02/28/2026
Karen’s Story: Quantum Leap Farm’s Warrior Mission: At-Ease Retreat Helps Army Vet Handle Two Traumas
By Dave Scheiber
When Karen enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1989, she was thrilled to chart her own path and see the world. And for a short time, life couldn’t have been more exciting.
She was stationed in Germany and often rode the famous Duty Train into Soviet-held East Berlin. She was there when the Berlin Wall fell on Nov. 9, 1989 – and still has a piece of the wall today. For a year, she was stationed in the Abrams Building, known as the Pentagon of Europe during the Cold War, and felt invigorated serving her country.
“It seemed like I was part of history just going to work every day to do my job,” she says.
But everything was about to change dramatically, turning her life upside down – ultimately putting her on a road to the healing embrace of Quantum Leap Farm and its Warrior Mission: At Ease Retreat.
First, she was the victim of a sexual assault on the base, leaving her shattered yet unable to file a report if she wanted to remain in the military. Her supervisors reminded her of her bright future as the top graduate of her advanced Signal School training at Fort Gordon, Georgia, and encouraged her to stay the course. So she compartmentalized her pain and soldiered on.
Karen was already working disseminating communications as a Comsec custodian, with a top secret clearance, working with Fifth Corps headquarters at the Abrams Building in Frankfurt. She had been in Germany for mere months when US and coalition forces went to war against Iraq and began Desert Storm. It was not long before Karen re-enlisted. Her high ASVAB scores, coupled with her top secret clearance, her prior awards, and her clean service record, provided her the opportunity to receive training as a counter-intelligence agent at Fort Huachuca, Arizona, specializing in interrogation and narco-terrorism. Unfortunately, it would set the stage for a second violent attack of a different nature.
One day in 1992, she found herself on a mission “outside of theater” conducting an interrogation with a handcuffed suspect. “My battle buddy – my other half – was right there with me and it happened in an instant,” she recalls. “We had just uncuffed him from the table when he suddenly wrapped his handcuffs around my neck. It was so fast. Apparently, he thought all he had to do was knock me out to escape from the interrogation room.”
The prisoner could not escape, however, and was subdued. But the damage was done – he had broken Karen’s jaw and torn several ligaments and tendons in the surrounding muscles. After her hospitalization, she returned to duty and wound up stationed at Fort Campbell near Kentucky for the duration of her service, finally honorably discharged in 1999 after 8 years active duty and 2 years in the reserves.
For the next decade, Karen continued to experience pain in her jaw while working as a computer tech – severe enough to qualify for disability. By now, she had relocated to Vermont, where she had grown up during her dad’s Air Force tenure. Even after undergoing 12 jaw surgeries over 11 years, the pain remained.
But finally, in 2012, she was sent to a treatment center for post-traumatic stress in Batavia, N.Y. And it was there that a V.A. doctor diagnosed the root of the problem – Karen had suffered a traumatic brain injury from the attack 20 years earlier.
“I had already had so many surgeries that they thought coming to the TBI clinic at James Haley V.A. in Tampa would be helpful,” she says. “So I thought, ‘I need to get to this clinic,’ and I just picked up everything and moved here in 2017.”
It was at the clinic that Karen first heard of Quantum Leap Farm, which hosted a retreat for veterans. Figuring she had nothing to lose, she first attended in 2018. “That retreat,” she says, “changed my life forever.”
Today, she is one of hundreds of veterans who have experienced desperately needed emotional, psychological, and physical help at the WMAE Retreat, now marking its 10th year at the farm. Participants have found a supportive space where they can open up and share harrowing episodes from their time in the military, face lingering issues head-on, and, as the name suggests, feel at ease once again.
“It’s been nothing short of life-changing,” she says.
Before then, Karen was caught in a downward spiral: she suffered from agoraphobia, was afraid to leave home, and her weight ballooned from 115 pounds to 200, forcing her to walk with a cane. She felt hopeless, unsure of where to turn – until she found Quantum Leap.
“For me, like so many veterans, I saw what I did in the military as black and white, but the farm taught me to see all of the gray areas,” she says. “For me, that is such a humbling experience and one that I am so incredibly grateful for. It’s something that anybody who is dealing with personal baggage can benefit from.”
Karen was skeptical at first, but quickly found herself immersed in the sense of calm and hope she had been missing. “They did so many amazing things with holistic techniques and guided therapy sessions,” she says. “And I fell in love with the horses. The equine therapy was the most incredible thing I had ever seen. I thought, ‘I need to keep coming back here.’ So I did. It didn’t change me; it changed my family. My son Joshua has been my heart and soul through this whole process. He also comes to the farm with me to volunteer and attends the fundraisers. He sees how much it’s changed my life; he, too, uses some of the modalities. He knows that ART, equine therapy, and yoga have absolutely changed my life, and it has become a family affair.”
“Yoga really saved Karen’s life,” says Jenna Miller, a co-creator of the retreat who also serves as the farm’s equine-assisted psychotherapy facilitator and therapeutic riding instructor. “And she’s really become our vet ambassador. She can tell them, ‘I’ve been where you are; it’s going to be okay.’ When she came to our first retreat, she was dissociated for most of it, so it’s been a journey, but she’s had an amazing transformation.”
That includes her overall health as well. Over time, she also lost the weight she had gained and now feels both physically and emotionally renewed.
“Even when I’m not there, all I have to do is think about the farm,” she says. “And that helps me find my peace.”
