The Family You Choose
The military is a calling and a FAMILY too
I should give some background on this story before we get too deep. My wife and I have been married for 17 years. We met at Technical School in Monterey, California, and married a few months later. Getting married young often happens in the military, especially in Monterey. It’s called the Defense Language Institute, but alumni call it the Desperate Love Institute for a reason. Shortly after my wife gave birth to our second child, she exited active duty and joined the Air National Guard. Since then, she’s gone on many long-term exercises and a few deployments, which are rare for the linguist career field. This story takes place when she was on one of those long-term exercises.
I love volleyball and have played on the base intramural team for several years. On March 11, 2024, my team was practicing for an upcoming game. One side of the net practiced striking the ball, and another teammate practiced blocking. I went up to block the hitter, and on the way down, my right foot landed on top of his foot. My ankle twisted and dislocated. I felt a pop and looked down to see my foot sideways. About a million things went through my head at once. “My kids are here, and they’re going to see their dad hurt.” “Wifey is in Germany,” “Wifey is going to kill me,” “Holy crap, my foot is on SIDEWAYS; I need to get a picture of this” “How am I going to drive my kids to school?” “Holy hell, this hurts.” “Is it broken?” “OMG, I won’t be able to drive!”…And a lot more.
Thank GOD and the Air Force for the Family I had around me that day. My actual blood family lives 800-plus miles away in Michigan. But I still had family around. They immediately went into action. Two went to call 911, and one went to get help from the gym staff (which consisted of an ice pack). I asked another person to grab my phone so I could call my wife in Germany and tell her what had happened. *gulp*. I got some great pictures, and I will attach them at the bottom of the article for posterity, but only at the bottom so the faint of heart do not need to scroll that far! One of my teammates told my wife what was up, and we also spoke. Her immediate concern, beyond me, was what would happen with the kids. I told my wife not to worry about the kids as a Family member, and a teammate covered that part. I gave her the front door code without even questioning the decision. She was unquestionably trustworthy. After the ambulance took me to the hospital, she brought them to Panera Bread and my house. She fed them and prepared them for bed and school the next day. Meanwhile, I was high as a kite on a cocktail of pain medications, and my First Sergeant and Supervisor came to the ER. They were prepared to either stay there all night if I had surgery or take me home if I could be released.
Turns out I did not need surgery. YAY! But I still could not drive and had no way to get my kids to school. Queue supervisor, who went well out of his way to show up early every morning to take my kids to school and leave work early every day to pick them up and bring them home. For that, John, I will be forever grateful. Margaret, Thank you for caring for my kids without me even asking. Gabi, thanks for calling 911 and getting the ambulance there quickly. To my Squadron, Thank You for dropping off meals for me and the kids for the week it took for my wife to finish her exercise. She had her own emergency, where she played Family for another airman with a medical problem.
Why am I telling you this story? Because it is a special part of being in the Military. We take care of each other. We all wear a uniform that has our Family name on it. It also has some variants of “U.S. & Military Service.” In boot camp, we are all told that wearing the uniform makes the other person your family. Most civilians would do nearly anything for their families. In the Military, far away from home, we form tight family-like bonds with our battle buddies, wingmen & shipmates, and that bond can be closer than the blood family we left back home.
 | A guest post by
|
There's another time in life when it helps to have the support of the community to call upon - when you're older. I fractured my ankle in May while my partner was spending 6 weeks in England visiting his daughter. My girlfriend network stepped up to take care of me in those early weeks when I was completely unable to get around except on a knee cart.
I always encourage my younger friends to nurture their friend networks. You would not believe how invaluable they become as you age!
So true, and when we both got out of the military, I expected civilian life to be similar — hahahahaha. My husband was sent off to a training school hundreds of miles away, we had 3 ft of snow and I called his supervisor asking if someone could come help me dig out the garage so I could take my son to school and go to work. “Why are you calling me?” — goodness, I can’t tell you the number of times we would have run to help a military family member if her husband was deployed and she needed something. I missed it for many years, now I am used to people simply not caring.