Forty-four years ago, Lt. William G. Haneke was pronounced dead five times over 48 hours.
The first time was after a Viet Cong–detonated mine catapulted him 80 feet into the air and left him hanging sideways on a barbed-wire fence.
When he came to, his left eye was blown out, he could not see and could hardly breathe. The carotid artery on one side of his neck was severed and every time his heart beat, blood would spurt out and bounce off his shoulder. His right leg was gone above the knee, his jaw shattered and part of his brain exposed.
It took four-and-a-half years and more than 200 major medical procedures before he was able to return some semblance of his former life.
As an Army brat and a graduate of West Point he realized his military days were over, but he decided to develop a plan for his future. "I was told I would never be able to sit up, ambulate, have a normal life in any way shape or form and that made me really angry. I was going to prove them all wrong," he says.
With one good eye and one glass eye, a cranial plastic plate, a reconstructed leg and foot, and a pair of crutches he set out to pursue a career in health care in order to become a patient advocate.
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