Veterans Archives: Preserving the Stories of our Nations Heroes
In a world where storytelling has been our link to the past since the days of cave drawings, there exists a timeless tradition. It's the art of passing down knowledge, and for Military Veterans, it's a crucial piece of their legacy. Join us on the Veterans Archives Podcast, where we dive deep into the heartwarming and awe-inspiring stories of those who served, no matter when or where.
Here, Veterans get the chance to be the authors of their own narratives. Through guided interviews in a relaxed and safe environment, they paint their experiences with their own words and unique voices. The result? A memory card in a presentation box, a precious gift they can share however they please.
But that's not all. These stories find a secure home in our archive, a treasure chest of experiences for future generations to explore. The best part? It's all a gift to the Veteran – our way of saying thank you for their service.
Tune in to the Veterans Archives Podcast, where history, heroism, and heartwarming tales come to life.
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Veterans Archives: Preserving the Stories of our Nations Heroes
From Drill Weekends to Disability: Susan McCain's Path Through Military and Civilian Life
In this deeply personal conversation, Susan McCain takes us on a journey through her life as a Michigan Army National Guard combat medic, special education teacher, and eventually, a proud advocate for women veterans. Born in Mount Clemens in 1962, Susan's path was shaped early by her brother Curtis who had Down syndrome—inspiring a lifelong dedication to working with special needs children.
At 23, Susan joined the National Guard primarily to fund her nursing education while keeping her teaching position. She vividly recounts basic training at Fort Dix where she became "X703" instead of Susan, and the moment she realized she was training to be a combat medic rather than a "medical specialist" as her recruiter had described. What's particularly striking is how Susan didn't identify as a veteran for decades after her service. "I never viewed myself as a veteran," she confesses. "I just did what I did because I did it."
Susan's personal life took a beautiful turn when her college algebra tutor (whom she initially wasn't attracted to) became her husband after sweeping her off her feet—literally—on the dance floor. Their story includes conscientious family planning around her military obligation, resulting in their son being born just months after her service ended. Her 35-year career working with special needs students mirrors her own journey through challenges, including serious health issues that forced her onto disability leave at age 47.
The conversation ultimately reveals how military service creates lasting ripples throughout one's entire life. For women veterans especially, who often struggle to have their service recognized, Susan's evolution from reluctance to embrace her veteran status to becoming an advocate for other women veterans demonstrates the power of community. As she powerfully reminds us: "It's okay to not be okay... And in those moments, we need somebody else to tell us that it's okay."
Today is Wednesday, june 4th 2025. We're here with Susan McCain, who served in the Michigan Army National Guard. So welcome, susan.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much, Bill.
Speaker 1:All right, so we're going to start out really easy and maybe the questions will get harder as we go along. But when and where were you?
Speaker 2:born. I was born in Mount Clemens, michigan, at St Joseph's Hospital. Okay, in what year? 1962.
Speaker 1:Okay, all right. Okay, in what year?
Speaker 2:1962. Okay.
Speaker 1:All right, so you're a 60s, 70s kid then yes, I am. We probably have some similar stories, right, I would imagine. So did you grow up in Mount Clemens?
Speaker 2:I did not. I spent my first five years in Utica, michigan, and then we moved to our new home in Sterling Heights.
Speaker 1:Okay, and then so how old? So you were like five when you moved to Sterling Heights.
Speaker 2:Yes, I was between five and six because I started first grade. I'd done kindergarten at the old house. Uh huh, first grade at the new house. Okay, brothers and sisters. I have four. I had four, okay, um, my oldest brother, ken. He's five years older than I am. My brother Ken, kevin, is four years older than me and my brother Curtis was just a year and a half older than I am, but he was born with Down syndrome.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:So he just passed this last September, so things are a little raw when I talk about him. We were the closest in age out of all my siblings, and then I have a younger sister who's two years younger than I am. Her name is Cheryl with an S and it's Curtis with a K. Okay, that's what he always say Curtis with a K. Lampar, L-A-M-P-A-R.
Speaker 1:How nice, that was my main name. Okay, alright, so you got to be the baby for a couple of years then.
Speaker 2:I did.
