"I promise you this next part is worth living for," reflections & reminders for me and for you

Two years ago, I embarked on a journey. A journey not unlike most Soldiers go through in their time in the military. I left the place where I was born, the place and the people I called home, and I left them, and I journeyed alone, with people I didn’t know. To a place I didn’t know. To a future that was terrifying, unknown, and most of all, away from my support system, away from the foundation to my existence.

If you want to hear more about what that experience was like, you can feel free to read a blogpost I wrote earlier this year reflecting on the return from my deployment. It is the rawest form of writing I’ve done on my experience, and encompasses everything I went through there.

But this post is different. This post is not only a follow-up to that blog post, but it is a redemption of the person I had to be while I was deployed. I am still in the process of redeeming myself, finding myself, loving myself despite all the things I did to survive, and the things I continue to do to survive even though I’m no longer in that space. My traumas follow me, my traumas continue to haunt me.

Two years ago, I embarked on a journey. That journey was not only traumatic for me, but traumatic for all of those who were on that deployment, and the people that we left behind.

For me, my brothers took the brunt of the heaviness. This year has not been forgiving for anyone, with training exercises back to back, every single month. My brother asks me “I see you in two weeks?” and “you not go airplane right?” Because the last memory he has of me boarding a plane, I was gone for 11 months. He says “I cried” and “you were gone long time.”

My year has been as difficult as anyone else’s and I’m not interested nor wish to compare the pain we continue to hold as we grapple with an uncertain present and future of pandemics, politics, rights, and reckoning with violent pasts (our own, and systems’).

But this year, I’ve been given so much to smile and laugh about. I felt so empty and broken when returning (and there are many days I still feel that) and I had colleagues, friends, and family pour into me when I was able and willing to accept their love. There were many instances where I shut people out, where I protected the core of who I was above anything and anyone else. I still do this.

I also learned what it meant to let go of people in my life that I had gotten used to but could not love completely or fully. I was able to be fully myself as I navigated my healing journey with my loved ones, with my brothers, and with myself. I learned about what it meant to be a better listener, advocate/activist, sibling, forgiver, and lover, grounded in love, compassion, radical love/hope/forgiveness.

I received my official certification to be a Sexual Assault Victim Advocate in the military, paving the way for me to engage in the work I do now, working alongside series of heroes who save people everyday, on their worst days.

I graduated from my Student Affairs Administration program. I left with such a sour taste of higher ed in my mouth, but I will always love the potential that it could’ve been. I hope that higher education becomes everything that they wish they could be, but are not right now.

Most importantly, I learned from everyone around me, what it meant to give up things that no longer serve us. I saw co-wokers and colleagues burn themselves up to keep institutions of oppression warm and then cut themselves off completely from systems that took more than they gave. I saw true heroes, paving the way for me to think about where I wanted to be, who I wanted with me, and who deserved my energy. These people, by showing me that leaving is not quitting, that loving yourself enough to walk away is necessary to preserve the core of our being, they taught me what radical love and hope can do. I am forever indebted to 1) my Campus Climate family: Amanda, AJ, Matt, Myxee, Laura, Garrett  and 2) my Introverts Unite family – I especially cannot thank enough the students who were there for me and with me along my journey. You have all touched me, loved me, held my brokenness and wholeness and sometimes a-lot-ness with love, care, and grace. You are and will always be my community. I will always show up for you in every capacity I can, in the way you have saved me on the days I could not get up.

These people listed above (and more), helped me gain my confidence, my self-love, my energy, and my passion again. For so long, I was on auto-pilot. I felt trapped inside my own body on days, and they coaxed the old me and the new me out with love and care, and never cast judgment. I’m sure I was not the best coworker or friend or neighbor on many occasions, and yet I know these people opened up their hearts to me in ways I can never repay you. This may be a love note to myself, but it is will always be a love note to the pieces of me that you helped me plant, water, and cultivate. It has always been a collective effort; I am a beautiful collage of all the potential you saw in me and invested in.

