GRAND FORKS (AP) - Not all war wounds are visible, a social worker said as soldiers talked about how their lives and their families have changed.

Sgt. 1st Class Greg Kaiser is a member of the 188th Air Defense Artillery unit, based in Grand Forks, which returned from Afghanistan in March. There are fewer U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan than in Iraq, but it's just as dangerous, he said Thursday at a seminar titled "Caring for Military Families."

"We had 150 guys (in the 188th SECFOR unit from Grand Forks)," Kaiser said. "We lost four soldiers."

And he worries about his son, who struggled to adjust from a bloody tour in Iraq and now is poised to go back.

Sgt. Jamie Kaiser is a member of the former B company of the Guard's 141st Combat Engineers unit based in Jamestown, now named the 817th. Three years ago this month, Jamie Kaiser was in a vehicle right behind his best friend, Spc. Philip Brown of Jamestown, on patrol in Iraq when a roadside bomb struck and killed Brown. Shrapnel wounded Kaiser in his right hand. He was awarded a Purple Heart.

"When he came back, he was a whole 'nother character," Greg Kaiser said of his son. Jamie was a good athlete and scholar, very "directed," and focused, his father said. "He came back without direction, spent a lot of time searching," he said.

"Went out and bought a new Chevy pickup and just drove around.

"He didn't balance his checkbook for a year and a half."

Greg Kaiser said his son drank too much, tried to go too fast on motorcycles or trucks. He forgot to stop for stoplights or stop signs because in the war zone such things don't matter.

He also got married, his father said. Greg Kaiser said his son soon will be a father himself, and is doing well. But his Guard unit, now called the 817th, has been ordered to deploy again for duty in Iraq.

Jamie Kaiser's unit is scheduled to leave the country again Aug. 21, his father said.

"It does make me nervous, as a dad, to hug him again at the airport, saying goodbye," Greg Kaiser said.

What Jamie Kaiser and his father are going through is typical for citizens asked to become soldiers, then warriors, then come back and be regular citizens again, said Bernadette Ternes, a licensed social worker.

Thursday's session included a "Talking with Heroes," live Internet radio show featuring war veterans.

Paul Goodiron, the father of Cpl. Nathan Goodiron, 25, of Mandaree, who was killed in November in Afghanistan, said he felt honor for his son by the presence of the soldiers and the idea that thousands of people were listening via Internet radio.

Carmen Kleinwachter, whose son, John Kleinwachter, was killed in Afghanistan in December, stood next to Harriet Goodiron, Nathan Goodiron's mother, and held her when she cried.

The Guard has helped soldiers reintegrate into civilian life after war duty, Greg Kaiser said. But like many young soldiers, his son isn't one to seek out help, he said.

"I had heard all of this before," Greg Kaiser said. "But I didn't think it would happen to my son."

One man sat alone Thursday night in the back row of the theater, wiping away tears while listening to soldiers talk.

He said he grew up in northeast North Dakota and served in the Army in Vietnam in 1967-68 and returned stateside through the Oakland, Calif., airport.

"Nobody was there," to greet him, he said with a wry smile.