of a recluse when I was first discharged, but H4H has allowed me to integrate socially again. I thought they existed to help amputees, but that’s just a tiny part of what they do.”
Dorothy, from Newcastle, was inspired to volunteer by the memory of her grandfather, who fought in World War I.
She said: “I just thought it was about time that I could serve the people who’d served me and our nation.”