 

It’s because of the support and love that I received, that I was able to survive this long. That I was able to venture outside of my field to something I am so truly invested in (and that I might be good at ?? idk yet, imposter syndrome says nah).

But most importantly, I’ve been able to hear my voice again and love it, fucking clap to it, say it with conviction and heart and passion and love and the echoing of all my loved ones’ spirits behind me. I feel less alone when I speak my truth, because it was taken so violently from me during the course of my deployment, and even when I returned.

For the first time ever, I read out loud a portion of a fiction story I’ve been writing. I would’ve never done that without truly believing in the power of my words and the beauty it captures.

And for the first time since I can remember, I’ve pushed back at the military. It’s such a jarring experience to be treated like shit for 11 months straight and to come back with a spark for a tongue that speaks oceans into existence.

I have always been afraid to be my true, authentic self in the military. (LOL I WONDER WHYYY???!!!) And instead of folding into myself, I made myself bigger, less easy to consume. Not because I wasn’t doing it before, but because I wasn’t sure of the backlash if I did. Realizing that no matter what I do, it will never be good enough for the military, I decided to make it worth my while. To make it less draining on me, to make it more authentic of an experience for myself and everyone around me. And it has been a life affirming change. It has allowed me to engage in the real lives of my soldiers, the realities of the military industrial complex, break generational curses that the military deems as tradition, and love myself enough to draw boundaries that I would have never dared to do before.

I brought “Critical Race Theory” to my training because I knew someone in my section called it “extremist.”

I leave when I’m done with work, I no longer wait for people to tell me when I can leave. (sometimes lololol)

I talk to my soldiers like humans, not subordinate beings to “do my bidding”

I am less anxious saying “I’ve never done that before” and then asking people to show me how to do things. I am so much less ashamed of saying this. I am so much more empowered to say I don’t know something, rather than saying nothing and suffering.

I am a FUCKING HARD CHARGING, LOUD AS FUCK advocate for my soldiers to not be treated like shit. To have their boundaries and wishes honored in the best way possible, to do the extra work to make sure their voice is heard when it seems to conveniently get stopped at a certain level. I fucking skip chain of command and that bureaucracy, I talk to people of other ranks because deep, meaningful conversations don’t end when we look at rank.

And I’ve enjoyed my time so much more in the military now that I’ve done these things. I have Soldiers who trust me, those who have stated they want to be a leader like me, stated that they look up to me. I have only ever wanted to leave a positive imprint on this world, and this is my way of doing it,. I am doing it for myself and the secondary effects are just as fulfilling too.

When I am met with resistance, the survival part of me wants to say “ok” and be passive, to let people walk over me, to let people use me, in the same way I let others who “know more” or “have been in longer” linger over my actions. I am no longer interested in continuing traditions that place “the mission first” and “people always” when we all know THAT’S A DAMN CONTRADICTION.

I’ve gotten so much better at overcoming the intertia for me to say “I’m going to do it this way, and if I fail *shrugs*” or “oh well” or “I guess we’ll find out” or “that’s really fucked up” or “yikes” or “I’m not interested in debating critical race theory because there’s nothing to debate” or “I’m leaving” or “I’m gonna take ten minutes to nap”

Never would I ever imagine myself saying these things in a military environment. Never would I imagine myself standing up to people directly, or indirectly going behind their backs to make sure people are taken care of, and loudly proclaiming my dissent for decisions. I became the person I always needed for my younger self in the military.

And this is when I started crying when I initially wrote this piece (lolol still crying as I edit it even….)

If I could go back to myself two years ago, if I could just meet her in passing before she got on that airplane, I would tell her that she would be proud of the person I was today. That everything she has ever wanted to be, everything she thought was too far out of reach, is everything that she is now. I would tell her:

“I am so proud of you. I can’t wait for you to see what I’ve seen, for you to accomplish what I’ve seen you accomplish. You do not have to be strong on this next part of your journey, you just have to survive. You just have to make it to this next part. I promise you this next part is worth living for, that the next part is right at the cusp of the horizon you will cry at in Ukraine. Remember those moments, because they will get you through these moments to where I am now.

