Photo by Janet Casey

Shakti Sabharwal | Patriot

It’s time she can never reclaim, and a commitment she won’t break: 8 months deployment overseas in Iraq and Kosovo, away from her children and comfortable life. Shakti Sabharwal, a Needham resident and physician, knew that volunteering to serve in a war zone was a risk.

But she’s not backing down from her commitment to the Mass. National Guard, which sent her to Tajit, near Baghdad, in 2004 and to Kosovo in 2006. It’s because she went to medical school on a government-funded scholarship and feels she should give back to her adopted country.

"In my book, all the dues must be paid," she says. The risk she took also shapes her daily life. "I live differently. I’m constantly reminded of my own sense of mortality, so I step back and smell the roses, I let go more than I did before."

~Alison, editor