Speaker 1:I really did. Did you hear any stories about what it was like when the new baby got there and you realized?
Speaker 2:it wasn't you anymore. Well, before the new baby got there, I had already earned the name the Brat, so you can imagine the first girl being born after three boys. My mom said my dad was walking on clouds. And so yeah, I was the golden child for two years and I used to say that my sister came along and ruined everything, but she has been a blessing in my life and I'm glad I have a sister.
Speaker 1:Oh good, yeah Well, you know, siblings aren't a blessing until has been a blessing in my life and I'm glad I have a sister. Oh good, yeah, Well, you know, siblings aren't a blessing until they are a blessing, right?
Speaker 2:Exactly so talk a little bit about growing up. What was it like for you and your family as a kid? It was, I mean, pretty dysfunctional, considering you know you got five children and my dad worked for Michigan Bell. So he made a decent income but needed to work a lot of overtime so he wasn't home a lot and he suffered with depression, manic depression. So he was on lithium basically for his whole adult life. He only lived to 74, and he was also an alcoholic on top of that. So that created a lot of challenges for my mother and us children. So, um, but we always knew we were loved, right?
Speaker 2:you know, yeah, so um, we always had food, and you know, shelter and cars, you know.
Speaker 1:All the stuff you needed, exactly, yeah, yeah. So tell me a little bit about your mom. What was she like?
Speaker 2:My mom was basically raised as an only child. She was like later in life child and had several older brothers and she was somewhat of a perfectionist. Both her and my father grew up in the Catholic church and Catholic schools so there was some remnants of guilt and sin and a lot of the things that come with that faith and I've learned to appreciate it and glad that I was able to have some foundation in my faith and my spiritual life and I always tell people I was born and baptized Catholic, married Presbyterian and then we raised our son in a Southern Baptist church.
Speaker 1:That's a big change.
Speaker 2:So I consider myself very well-rounded in the spiritual realm and I still, to this day, very strongly keep close contact with God every day, and I'm grateful for that heritage.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that foundation means a lot. It does. It doesn't seem to at the time when you were a kid. I don't think Right, but it really does mean a lot. So did you go to Catholic schools then?
Speaker 2:I did not. No, all my siblings and I went to public school. Okay, what was school like for?
Speaker 1:you.
Speaker 2:It was a playground. I was told by one of my bosses I was a social, not a social butterfly, but a social animal.
Speaker 1:Not quite a butterfly though.
Speaker 2:Right. So it was my time to get around my friends and just hang out. I wasn't real academically orientated. I struggled with reading comprehension. I can speed read, but I couldn't tell you what I just read. So, um, I think, I think I'm adhd, if I had to diagnose myself. I've never been tested, but um, yeah, so there's that That'll present its own challenges, right?
Speaker 1:so is there anything in particular I mean other than social aspects anything in particular in school that really stands out to you or that you really appreciated?
Speaker 2:Yes, I had an English teacher in middle school who tutored me with all of the nouns and verbs and pronouns and all of that. And then I had one other teacher, that was Mrs Jarkey, and then I had Mr Smith when I was in high school who was my algebra teacher. And later on, when I was 26, I married my college algebra tutor. Oh, because I didn't do math very well.
Speaker 1:I failed algebra twice, chemistry once, so math wasn't my strong suit either. Okay, it's kind of cool how there's always that those one or two teachers that you really remember and that stick out to you yeah, so you made it through school and you graduated. What happens next?
Speaker 2:Well, I don't want to forget to mention Mrs Stewart. She was an elementary teacher, that stands out. She was very instrumental in shaping me. Anyways, what was the last question?
Speaker 1:Oh, just so. When you graduated high school, what was kind of the next step for you?
Speaker 2:Well, I wanted to be married. I had a boyfriend I'd been dating since I was 16, and we stayed together for about three to four years and I just decided that I wanted more than what he wanted. And so I kissed my baseball coach. I started playing softball after high school, Moved out of the house when I was 18 and got a job working for Macomb and Reedy at school district. As soon as I turned 18, I turned in the application. I got hired just a couple months after that to be a teacher's assistant for special needs children and adults like 0 to 26. So that was basically my career. So I did that for five years and at 23 I decided I can't afford to go to college except for one class a semester and I'd be there, ended up taking me 37 years to get my first associate's degree. But I really wanted a family more than a career and um. So my quest was to find Mr Wright and I found Mr McCain.
