I Never Went To Afghanistan, but Serving Was Still Worth It
A veteran’s reflection on Afghanistan & prior service
By now most of the World is aware of what is happening in Afghanistan. The with drawl of American troops has lead the Taliban to almost completely take over the Country. Afghanistan is a place thousands of Military members have deployed too. I am not one of them, but I feel I have an emotional connection in some ways, being I served active duty in the Navy from 2008–2012. Despite me never being deployed to Afghanistan, I believe my time in the service was still worth it.
I am getting several emails a week from the VA providing resources to veterans/current military members for coping with the emotional toll the situation in Afghanistan may have on a person that has served there. They may have felt it was nothing, a waste of money, energy, and brought on a hell of a lot of unnecessary PTSD, seeing what the current state is now, utter chaos and turmoil. Residents are desperately trying to flee the Taliban. If you haven’t already read “ Afghanistan Meant Nothing” by Laura Jedeed https://laurajedeed.medium.com/afghanistan-meant-nothing-9e3f099b00e5, you definitely should if your curious to learn more about a service member serving in Afghanistan and what all really goes/went down there from a persons eyes. Laura, thank you for your service.
Its been almost 10 years since I have been separated. I am always thinking back on my time in the Navy. I would be lying if I said I never asked myself,”was it worth it?” I say that, because when people ask, “why did you join”, my answer was simply “money for college.” Which I am blessed to have received. I actually used it all up, and never ended up pursuing that major. I can honestly say now, especially with the tragedies in Afghanistan, “hell yeah it was worth it.” I served to defend America’s freedom. I’m ashamed it has taken me this many years to realize freedom should have been one of the top things as for my reasons to serve. It’s OK to have other reasons for wanting to serve your Country. But now more than ever I see freedom as something I had undermined for years.
I have great memories of laughter & fun, working with funny and amazing people in the Navy. I developed amazing friendships. Like any job, not all parts were glamorous. I don’t always miss those dark long nights working on the flight deck during flight operations. Fighting my body to stay awake during the cold dark late night hours, while I can barley see a thing, not even the large loud helicopters flying above. Or the blistering humid heat while we were off the coast of Singapore. Or the physical exhaustion of carrying heavy chains to tie down an incoming aircraft. But it was worth it. One of my closest of the few friends I have was in the Navy too, we met at the recruiting office before our boot camp departure dates. I’d say that’s a pretty serious friendship to still remain friends years later, despite being on different ships and never actually working together. I saw amazing places around the World. As mentioned earlier, I was relieved of thousands of dollars for college tuition because of college tuition benefits from being a Veteran.
I proudly drive around with my Veteran’s license plate on my car. Although the constant “who is the Veteran” drives me bonkers, that people still in 2021 assume the Veteran has to be a male. Overall, I am happy and pleased with my service to my Country.
The Military forces a young person to grow up fast. You can be faced with huge tasks and responsibilities. Rarely did i ever stop to think during my time, “wow, there are literally tons of 19–21 year olds keeping this ship afloat!”
I obviously cannot speak personally on how I feel about serving in Afghanistan, because I never did. However a few of my family members have, and they still have PTSD. My older brother got deployed there twice, his PTSD was very bad when he got home. He actually really discouraged me from joining. I think it was due to how traumatic his experiences were in Afghanistan, and did not want the same for me. My deployment during my 4 service years was at sea for 7 months on a large ship smaller than an aircraft carrier. My ship was inside a “combat zone” for about 5 of the 7 months. We were off the coast of Somalia for quite a while, there was so much shit going on at the time, still is. Just in my city where I live there is quite a big Somalian immigrant population that has grown substantially just over the last 5 years or so. I see why.
To all of the service Men and Woman who have served, thank you. Your honor and courage is not forgotten or dismissed. My point is to not dismiss your experience or tell you how you should feel about your service in Afghanistan. But to say, your service to America still mattered. Fighting for freedom is nothing new when it comes to the history of America. We have freedom’s in this Country because part of your service involved going to Afghanistan, despite how you feel about the purpose of the Military’s role in Afghanistan. Your service mattered, you matter as a person. Thank you.
If you are struggling emotionally with the current state of Afghanistan, please reach out to the your local VA, or call the crisis hotline. Here is the number for the Veterans Crisis Line: 800–273–8255, then select 1.
