Soldier’s wife comforts wounded

Thursday, Oct. 13, 2005

Click here to enlarge this photo Tom Fedor⁄The Gazette During the last year, Andrea Ulm of Frederick has visited wounded soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Her husband, Staff Sgt. Tim Ulm, was sent to Iraq earlier this year, three months after they were married.

Three months after their November 2004 wedding, her husband was sent to Iraq as part of the U.S. Army’s bomb squad unit.

When he left on Valentine’s Day, little did the new bride know that she would soon be making daily visits to Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Nor did she realize that the hundreds of hours she spent visiting wounded soldiers would help her cope with her husband’s absence and his very dangerous job.

Helping soldiers Andrea Ulm of Frederick has visited wounded and sick soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center for much of the past year, spurred on by her friendship with Sgt. Brian Doyne, a colleague of her husband, who was stationed in Iraq. Many of the soldiers do not have friends and family nearby. To volunteer, call 202-782-6362.

The bomb squad her husband belongs to dismantles bombs and does ‘‘post-blast” investigations after a bomb detonates. Ten days after Ulm and his 21-member team got to Iraq, he lost his best friend in an explosion, and another friend was severely injured and ultimately sent to Walter Reed. The pair were doing a post-blast investigation, but the area was booby-trapped with more bombs. One blew up, killing Daniel G. Gresham of Chicago.

Sgt. Brian Doyne of Georgia lost an arm and an eye and had 80 bomb fragments removed from his face alone. His legs were shattered. He was 26 years old.

The unit is based in Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas. And although Doyne’s mother stayed with him at Walter Reed, Andrea Ulm felt compelled to be there for him, too. ‘‘I wouldn’t have expected anything less,” her husband said. ‘‘She is very caring and wants to give as much as she can to people.”

During her evening and weekend visits, Ulm took note of the many wounded soldiers who had no family or friends nearby and made sure to make time for them, too.

One mother who flew across the country to be with her son, Ulm said, had seven other children at home. Many families do not have the resources to stay with their injured loved ones for more than a few days.

‘‘It’s really sad,” she said. ‘‘A lot of them don’t really push themselves in physical therapy because there is no one to visit. We would take cookies around and try to spend time with them. Some of them just don’t want to talk at all.”

But, visitors can often put a smile on their faces, and simple gestures mean a lot, Ulm said. As a constant presence, Ulm played a pivotal role in Doyne’s recovery. She felt she was doing what her husband would have done, had he been here.

‘‘She was a way for him to open up, to talk about things he never even talked to me about,” Jamie Ulm said.

Ulm became the coordinator of the wives’ unit and kept everyone posted with weekly e-mail updates about Doyne’s condition and Gresham’s family. Doyne began walking well before doctors predicted he could. He pushed himself hard in physical therapy and is learning how to use his prosthetic arm. Today, he is an outpatient at Walter Reed.

But in the beginning it was rough, Ulm said. ‘‘There were many times it got to me. There were times in the beginning when he was in the intensive care unit that I would stay for hours rubbing his head, letting him know I was there. He was having trouble sleeping, and I didn’t want to leave. Then when he finally did go to sleep, I would sit there and cry. Many nights I cried the whole way home.”

But, she persisted. Every bit of progress he made gave her hope.

The experience not only encouraged Doyne but kept her focused and positive for her husband’s sake.

Ulm, 39, has two children, 15 and 9, and works full-time for a mortgage company in Owings Mills. When she looks back on the months of daily visits to Walter Reed, Ulm wonders how she managed to hold everything together. ‘‘I don’t know how I did it, but if I didn’t do it, I would have been miserable,” she said.

Ulm encourages people to visit the soldiers in Walter Reed. ‘‘They are all so young, the men and women there. ...After just one visit, you feel so blessed in your own life. Your own problems seem so small,” she said.

The Ulms hope to be reunited soon. Jamie Ulm is back at Fort Sam Houston and will be transferring to Aberdeen in the next few months — hopefully in time to celebrate the couple’s one-year anniversary on Nov. 12.

To nominate someone for Our Neighbors, contact Katherine Heerbrandt at kheerbrandt@gazette.net.