Speaker 1:And he was Mr Wright, but not Mr Wright. Now, right.
Speaker 2:Exactly exactly. But we had known each other and taught at the same school district and at 23 I decided to join the military so I could get help with paying for college and going to nursing. Thinking that I was going to make more than I did as a teacher's aide. I didn't want to be a teacher's aide for the rest of my life, ended up staying over 35 years just transferring to different positions in order to, you know, get new experiences and different age groups, different disabilities.
Speaker 1:So you and Mr McCain met. Were you dating then when you joined the military, or were you married at the time?
Speaker 2:Well, no, there was John.
Speaker 1:Oh, so there's more to the story yes, okay so you met mr mccain, but you didn't quite get married yet.
Speaker 2:And then you met john yeah, we, we worked together in the same building because he would sub in the summertime, because my job, my position was year round okay and his what.
Speaker 2:He was off in the summer so he would come and sub in our building. So I knew of him and he had wanted to ask me out. But I always had softball practice after work when everybody else was going out to the bars. So he's like, yeah, you never came out to the bars. So I joined the military in 85 and joined the military in 80, no, 85, and getting my thoughts mixed up. So I joined in 85, hoping to go into nursing, did my basic training, did my combat medic training down at Fort Sam Houston, did my basic at Fort Dix, New Jersey. And when I got out is when I took the entrance exam for the nursing program and they said you didn't do too well in the math section. We want you just to go take a couple of remedial math classes at the college. And so I said okay. So I did that. And then I took the next algebra because I knew for any degree I was going to have to have more than just 100 classes.
Speaker 1:Right, right, the 100 classes to get you ready for the next class. Right, Exactly.
Speaker 2:So I get into algebra and I'm like totally lost. And one of my coworkers said call Terry McCain, he's over at the high school and he runs the algebra program. So he said, well, send me some things through the van mail and I'll let you know if I can help you. And so I did, and I actually ended up getting transferred into his building. Oh, and he was working at the high school for severely emotionally impaired adolescents at the time and there happened to be an opening and I applied for it, and so he would literally tutor me after the kids left in the classroom and he would say X equals Y, because and I would say I don't know when I would cry and just carry on.
Speaker 2:And we found out our birthdays were a day apart, in November. This is the 21st and mine's the 20th. There's like four years in between as far as our ages, between as far as our ages. But, um, anyways, uh, he said, do you want to come out? We're going to go see a band with some of the teachers that we work with. They play in this band at night. So we went to this local bar it's called, uh, wooden nickel, and they had meatloaf sandwiches on the marquee. Oh, there you go.
Speaker 1:Can't be all bad.
Speaker 2:Now, his older sister is four years older than him and he's four years older than I am, but her birthday is also on November 21st. They were born exactly four years apart.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:So I said I knew your mother was organized and a planner, but that's ridiculous. That's out there. Anyways, my father-in-law was a Presbyterian minister, so that's why I married Presbyterian and Terry was tutoring me in algebra and then invited me to church and I loved his saying but I can't carry a tune to save my life. So he asked me to join the choir and I'm like I love it, I love to sing. Well, little did he know.
Speaker 1:How long did you stay in the choir?
Speaker 2:Actually we were the choir, we were the elders, we were the school teachers. You know school teachers. So we did a lot of. Everything was a very small congregation. It was cumberland presbyterian, so it was a small sect, and there's only two churches in michigan that I'm aware of, but um, was it a big deal for him to invite you to church?
Speaker 1:for me it was I don't, I never asked him, but I'm sure it was yeah, I mean, in some religions you don't just bring anybody to church with you, it usually means something's going on right, yeah well, I want to, I want to put a pin in that, I want to back up a little bit, though. So you, um, you joined. You joined the national guard or the army, right?
Speaker 2:away.
