When I found out Lauren, author of The Fine Art of Camouflage, had served on a Provincial Reconstruction Team in Afghanistan I was intrigued. I served on a PRT in Afghanistan. And I didn’t know anyone personally who had deployed on a PRT besides the people I met on my own deployment. Sometimes you wonder […]
Category Archives: 31 Days
The Challenge of Deployment
Lauren Kay shared the challenge of deployment in her memoir The Fine Art of Camouflage. Lauren’s decision to join the military was inspired by her moms service during Desert Storm and the events of September 11th. Those two things led her to look into the military and she ended up gaining her commission through the […]
Finding your career path in the Navy
Theresa is currently serving in the Navy as a Public Affairs officer. She was able to find her career path in the Navy. She started her career in the Navy because she was looking for a career. Her friends had headed off to school and she was struggling to make ends meet and was looking […]
A Female Purple Heart Recipient Story
Combat exclusion was lifted in 2016. But women were serving in combat long before combat exclusion was lifted. Vanessa Brown served as a mechanic and was running convoys on all three of her deployments. The first one happened in 2008. She is also a female purple heart recipient. Each deployment she faced a close call […]
Joining the Marines as a woman
What is joining the Marines as a woman like? Jennifer decided to join the Marines after September 11th. She went from not knowing a lot about the military to deciding she had to join. She ended up reading the book, Marine Sniper and decided she wanted to be a Marine. She was only 16 but […]
Overcoming Imposter Syndrome in the Military
Alani talks about her overcoming imposter syndrome and how it affected her and her military career. She is an Army brat and thought she would go to West Point and join the Army. Instead, she ended up gaining a Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) scholarship with the Air Force and served in the Air Force. […]
Rock the Boat – Rear Admiral Danelle Barrett
Retired Rear Admiral Danelle Barrett took her 30 years of military experience and put them into her book Rock the Boat. In her book, she talks about the lessons she has learned from her military career while also including real stories from her time in the military. I enjoyed getting a chance to have her as […]
Hear Iraq War Stories from a female combat veteran
Most often when Iraq War stories are told they are from a male veteran’s perspective. In Jennifer’s book, Calmed she writes not only her story but includes her husband’s perspective of what being deployed together was like. When Jennifer put on her brother’s Marine Corps uniform she stood a little taller. It inspired her to […]
Deployment – What is it like to deploy
Sitting on the airplane with a book in my bag that I knew I should read. But it is about a deployment experience. And I’m unsure if I should dive in or just ignore it a little longer. Sometimes reading books about people’s deployment experiences can be difficult. Instead, I try to watch a few […]
Air Force Public Affairs Officer Experience
Sometimes the path to a military career isn’t straightforward. And that is what happened in Elizabeth’s journey to becoming an Air Force Public Affairs Officer. Elizabeth had dreams that began when she was young watching her dad fly in the Air Force. She applied to the Air Force Academy but didn’t get in and instead […]