I promise you that you will love this part, and that you will struggle through it, and you will also find joy, happiness, and love in the next part. You will meet so many people who will push you towards being the person you have always wanted to be, to challenge you into becoming who you are meant to be. But you have to be alive to enjoy it. I’ll see you soon again, further down the line, and with more love for you than you can handle. And guess what? The person who will hold you in their arms will do the same, show you love like you've never witnessed. You'll think you don't deserve it, but one day, you'll realize you do, and I promise you it won't be too late. 

Please take care of yourself until then, I love you so much more than I ever have before; I have enough love for the both of us to sustain you on this journey. And you are the best thing to ever happen to me.”

“Thov kom tu neeg koj mus yog tom ntej no zoo tshaj tus neeg koj ib txwm yog.” - Maa Vue, Tsab Ntawv

“If you stick around, you’ll find yourself in the embrace of someone who waited their entire lives to embrace you, whose path you will beautifully alter with your presence.” - John Pavlovitz, If you stick around (a letter to those wanting to leave)

 

In the aftermath of a deployment

TW: Self harm, suicide, alcoholism, sexual harassment 

The person that I am is not the person I was a year ago. 

 The person that I was a year ago had her growth, her confidence, and her passions stripped from her throughout the course of my deployment. 

I look at the person that I was with agonizing longing and a type of anger that makes me wonder who I can blame for creating the conditions of that loss. For the longest time upon returning, I believed that person to be completely gone. I spent days gathering the pieces of who I was, who I wanted people to remember, and shoving them into the mask I presented to others. 

The military can do many things to a person, and many of those things include stripping away people’s personalities, values, morals, and replacing them with a false sense of camaraderie through trauma bonding. I joined the military for the money, and that’s that. The ways that the military abuses the most vulnerable folks with the promise of adventure, money, and honor—to die for a country that would not ask the same of those who already have these resources—it’s a tool of exploitation. 

The truth is that the military takes more than it gives. The most significant thing the military has taken from me is time. I haven’t had a full summer with my family and loved ones since 2014. I’ve missed weddings, birthdays, births, and funerals due to the military. As a primary caretaker for my family, being gone for months at a time means that my brothers shouldered most of the burden of translating, explaining bills, calling SSI, working through transitional periods, and during this past year, COVID response. 

My deployment took time away from me and my loved ones. It took time away from my graduate degree, time away from learning, time away from myself in the prime of my years of activism and passion. It is time I will not get back. 

When I deployed, the world and time seemed to stop for me. For my family, friends, and loved ones, their world continued. It’s such a hallowing feeling to know that everyone’s life goes on without you while your world has completely halted. I still feel like I’m living in 2019 sometimes, and the changes in people’s lives without me still feel so drastic. 

The Deployment

The details of my deployment are fuzzy at best. 

All of the things that happened to me feels like a list in my brain. Some are bolded, italicized, circled, but each thing that happened to me (and others) got bumped down every time something new popped up. There are things my mind has intentionally blocked out. I will attempt to recall my experiences as a means for you to understand the mess of my mind. 

I deployed to a non-combat zone. While there were definite risks where I went, I was not actively being shot at. I make this clear because the type of PTSD that veterans go through can be from multiple types of experiences, and one is not more or less than the other. PTSD is a serious mental condition that the military still misunderstands (i.e., seen as a weakness). I am here to say that it is not, and anyone who is in the military who undermines Soldiers and their strength for not being “resilient enough” to “get tough” with shit going on in their head is not here to support anyone but themselves. 

There are two types of Soldiers: commissioned officers (Officers) and non-commissioned officers (NCOs). In a perfect world, Officers are the “planners” and “decision-makers” while NCOs are the “executors” and also the subject matter expert in their specific areas—they come with a wealth of knowledge to ultimately drop knowledge bombs on officers so they make the right decisions. Both officers and NCOs are entrusted with caring for the Soldiers below them.

