Local Purple-Heart veteran looks to inspire others at book signing
By Kate Jonuska

Whether due to natural adrenaline or training received during her five years of military service, Latoya Lucas remembers everything from that day in 2003 when she was hit by rocket-propelled grenade and small-arms fire in Mosul, Iraq.

“I remember the whole situation until I passed out due to loss of blood, and then I was in a coma for two weeks,” says Lucas, who suffered intestinal damage, loss of soft tissue and muscle on most of her left side, burns and permanent nerve damage. Now retired from the service, she’s the first female who served in Iraq out of Fort Carson to receive a Purple Heart and is the author of the book “The Immeasurable Spirit: Lessons of a Wounded Warrior about Faith and Perseverance.”

Even after four months in the hospital and two years of rehabilitation, she’ll carry the scars and feel the ache of those injuries for the rest of her life. But the foremost lesson she took from the harrowing experience is the message she relates in her book, which she’ll be reading from and signing on Saturday at Poor Richard’s Bookstore downtown.

“As a wounded warrior, I’ve learned a lot of lessons about how faith affected my recovery process and future outlook,” says Lucas. The idea of sharing that experience in book form, transforming a personally negative situation into a potentially positive one for others, grew out of that healing process. “Early on from my hospital bed, once I endured what I endured, I made the decision that I wanted to serve others and encourage them to be strong.”

CLICK HERE to read the full text of this article, which published in the March 6, 2009 Woodmen and Cheyenne editions.