Courage, shared
By Steve Herring
Published in News on May 10, 2015 1:50 AM
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News-Argus/CASEY MOZINGO
Shilo Harris signs books after his speech Thursday at the National Day of Prayer luncheon at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base. Harris, who is an Iraq war veteran, offers a message of resilience and bravery.
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Growing up, Shilo Harris could sense that he had a calling.
He just didn't know what it was.
It took his Christian faith and journeys through two doors separated by thousands of miles, time, agonizing suffering and recovery to help him become the man that he says he knows he was meant to be.
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It was Feb. 19, 2007.
A bloody, burned and maimed Army Staff Sgt. Shilo Harris struggled to force open a 500-pound armored door to escape his destroyed and burning Humvee. He still doesn't know how he was able to do so.
Less than four months later, his life took another twist when he accidentally walked through a door and into a room full of people who wanted to hear his story.
Harris, of San Antonio, Texas, shared that same story Thursday as the keynote speaker for the National Day of Prayer luncheon on Seymour Johnson Air Force Base.
While he was there to tell his story, his visit was more about assuring veterans they are not alone.
"I am a voice now," he said. "I speak for a lot of the people who don't want to open up and share their stories.
"Hopefully I am bringing more awareness to the men and women who have served and don't want to open up about it."
Anybody who puts on a uniform is part of a team, he said.
"I meet so many men and women who go, 'I just don't have anybody to talk to,'" he said. "Are you kidding me? You have got thousands of people to talk to. If you want to talk all you have to do is open your mouth.
"Start talking to your friends. There are counselors, volunteers, there are organizations. There are so many ways to share and to open up."
Harris said the increase of veteran suicides helped him to push forward in his efforts to reach others.
There should be no suicides, he said.
"We should have a network," he said. "There are enough veterans, active duty. There are retirees. There are enough of us to build a network so that not one person should feel alone.
"The core of my message today is you are not alone. I came though it and you can, too."
After the program, he moved to the base chapel to autograph copies of his book "Steel Will."
The book is about what happened that fateful day, how it changed his life and how he moved forward to find his new mission.
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Harris was on his second tour of duty in Iraq when the Humvee he was in was demolished by an IED estimated to have 800 pounds of explosives.
Three of his five-member team were killed.
His fellow soldiers thought that Harris was dead as well, especially after the heat from the burning vehicle set off a weapon that exploded in the cab causing a secondary fireball that burned him even worse.
Three of the four doors were blown off except for the one he was against.
Harris said he had no idea how badly he was injured, but knew it was serious.
"I was pushing on the door, and this is where I know my faith played a role," he said. "I could just imagine the Lord with His arms stretched out protecting me before that IED hit.
"As I was pushing on that door, and in the condition that I was in, I don't think there was any way I could get out of that vehicle. This 400 or 500 pounds of armored door was embedded in the dirt and asphalt from the blast."
Finally the door opened and he was able to escape.
As ammunition inside the vehicle was set off by the fire, a fellow soldier used his body to shield Harris.
He suffered severe burns over 35 percent of his body, lost his ears and the skin off his face and lost much of the use of his badly mangled fingers.
Harris was evacuated and for 48 days was in a medically induced coma. He has undergone more than 60 surgeries.
But he has refused to allow the experience to make him bitter. Instead, he has turned his experience into a new mission -- to reach others.
Harris attributes his positive attitude, as well as his recovery and his becoming the man he says he was meant to be, to his family -- particularly his five children.
"I have one grandbaby and another on the way," he said. "Every time I look at the faces of my children, I know it is not about me. I almost died. Actually I did die a couple of times.
"I almost wasn't able to be a father because I was so crippled and that scared me probably more than anything, thinking I would not be able to get out there and do those things with my children that a normal father would be able to do."
Harris said he guesses he is still not a normal father.
"But my goal now is to leave my children a legacy -- leave my children with something positive to remember their father by," he said. "I stopped focusing on the negative and started focusing on the positive and not focusing on what I couldn't do, but on what I could do. I can take my kids to do this. I can take my kids to do that. That really helped to change my mindset."
Now his mission is to share his faith and story with his fellow veterans and to let them know they are not alone.
Harris said he became a motivational speaker by accident.
"I accidentally walked into the right (hospital) room one day I guess you could say instead of the wrong room," Harris said. "There was a small audience there, and they asked me if I was their guest speaker. I said, 'I can be.' I was joking around, but that led to another event and so on and here I am today.
"Their speaker didn't show up, and I had a few minutes. I was actually looking for my doctor's office. I was heavily medicated and didn't know where I was. I was kind of joking. They said, 'Come on in and tell us your story.'"
They started asking questions about what had happened and his recovery.
"That right there really started the foundation for my speeches," he said
They wanted details. They were chaplains and new staff at the hospital.
"So the information that I shared with them made a difference," he said. "I was telling my story. It just opened up a whole other door. It was another one of those decisions. I think it was the Lord saying, 'Here is a door open. You can walk through it or you can keep doing what you are doing.'"
Harris walked through.
It was actually during his recovery, just a few months after being injured.
"I was still in bandages, could barely walk," he said. "I have really been blessed with my recovery."
Harris was asked to speak again, but realized he didn't know what he was doing.
Harris spoke to a nurse who encouraged him to talk to the base commander at Brooke Army Medical Center where he was being treated.
"I got the best advice I ever could have right there, and it has stuck with me for all of my career," he said. "He said, 'You can't go wrong if you speak from the heart,' and that is what I have done.
"I don't have a script. I kind of have a general story line that I go by, but each speech is based on what I want to say right then, and I let the Lord speak through me."
Harris said he believes that what he does is therapeutic.
It is a part of a family legacy of service that he honored by joining the Army.
His father served in Vietnam and his grandfather in World War II and Korea and during the Vietnam era.
"Like probably many of you I joined after 9-11, 2001," he said to those gathered at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base Thursday. "I know that I don't have to tell you what it means because we are still in the middle of our fight against terrorism.
"But just to remind you, we lost nearly 4,000 innocent lives in a matter of hours. I felt like it was my calling, my duty to step up and serve my nation."
He was 27 at the time.
It was a difficult decision to write the book "Steel Will," which is co-authored by Robin Cook, he said.
Harris said he was hesitant at first about writing the book because "it is a lot of (personal) information to put out there."
But if he wrote the book he wanted to make sure that "it was all out there," he said.
"The inspiration for the book, one of my young soldiers, one of my friends committed suicide back in his hometown," Harris said. "I realized at that moment that I needed to do more. Getting out here telling my story and testimony is good.
"I have had a lot of men and women who served in combat and come back with PTSD tell me I helped change their lives, saved their lives. I have heard a lot of these magnificent wonderful testimonies that encourage what I do and why I do it."
Harris said after the suicide he realized writing the book was the right decision and the decision that he needed to make.
While he feels that he has done his part, Harris said he is not through serving.
"This (speaking) is another way of serving, and I get to share my faith along the way, and it appeals to other Christians out there and I want them to feel empowered," he said.