I am a commissioned officer. I was not only new to my role, but new to being a commissioned officer. I was fresh out of my basic officer course—which teaches you the basics of your job in the military but not quite the intricacies. The military typically trains its Soldiers with “on the job” training. 

For the deployment, I was assigned as the Human Resources Officer in Command (OIC). I said earlier that Officers and NCOs work in tangent with one another, so an OIC has an NCOIC assigned to it as well (Noncommissioned officer in charge). Typically, you pair a new officer with a more seasoned NCO. My NCOIC and I were completely new to our roles, which meant collectively, the HR expertise was not there—this was at no fault of our own; the people who created the manning document should have put someone who would be able to advise me through this HUGE role. This is where the problems would begin, and never end. 

Because of the lack of expertise that we both had, our credibility was not strong to begin with. It only plummeted from there. Ultimately, I was the face of our HR section (6 Soldiers total, including us). 

Because of my youth, and because I didn’t know any better, I was easily manipulated to get what people wanted, to get the answers that people wanted to hear. 

Because of my youth, my superior officers did not take my recommendations into consideration. It was always “this is how we do things” with the guise of “I just didn’t understand yet.” 

Tasks were given to me without context, without purpose, without direction. This meant I put countless hours of work into products, only to have them dismissed because they weren’t what people “wanted.” 

Being an OIC is a position of high responsibility, even when I am not a high ranking officer. Equating my rank and responsibility meant that my words did not mean anything when I provided answers or recommendations. People would always find a way to tell me I was wrong, that I didn’t know what I was talking about, or simply berate me because they had more experience in the military than I did. 

I did my research. I consulted with the experts of the organization for their advice, their input. I did everything in my power—gathered all the information I had at the time to make an informed decision. It was never enough, there was always something wrong, and the way it was delivered to me was never in a way to empower me, only to exert power over me. 

At the beginning, I was resilient. I took it one win at a time. I reminded myself that HR was a thankless job, that there would be more difficult problems to solve than easy ones—that I was being paid to think and problem solve. But there was so much more going on that pushed me over the edge. 

There are days I would skip lunch to cry in my room, because I knew my roommate wouldn’t be there at the time. 

There was a week straight where a high ranking officer came into my office everyday to interrogate me about decisions that were made at a level higher than me. I was just the messenger. That week, I cried every single fucking night. That weekend, I skipped every meal except dinner so I could sleep through the day. 

Not a week went by where I was able to keep a consistent schedule or task list. There were always things being piled on, emergency fires to be put out, one being prioritized over the other. Deadlines from 9am being due at 12pm. Emergency meetings added onto my plate. Soldiers coming to me to fix things “at that instant.” 

My inability to draw boundaries and need to find a purpose meant that people manipulated me. I was approached and asked questions/for favors at every venue. The gym, the track, walking back to my room, the coat room before getting into chow, on the way to the bathroom, getting out of the bathroom, when there was food in my mouth, at the beer tent. Everywhere.

There would be nights I would have nightmares about waking up late, missing meetings, misspeaking at meetings, missing Red Cross Messages, forgetting to address someone as Sir/ma’am in emails. Forget to send up a report at 10am on the dot and get a phone call from our higher HQ.

There were rumors spread about all the women and who they were supposedly sleeping with. At the beginning of the deployment, I took it personally, and as a marker on my character, as if people weren’t questioning it enough. Even after multiple tries by the command team to address the issue (i.e., a separate meeting with the women to address it…as if the only problem was the women), eventually, I became numb to it.

The military has a fraternization policy on NCOs and officers not having unprofessional relationships beyond work. But when the gossiping came about, I was told to “watch my perception” and to hang out with the women of my section instead of hang out of people who were my own rank (who were mainly men). I was being given a different set of rules in order to navigate the system and my “perception” because it was too difficult to create the conditions for people to stop spreading rumors. With every rumor that was spread about the women of the deployment, I became more and more suspicious of everyone’s interactions with me and “what people would say” if I laughed too loud, if I smiled, if I didn’t smile, if I rolled my eyes, if I did yoga, if I was walking the same way as someone.