Speaker 1:I'm the national guard, okay, so a lot of people don't know this, that and I'm embarrassed to say I didn't know it either for a long time is that you can't just join the national guard. Yeah right I always thought, because I was prior service, I always thought, oh, it's just for people prior service that want to serve still, nope, you can join the national guard, just like join the army or any other branches of service right reserves is the same yeah, so you, uh if I'm hearing right, though your your reasoning behind joining the national guard was to be able to go to nursing school.
Speaker 2:Then right and I I really didn't want to lose my job, yeah. So it's kind of like the best of both worlds I can keep this job that I've had for five years. I, I've got seniority, I've got a salary, a pension and all of that. So I just moved forward and I'm like, okay, cool, they have to let me go and they have to let me come back. And contractually, at the time I was dating John, who was the union rep's brother. So interesting thing about John John was married prior to us dating and recent, like I, was his rebound basically. Yeah.
Speaker 2:But he was a cook and he was the one that went with me to see his recruiter at his unit. And that's the unit I joined, which was 207th Evacuation Hospital Unit in Detroit, michigan.
Speaker 1:Okay so, and this is back when it really was like one weekend a month.
Speaker 2:Two weeks. Two weeks in the summer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's not like that anymore.
Speaker 2:It's not. What is it like now?
Speaker 1:It's. So I got out, I retired in 2010 and, um, if you think about the op tempo during, uh, all the wars that were going on, um, you were either deploying or you're preparing to deploy. So a lot of times it was, you know, three or four weeks here and there, long weekends. You know, hopefully they get back to the one weekend a month, two weeks during the summer, but it really has changed quite a bit. There's a lot more emphasis on not being home. That's how it's kind of changed. But, yeah, and when I first joined it, it was, you know, the two, two weeks out of the year, one week in a month anyway. So, yeah, so it's perfect if you have a job, um, you know, you know that you're going to be gone, um, I guess. The other question I have is it always seemed like drill weekend fell on a weekend where there was something going on that I wanted to do right.
Speaker 1:Always there was always a wedding or something going on, right? Is that kind of the same way for? You yes, yeah, yeah. So tell me a little bit about, um, what was it like getting to basic training and? Here's another interesting thing. So I've interviewed a lot of women veterans and Fort Dix, uh, seems to be the place, like that 80s time frame, where a lot of women soldiers went. So you get to Fort Dix, were you on a bus or did you fly a plane there? How did that?
Speaker 2:work. I took a plane, I took a van and they picked me up in a van at the airport in Philadelphia and then we drove from the Philadelphia airport airport in Philadelphia and then we drove from the Philadelphia airport. I actually got to go back to that airport because I missed my flight one time when I was in Vegas at a conference and like cool, I'm getting off. I had a little layover so I was able to go get me a Philadelphia sweatshirt Perfect.
Speaker 1:Perfect. So what? What was it like? Stepping off, stepping out of that van then into basic training, Were you like prepared for?
Speaker 2:it. I don't know if I ever would have been prepared for the unknown, but I think I was. I think I was physically and mentally and somewhat emotionally, you know, emotionally, as you can be stable at 23.
Speaker 1:Right? None of us were yeah. So how was? How was basic training then?
Speaker 2:Well, um, they just basically take everything that you think you could have had with you and take it away, and I became X 703.
Speaker 2:That was my, my number, number your prison number yeah right, so you were no longer susan mccain, you were x703 and anyways it was. Um, it was a challenge because I'm small and they didn't have boots to fit my three and a half, so they had a special order and make three and a half size, three and a half for me, and everybody was mad because I got to do pt and everything in tennis shoes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it took a while for those boots to get there, didn't it?
Speaker 2:right, and then my my uniform tags came back and it was spelled Lamar. So I told everybody for about three weeks I was P-less because I didn't have a P in my last name on my tag. They corrected me. The right ones, yeah.
Speaker 1:Okay, and then you anything stick out in your mind about basic training Any like, is there anything that like when you think about it? Oh, that's what I remember. Yeah, the shotguns like is there?
Speaker 2:anything that like when you think about it, oh, that's what I remember. Yeah, the, the shotguns. I mean just walking between desks and there was people in between each desk with a shotgun, giving you an immunization of some sort right, you didn't want to move either, because those things I know and I'm like hey, where's my list of what you guys are injecting me with?
Speaker 1:I want to know what this is all about.
