Double Amputee Veteran Says Yoga Saved His Life: 'I Realized I Was Supposed to Lose My Legs'

By January 2014, Dan Nevins had made it through multiple Army deployments to Iraq, the loss of his left and right leg after experiencing a roadside explosion in combat, 36 surgeries and two divorces.

Despite all of that, he never noticed feelings of PTSD that befall so many veterans because he distracted himself with athletic achievements – beating guys with both their legs in golf, biking up mountains and summiting Mt. Kilimanjaro – until he found himself recovering alone at home from one of his final surgeries.

"I couldn't do anything. I couldn't keep up with my then 3-year-old daughter, couldn't play golf, and those thoughts that I used to be able to chase away with a golf club or my road bike just kept coming back," Nevins, 43, tells PEOPLE.

"I had learned the statistics about suicide, like that 400,000 soliders live with PTSD. But I had never identified with that group because I never had PTSD. I never delt with that. The one statistic I never understood was the 22 veterans a day that take their own life."