Testimonies, quotes, “proof”

These are comments that were made about me: 

 - “Take pictures when you have sex with her.” – A Soldier had messaged me asking about HR questions, and a buddy of theirs had looked over their shoulder and said this to them. 

 - “She’s just learning English.” – A group of officers and I were playing scrabble and I had failed epically because I’d never played before. 

 - “I want to put my nose in your butthole.” – An officer said this to me while wasted on New Years night. I left immediately afterwards. When I told someone about it, they made “nose” and “butthole” jokes for the rest of the deployment when I was around. 

 - “I treat you like a daughter” / “I’m old enough to be your father.” – Literally all the fucking men on the deployment. I’m not your daughter. I don’t want you to protect me like a father. I am a commissioned fucking officer in the fucking Army, and I deserve to be treated as a fucking professional. I deserve to be respected as a person, as a woman of color and the unique experiences that it affords me, but not as your daughter. It is infantilizing and condescending. 

 - “I’d like to talk to you about polygamy.” – This person found out that I was bisexual and immediately equated it to polygamy (this happens a fucking lot…please fucking stop. I’m monogamous), and asked me about my “experiences” 

 - “We don’t serve people who don’t open their eyes” – A man of color, to me. 

 - “I don’t want COVID from you.” – After the COVID bs and the racism against Chinese/Asian presenting folks, someone said this to me when I offered them my drink because I was leaving. I said something back on the lines of “Wow, it must suck to be such a racist piece of shit.” 

I don’t remember when I hit my breaking point—it was definitely 2-3 months in. It was amidst the feeling of hopelessness, having my recommendations dismissed, the gossip, COVID. I dreaded waking up and having to sleep just to wake up. There were days I wanted to go to sleep and not wake up. I wanted to die so I would not have to face people, but I remember telling myself I had to live because there was so much work to do that it would just create more of a burden for those around me.

I did everything in my power to prove that I was trying, that I was making decisions as indicated by my job. I tried to prove myself to people who were dead set on misunderstanding me.

I drank almost every single night. If I wasn’t at the beer tent, people would ask for me (and that’s a bad fucking sign y’all). I started cutting myself (again). It’s the first time I’ve cut myself in years. While the feeling of relapse was terrible, I drowned it out with alcohol.

I mentioned earlier that the military is good at masking trauma bonding as camaraderie and group cohesion. I had a strong bond with people through the traumas that we were going through, which isn’t the best way to form friendships with people, but they saved me during this time. I’d like to think we all saved each other. I had a group of women who ate together, drank together, went to the lake together, or worked out together. While they were not regular in my life (because I was always busy working, or asleep), they allowed me some comfort.

I also had strong bonds with a few men during the deployment. Of note is that the bar is low, but I was craving such intellectual conversations beyond work, that leading up to the George Floyd protests, there were a few men that had a racial reckoning and were able to process with me. The emotional labor that went into developing these men took a toll on me, but it was one of the very first times that I was able to have candid and critical conversations in months. I craved it and it fed my soul. These people helped recenter me, remind me where my passions lie. These men were also the ones who supported me as I completed my training to become a Unit Victim Advocate on top of my regular duties.

Again, the bar is low while the trauma-bonding was strong with the folks I surrounded myself with. But some of these folks saved me during this time. I hold these connections as necessary during hardship and I hope that they grow—and even if they don’t, I’ll know that during my deployment, we had one another.

I’ve said this many times before in my career in the military: code switching from Ka to Military Ka is exhausting. When I was in college, code switching was only on during my ROTC courses, and I could turn it off when I went home for the night. But for 9 months straight, I wore a mask. You wear a mask for so long and you start to forget who you were underneath it (it’s a v for vendetta quote lol). The type of emotional and mental exhaustion is unimaginable. I’m still tired from it. I don’t even know what recovering looks like. There are still missing pieces of me that I am still discovering everyday.

