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A Split Second Decision – and a Medal of Honor! DoD Blogger Roundtable
Medal Of Honor Recipient Sergeant First Class Leroy Petry and his wife Ashley“Rangers Lead the Way” We all make them – those decisions that are made in the blink of an eye. But some are more important than others, how about life changing ones? We take time to consider those? Right? Sergeant First Class Leroy Petry had a life changing decision and he only had the blink of an eye to make it in – the grenade was live, it was close and he and his fellow Rangers were going to die. His decision to pick up the Taliban’s grenade and throw it away from his team saved their lives and…
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Swim Lessons: Two Year Later
There are a few things I have done in motherhood that are questionable. As an example, cutting my then 9-months old hair by myself. Disastrous. Thinking I could travel across state-lines, 200+ miles, as a new mom with a six-week old. Excruciating. Attempting to convince my boys that they should like asparagus because it makes your pee stink. Bad choice of reasons. But this weekend I was reminded of one of the best things I have done for my boys in their eight and six years of existence. Swim Lessons. When hubs was in Iraq with the Army National Guard we used our free membership at the YMCA and the boys hopped in the pool every Saturday morning. …
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A Must Read for a Better Understanding of PTSD “Achilles in Vietnam” by Dr Jonathan Shay
Volunteers of America Michigan Veteran Homeless ShelterDuring a recent visit to a veterans’ homeless shelter in Lansing, MI, Patrick Patterson, the Volunteers of America Michigan Vice President for Operations gave me two books to read. The gift was a great way for me to find meaning as to how our veterans end up on the street. As I read, Jonathan Shay’s “Achilles in Vietnam, Combat Trauma and the Undoing of Character” the memories of the Vietnam era came flowing back to me… not as a combat veteran of that era but as an American who could not understand what was happening to my country, its soldiers and my friends. While…
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“No Shame in Seeking Help” – Real Warriors Campaign DoD Blogger Roundtable
Staff Sgt. Meg KrauseStaff Sgt Meg Krause had her act together! Joining the Army in 2001 she served as a medical technician at Landstuhl Army Medical Center in Germany and then found herself in Iraq. It was according to her a “life changing experience for me”. Something she did not expect! Leaving active duty in 2006 to attend college at Penn State she stayed part of the military with duty in the Army Reserve. Then the problems came: alcohol abuse, tardiness, poor class attendance, attitude changes, bad decisions and more! The unit leadership and peers noticed, family and friends too! But she failed to respond until her First Sergeant sat…
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Happy 10 Year Anniversary!
Hubs and I celebrated 10 years of marriage this past week. Ten years! That seems huge to me, in this age of short term relationships, marriages falling apart, rampant-divorce. I can’t wait till we hit our 20 year anniversary and then our 30th, 40th, 50th but for now I can’t help but look back at the past ten and smile. 10 Random Facts: Hubs and I danced to Susan Ashton’s Spinning Like A Wheel “This is good, and this is strong. So hold to me and I’ll belong to you.” Great lyrics to an unknown love song. Hubs and I met at our mutual friends’ wedding in October of 1996. We didn’t…
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Deployment and Finances
Deployment … Changing of the Guard … Total upheaval … “Change” doesn’t even begin to describe what deployment was for my family. I was juggling so many balls while my husband was gone for a year that they could have put me in the circus… (or possibly the funny farm?) One of those proverbial balls: Finances. The family budget and bill paying are somethings that my husband does for the family, and he does it well! Bills are paid on time, the budget is allocated correctly, and interest-payments are kept to a minimum. So what was one of my major stresses in the months before and after he left? How…
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Looking Back
I have a full checklist of things that need to get done this morning but as I was doing a bit of research I ran across an old blog-post that took me back: Holding up the Fort. I wrote this two years ago right after Hubs returned to Iraq from R&R. You can go ahead and read it I’ll wait right here… 🙂... Isn’t it fun to look back? Relive? Revisit? The kindergartener in “Holding up the Fort” is now a 2nd grader. My preschooler from a few years ago is enjoying his own Dr Seuss week with his kindergarten class! This morning he proudly got on the bus with…
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Suffering
We are military-wives. We know suffering. Some of us worse then others. Some have lost husbands to war. Some have lost their soul mates to PTSD. Some have lost any sense of closure when something happens ‘back home’ and unable to go to the ones that need them in their hour of need. Other struggles aren’t as bad. But still leave us hurting and feeling miserable. Saying goodbye to our spouse for a year deployment. Saying goodbye to the best of friends as we move across the country, the world. Watching our children struggle with depression because of their “Military Brat” lifestyle. All suffer. Today at church our sermon was…
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Praying for our Deployed Service members and their Spouses
It is that time of year! Travel plans have been made. “To-Do” lists have been created. Families are getting together. As you gather around the Thanksgiving table this week pledge to remember our families with service members serving in Iraq, Afghanistan, Africa, over oceans, in the air… many places, far, far from home; many spouses far from the other half of their heart; many children relying on one parent, when they would much rather have two hands to hold, another set of arms to wrap around them; many moms and dads missing the little boy and girl they raised into fine men and women! Pledge to remember these people as…
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Fun on Veteran’s Day with my Grandson and His Class
What a great opportunity to tell the kindergarten class about veterans and share some experiences! Thank you so much for the Parent Teacher Organization at Pine Ridge Elementary School in Ada, Michigan for making this a special day for veterans! I had the chance to speak with my grandson’s class about what it meant to be a veteran, tell them where Afghanistan, Iraq, Bosnia, Kosovo ++ were located and had some great laughs. I learned that one child’s cat had died, one child’s dog had been sprayed by a skunk but for 15 minutes I held their attention! They were well behaved, sat and listened, raised their hands, made calls…