Speaker 2:Right, and I still wonder to this day how I could find that information out. Yeah, you know.
Speaker 1:Somewhere there's a record.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm sure.
Speaker 1:I don't know if we can get to it, but it's there somewhere. So you graduate basic training. Did your family come out for your graduation or anything like that?
Speaker 2:Yes, my mom and my dad and my brother curtis um came and they um their first hotel wasn't acceptable, and my mother so they found a holiday inn. Uh-huh and um, I was able to go and spend the night with them before I shipped out the next day.
Speaker 1:Okay, so, holiday inn was a big deal too. Like right, it was the place to stay exactly yeah, I remember the big sign with all the flashing lights.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it's funny that that would be what your mom had to have yeah, and for my dad to drive from detroit to new jersey, like that was a big deal. My dad was like I was sharing with you. He was still a very nervous person, yeah, especially with fear of the unknown and um, but he was a wonderful man. I never heard anything anybody say anything bad about my dad. You know, my friends used to come over. My brother used to get around. He goes, yeah, my friends come over to have a beer with my dad, but they don't come over and have a beer with me, right?
Speaker 1:So yeah, yeah. So you, uh, you graduate and graduate and you, um, you ship out, you head to your ait, so you're gonna be a combat medic. How was that school for you?
Speaker 2:well, oh no, I was gonna be a medical specialist.
Speaker 2:That's what the recruiter told me right I never heard the term combat medic until I was driving in the bus from the airport into Fort Sam Houston and there was this huge old sign and said welcome to the home of the combat medic. And I'm thinking I wonder what they do. I got on the wrong bus and I'm like, oh, I'm a combat medic. And I mean nowadays people say, oh, you're a combat medic. I never served during combat, but that was the title and I kind of say it proudly. Yeah, because I did enjoy the training and in my service time I didn't suffer with any MST, aside from my boyfriend at the time, who was the cook in our unit, cheated on me while we were standing in line, you know, for information. I seen him over there talking to some girl and then I wanted to find out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, welcome to the National Guard. Yeah, I know I hate to say that.
Speaker 2:Okay, john, I was kind of rocking the cradle over there because he was younger than me. Yeah. But very good looking and handsome and you know I mean when you're in a, a unit and you know one of the cooks, it's a good deal right, right, well, and you don't want that person to be mad at you exactly for sure?
Speaker 1:so you, uh, so this was the end of you and John. Then.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:So that was before I got back and took the nursing entrance exam and I lost my way as we were talking. I get sidetracked very easily, but anyways, so I go back get my college algebra tutor. Mr McCain. We go out for the birthday celebration and he sweeps me off my feet on the dance floor. We both had like one beer and he's like hey you want to dance? I'm like, yeah sure Never danced with a guy that knew how to take control of me and I was like he actually knows what he's doing.
Speaker 1:So, first of all, guys don't like to generally dance anyway, so that's a score right there.
Speaker 2:Right, he can actually dance yeah.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:Well, and that first date, my sister was also there because my sister's birthday is in November. So I called her and I go, I have this date and I'm like I'm not really attracted like physically to him, but I really like him. He has goals, he has, you know, he has a teaching degree and he's working on his master's, he's got plans and you know, some direction and so, different from all these other guys I'd ever dated, you know. So, anyways, um, she came, you know, to be part of the celebration and to you know, kind of support me in this like maybe first date, right.
Speaker 1:Always good to have a wing person.
Speaker 2:Absolutely yeah.
Speaker 1:Especially with your sister. Why not Right Now? That story could have gone a different way. He could have liked your sister, and then you just never know.
Speaker 2:And there's that yes.
Speaker 1:So he asked you to dance and you danced. Was it like love at first dance?
Speaker 2:Yes, literally. Wow. I mean it was kind of like a fairytale thing that I didn't expect, because I wasn't really physically attracted to him initially and when he was tutoring me he'd come over to my house and I would make him dinner and then we would do our studying and he would keep trying to get closer and closer and elbow me and I was telling my cousin. I said I really like this other guy at college and I wish he'd asked me out, but Terry keeps hitting on me and I don't know what to do.
Speaker 1:Wow, so how long have you been married then?
Speaker 2:It'll be 37 years this June.