The aftermath

My therapist and I have worked through my emotions since coming back. It took me a few months to even push myself to get a therapist. I recognize how privileged it is to even afford one (my therapist is free; I receive an hour of free counseling per week through a military program called Give an Hour). Going back to therapy was a good decision, and I don’t believe you have to be “fucked up” in order to go. Sometimes you need someone who has enough distance from you to process through events in your life or your childhood and call you out on your bullshit.

She and I have worked through (and continue to work through) key things from the deployment: 

 1) My confidence was not lost, it was taken from me. Overworking to fill the gaps of my knowledge, only to be told my work would not be taken into consideration for 9 months straight takes a toll on the voice and confidence I had. ESPECIALLY because on the civilian side, I work in an office that values my voice and all that I have to offer. Coming back and attempting to engage with less confidence is demoralizing and dissonance-inducing for my body that has only knew defensiveness for 9+ months straight. 

 2) My inability to draw boundaries is directly tied to the worth that I placed in my work, and when I was told that I was unworthy, I intentionally put myself out there for people to do labor and find a purpose through that labor. 

 3) The way that we cope when we are stressed is not inherently wrong/right. Regaining control by cutting/drinking are not healthy coping mechanisms, but they were all I had to have control. 

 4) There is no saying that I can’t go back to the person that I was prior to the deployment, but the person who existed before the deployment does not have the experience and resilience that I do now; not acknowledging that does a disservice to my survival. I wish surviving this wasn’t a marker of strength.

I was not prepared for the drastic change of a person that I was when I returned, and as I recount the person that I was when I returned, I think about how much pain I inflicted on those closest to me. I’ve left scars on people in ways that I can never forgive myself for.

When I returned from my deployment, my friend committed suicide a few weeks after. In the same way I am still learning to grieve the beautiful person that she was, her absence, and the anger of the conditions of her suicide—I am doing the same to grieve the person that I was before this deployment.

I still don’t know what it means to “allow myself” to feel all the emotions from this loss. Responding to the feelings the deployment created for me has been messy. I have not been the best person to be around. My worst traits have revealed themselves through unhealed trauma: pushing people away, being silent when I’ve wanted to say something, being easily irritable, being a control freak, being selfish, stifling my own creativity because ‘I don’t deserve it.’ I’ve ruined relationships and hurt loved ones through this. I’ve become someone I do not love, I do not admire. Sometimes I look at myself in the mirror and wonder if this is the best person that I can be for myself, for the world.

My entire life, I’ve held words of affirmation as one of my top love languages to affirm my existence, because I can’t seem to do it for myself. I’ve heard so many times, “You don’t realize how amazing you are” “I wish you could see you the way I see you” “You underestimate your impact.” Because the truth is, I don’t know how to accept myself or love myself for who I truly am. I live in moments and bubbles where there are times I can acknowledge it. But it is not a truth I can accept of myself yet.

I’ve never fully believed the phrase “if you don’t love yourself, no one will.” I believe that if I don’t love myself, I won’t be able to accept others’ love. It’s one of the hardest fucking lessons I’ve learned in life, and I hope that one day, I can see myself worthy enough for the love that everyone gives me.

I’ve spent my entire life caring for others, pleasing others, and serving others in ways that is so detrimental to myself. I am a first generation Hmoob daughter of refugees, the eldest daughter in a swarm of sons, whose life is supposed to be dedicated to leading my people to liberation. But I know that it’s time for me to invest in myself. It’s time for me to care, please, and serve myself.

I still don’t know what it looks like. But I know that my decision to choose myself is the best decision for the version of myself waiting on the other end. I hope she is proud of me. I hope she can look at me with more love than I can give myself at this moment. And most of all, I hope she can fully and truly say that she made the right decisions for her healing.

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