“I was blown up the day after my daughter’s second birthday,” says Andy Geelan. “But I still got home in time for her party.” Andy is a strong and determined family man, but some blows would knock anyone for six. Despite his elusive and enduring injuries, Andy persevered and overcame his enemy: pain.
We spoke to Andy to hear how his life was turned upside down, literally, and how he’s rebuilt his body, his mind and his life.
Andy joined the military in 2006, as part of The King’s Royal Hussars Cavalry.
“I was trained to be a vehicle operator, a weapon operator,” explains Andy. “I was fortunate enough that my regiment was sent here, there and everywhere, so I did training operations in Africa, Canada and beyond. I also studied Arabic to become an interpreter in Iraq, but we withdrew so I then learned Pashto [spoken in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran].”
“I was posted to Afghanistan,” he says. “I was on what they called a ‘jackal’ – an open-top machine gun carrier. We were down in Lashkar Gah in the middle of bandit country. It was a very ‘kinetic’ tour with firefights every day. We were always on the move.
“Then, three days before I was supposed to fly home for my daughter’s birthday party, we were out on patrol when we hit a 40-kilo IED and just tore the vehicle to pieces.”
“It was the 8th July, 2012, the day after my daughter’s second birthday,” says Andy as he picks up the tale. “I was supposed to fly home in time for her party that weekend, but I got blown up instead.”
The bomb blast sent debris flying. Something hit Andy’s spine and the back of the head, forcing his head into his shoulder so hard that he dislocated his jaw.
“I was heavily concussed, but I still made it home for my daughter’s birthday.”
Doctors thought Andy had only damaged his neck and expected his concussion to have cleared, and so they sent him back to base. “I felt fine but I was slurring my words… not that I knew I was. I had problems with my coordination and had to be escorted about the place. People were wondering what was wrong with me.” Eventually, Andy was sent to the military hospital at Headley Court for diagnosis and treatment.
Andy was diagnosed with a traumatic brain injury and spent the next few years in and out of Headley Court. He was treated for nerve damage, brain injury, chronic concussion syndrome, chronic headaches and cluster migraines. His vision was also impaired, living in the dark due to photophobia. “The pain is either around my temples, the back of my eyes or the back the my head. I don’t remember what it’s like to not have a headache.
“I’d had months and months of filling me full of drugs but none of them seem to work.”
With the stoicism displayed by so many soldiers, he “refused to admit that I was broken” and tried to get back into his work as he weaned himself off the pain medication.
In February 2015, Andy got married, but despite hoping for a fresh start, went to mental health charity Combat Stress for support later that year. “My life had become a rollercoaster of ups and downs”.
“My mental health had progressed, but I wasn’t able to do much with my family,” says Andy, massaging his temples. “Stress makes my brain malfunction. I tire, my PTSD takes over and I become quite insular.
“I felt like a terrible father,” he says. “Then my own father died.
“Combat Stress had told me about King Edward VII’s Hospital’s Centre for Veterans’ Health the Veterans and the Pain Management Programme, but, so soon after my dad died, I just wasn’t ready.”
Andy started the Pain Management Programme in February 2024.
“The course? Let me tell you, just day one had a massive effect on me,” says Andy and he rubs his arm. “The information I received on that first day alone put everything into perspective.”
The Pain Management Programme (PMP) at KEVII is a group-based course led by expert clinicians, including a psychologist, nurse and physiotherapist. They provide the latest insights into pain science and offer practical strategies to help manage pain more effectively. The programme aims to introduce a variety of techniques designed for the daily management of pain while also creating a supportive environment where veterans can share their experiences and receive mutual support from fellow participants.
“The course taught me the relationship between your brain and your body – the role of nerves and the nervous system. Everything that was happening to me suddenly made sense. Until that point, I’d thought the problem was me.”
“I also realised that I was doing everything wrong,” says Andy as he reflects on the stretches that he had been taught, that the course was able to correct.
“The therapist was saying, ‘Andy, just be kind to yourself. Just stop and do things within your limits. You don’t need to push yourself to the limits anymore’. I needed to hear that. I needed a stranger to tell me to be kind to myself and take it easy – I didn’t need to push myself until I broke.”
Andy tells us how he enjoyed the sessions and found them well-spaced – enough time to digest what had been said and start to implement the advice. Andy also valued the space to ask questions and the private conversations he was able to have with specialists.
We ask Andy how it’s going, now that he’s nearing the end of the course.
“Well,” he begins and smiles as he stretches his neck. “I managed to go to get the train to London on my own. I stayed in London on my own for the first night and then walked across London from South Bank.
“How does it feel? It feels amazing. When I went to the train station, I was thinking, ‘There is no chance I’ll manage this!’. But I got on the train and I just clicked into the mindset the course had taught me. I was just like ‘Let’s do this. Because there’s nothing you can’t do’.
The course has helped Andy build a new routine that helps him manage his pain while being the dad he wants to be. He wakes up, exercises and sorts the family out ready for school. Then he sleeps. He wakes up and picks up his son from school before making dinner. He’s also stopped needing to take some of his pain medication.
“My son wanted to go to see a Liverpool football match, so we jumped in the car and I drove to Liverpool City Centre – during rush hour. That would have been unthinkable before I’d done the course.”
“My dad used to run the Lake District, Three Peaks Challenge,” says Andy, “and I wanted to take on the challenge in his honour.”
Three Peaks involves climbing England’s three highest mountains in a single day and Andy managed nearly 19 of the 29 miles and 2 of the mountains. He laughs as he tells us: “I just need to pace myself next time.
“I know that my dad would have been proud”.
With the help of the pain management course, Andy Geelan’s life has been transformed. Previously, he struggled with daily life, avoided physical activity and travel, and felt that he could never be the son and dad he wanted to be. Now, he’s a family man running three miles every day on the road to recovery, his sights set on the peaks.
“The pain management program is not a golden ticket, a quick fix or a magic pill,” says Andy. “It’s about helping you to make small, informed lifestyle, physical and mental changes to enable you to live a better quality of life… and it has certainly changed mine for the better.”
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