All My Children

JR Martinez plays Brot on All My Children.

This real-life Iraq war veteran recently spoke to Soap Opera Weekly about the actual injuries he suffered in combat, ones that play a central role to his character on the show.

Q: The day you were injured in Iraq, your Humvee drove over a landmine, throwing three other soldiers from the vehicle. But what happened to you?
Martinez: I was trapped inside the vehicle. The explosion caused a fire. We would rather lose one guy than five, and what that means is if one of our guys [is] injured, then we have to get to a safe point, and once we figure out what's going on, then we go back to help our fellow service member.

Q: So you ended up being trapped in the burning Humvee for 10 to 15 minutes. What were you thinking?
Martinez: "My life will end in another country." The biggest thing was my mother. My mother was the one who raised me on her own, and she's basically my best friend. I [was] thinking to myself that my mother was going to be devastated, because she had already lost a daughter when I was 5 years old. I was conscious, and all of this was going through my mind.