Speaker 1:Yeah, some spark must have been there at some point.
Speaker 2:Exactly.
Speaker 1:Good thing you didn't date that college guy Well or did you?
Speaker 2:Um, no, no, no, he. He never asked me out, um, and Terry knew that I wanted to get my mom some perfume but I couldn't afford it. So they always have these off brands that's supposed to smell like it. So little did I know. He had terrible allergies and I'm asking him to smell this because my roommate had the perfume and I had the fake stuff. So I said, can you just tell me, doesn't this smell close enough, you know? And he's like, yeah, I think that'll work. Well, he ended up going out and buying me a bottle of the real stuff and didn't wrap it or anything, just had it in this old jacket that I couldn't stand and pulled it out and gave it to me as a birthday present. So another bonus. You know he was chalking up points left and right, right, well, he listened.
Speaker 1:Exactly, he listened. He could dance and he listened. So, yes, that's awesome, absolutely. So how long did you date them?
Speaker 2:We dated about two years because we were married on June 25th in 1988. Okay. The hottest day of the year was 104 degrees Oof. No air conditioning in the church.
Speaker 1:Oh, my goodness, was it the Presbyterian church? I'm assuming the Presbyterian church, right? Yes?
Speaker 2:It's a small country church in the midst of a big city is what their little quote was Is that their draw? Yes, okay.
Speaker 1:Well, I want to ask, though so there was no real spark for a while what finally connected for you with him that you knew that you were going to marry this guy?
Speaker 2:Well, my sister was pregnant at the time out of wedlock, and she needed a roommate. So I moved from my cousin's house when I got out of the military into an apartment with her while she was pregnant because I wanted to make sure she was taking good care of herself. And anyways, I couldn't sleep at night after the baby was born, because they wake up all the time as babies will do yeah.
Speaker 2:And so Terry and I were dating and I said hey, do you think you could talk to your roommates and see if I could move in? And he goes oh, I don't know. One was a teacher that we worked with in the same building and the other one was an assistant, like myself at the time, so all four of us would work at the same high school and that was quite a treat. But I said I'm not moving in with you until you put a ring on my finger. I said I've already lived with one guy and I'm not doing it again until somebody's gonna make a commitment to me. And he said are you asking me to marry? You Said well, I guess I am.
Speaker 1:Wow, now this whole story is just so different from anything I've ever heard. It's like I'm trying to wrap my head around it. I do want to back up just a little bit, though. So how long did you serve in the national guard then?
Speaker 2:eight years. Okay, when I enlisted it was two by six, and if you that meant six active, two inactive in the ir and or three five, so three active five and you got a $2,000 bonus if you signed on six years. And I'm like you know, even college is only a four year commitment. I think I'll give this three years and then I can always re up if it goes well. Yeah and uh, and I and Terry and I didn't want to have any children until my obligation was fulfilled. Right, that obligation was fulfilled on april 26 1993 and our son was born on july 6 1993.
Speaker 2:Okay, good planning good planning well that was my husband's, yeah yeah, planning, because he, when I married him, he did not want to have any children and we both taught, so we were children all day. And he said I just, you know, I'm getting older, I'm gonna be 60 when our kids walking across the you know, getting his diploma or whatever. And so we waited five years until after we were married and then I finally said, okay, am I gonna continue, you know, pursuing a career in college or are we gonna start a family? And he said, do you mind waiting until september? This was like between Christmas and New Year's, yeah, and I said I've waited five years, what's another nine months? Right, how could that hurt? So his in his mind our school goes from his school Go went from September to June. And so we figured if we started trying in September, that would give us that time and maybe the baby would be conceived in the summertime when we were both off work.
Speaker 1:Yeah, makes sense. Yeah, my daughter's a school teacher. Oh, cool so yeah, and her and her husband do not want kids. She loves teaching school, she loves kids, she doesn't want her own. I can understand that a little bit, so I do want to kind of close the chapter on the military. Is there anything from your military time that you'd like to share as we kind of move forward in?
