James Street, a Warrenton native, enlisted in the Missouri National Guard in 1998. He would later join the Army Reserves and then the Army, and his military service would change his life forever. 

Street suffers from grand mal seizure disorder but he still served two tours in the Iraq War. While his disorder caused issues while he was in the service, he persisted. 

“I did two tours in Iraq and a year in Kosovo,” said Street. 

That was until he was struck by an improvised explosive device in 2006 and things became much more difficult. 

He said while he was in the service he was a motor transport operator with an engineer boating company in the Missouri National Guard as well as a military police officer here in Warrenton. 

He returned home briefly after his injury before he was sent to Kosovo through the national guard. In 2015, he received a medical discharge and started the long road to recovery. 

Street’s mother, Theresa Raterman, said they spent years trying to get him diagnosed and to convince the Department of Veterans Affairs that he was injured. 

She said doctors with the VA told her that her son was suffering from severe anxiety and diagnosed him with autism, but she knew something else was wrong. 

Raterman said they finally had a breakthrough at a psychiatrist at Washington University in St. Louis. 

“The girl looks at me, and she’s like ‘this is not at all my department, but first of all, I’m pretty sure he’s got a traumatic brain injury, I don’t care what they say,’ she’s the expert, ‘and he’s definitely got PTSD,” said Raterman. 

From there they started seeing doctors again to try and figure out what happened, and how to fix it. Raterman said when he was hit with the IED, it caused a traumatic brain injury from the blast. 

“There’s a lot of damage that has been done that you can’t reverse now because they waited too long, his brain is shrinking and they don’t know why,” said Raterman. 

They had tried doctors and physical therapy and for years it did not seem like anything was working, until they found personal trainer Nicholas Ross at K4 Fitness in Warrenton. 

He has been working with Ross for a little over two months, and Raterman said there has been a marked difference in Street’s condition. 

“He walks with his head up now, he makes eye contact, and he’s really different,” said Raterman. 

She lauded Ross’ efforts with her son and said without him, she was not sure where they would be. 

“Nick is the hero, because he recognized things, the very first day, he’s just like ‘he’s mine, God meant for me to be here at this time,’” said Raterman. 

While Ross was happy to help Street, he quickly refuted that he was the hero at any point. 

“He’s a hero man, he’s doing the work, not me,” said Ross. “He’s coming here, and a lot of people can’t even make it to the gym, they’ve got every excuse. He doesn’t look at everything that happened to him as an excuse, the way I see it is he looks at it as a way to move forward and come back.”

Ross said they have been focusing on building back Street’s strength and working on “central nervous system training” to help Street regain his abilities. 

“When I first met him, he could hardly walk through the door,” said Ross. “He couldn’t even talk very well at first, now he’s joking around with me, telling stories, it’s awesome.”

While it is not perfect, and Street still faces difficulties, with Ross’ help, and through his own herculean persistence, the future is looking up.