Speaker 2:your life with your husband and your children. Yes, I guess I came to the realization. What I really signed up for was when we did two weeks of simulated wartime up in Grayling and I got to drive a deuce and a half in a convoy several times there and back to Grayling and there and back to Battle Creek for one of our two weeks. But when we were in Grayling was when I really got a vivid picture of what it would have been like if this was wartime. And prior to going to this two week summer camp, the supply sergeant who I helped out with in supply he would call me spud Because all of the gas masks were on nails. It was numbered and so I would help him pass out the gas masks when we were doing that training and I could never reach most of them because they were all above.
Speaker 2:So, he called me Spud. I don't know if you're familiar with Spud McKenzie.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the dog with the.
Speaker 2:No, this, and I always get the dog and the guy mixed up, and I think his last name may be McKenzie, but Spud was a basketball player and he was really short but really good and so anyway, so I've been the brat and I've been Spud, and then when I worked in the gym I was jim su, so and I like nicknames yeah, it was uh, to me it's endearing, you know I can't let my wife hear this, because she gets, she gets.
Speaker 1:She's got a million nicknames for me. I think I have one nickname for her and she's like why don't you have nicknames for me? I'm like it's not a nickname kind of guy, so she cannot listen to this, so okay.
Speaker 2:So yeah, like you kind of got a glimpse of this isn't really what I want to be doing yeah, and the supply sergeant had asked me to join or to be on the nuclear, biological and chemical warfare team mbc team and so he told me what it entailed and I was honored that he asked me and I respected him as a leader.
Speaker 2:Well, if there's anybody that I'd want to work under, it'd be you, so I was really grateful for that time. Pat Harrington Sergeant Harrington was wonderful. He kind of I never had to worry about black men in the military. They were always very respectful and I was small, so I didn't really feel vulnerable even though I was small. But I felt more threatened by white officers than I did any of the enlisted or you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's interesting. Is there something that? Is that just something like this part of you, or was it something that happened that made you feel?
Speaker 2:that way. Well, there were several women in my unit that would gossip and I'm sure I joined all in. But you know there was hearsay about who slept with who to get rank and, you know, get promoted or whatever, and I just thought I'm not that kind of person and I lost some respect for some of those women. But I also didn't understand a lot at 23.
Speaker 2:I also didn't understand a lot at 23. Right, and so now that in retrospect I look back and think, well, they were doing what they were doing in a man's world to try to get ahead. Yeah, so I can't fault them for that today. Right, you know it's their story to tell and their life to live, not mine. Yeah, you know it's their story to tell and their life to live, not mine.
Speaker 1:Yeah, people make decisions that are different from what we would do for all kinds of reasons. So, yeah, so it sounds like there's a lot of things kind of coming together that you decide this, it's time to pack it in and go. Besides, you wanted to start a family, right? Yes, I did yeah to start a family right yes, I did yeah yeah yeah. So you, you get out and you start that family pretty quick, um.
Speaker 2:So how many children do you have? We have one son, uh-huh, ian colin mccain. I have a little song that I made up for him. Anyway, I'm not gonna say it you sure but he's uh, he's, one of the loves of my life. Yeah, he'll be turning 32 this July 6th. Okay, and he was like his dad, he was born on his due date.
Speaker 1:Everything right down to where it should be right, All regimented.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we still had a couple months at home with him before my husband had to go back to work in September. Uh-huh School and I took three years off. I was able to take two years parental leave, or one year maternity leave and then two years parental leave, um, and it worked out well, cause one of my coworkers wanted to work halftime and I wanted to work halftime, and it was working in the preschool program at the time, and so she needed the benefits and I didn't, because my husband had them, and so it worked out well. We were able to share a job share, so I could stay home another two years oh, that's perfect, and I wouldn't lose my position.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:You know, they always have to have a position for me, but they didn't have to save that position and they've been. And my one of my goals when I started with the school district was I wanted to work with the babies before I retired. And then, when I retired, I wanted to retire from let's school for work experience, because that's the older, higher functioning adults. And so, in my mind, that was my plan. And and and, lo and behold, I was able to do that.
Speaker 1:Wow, so did having a special needs brother kind of shape the things that you wanted to do as an adult.
Speaker 2:Absolutely my entire life, curtis and I. He took care of me when I was little. We shared the same bedroom and cribs and he used to pull me out and teach me how to get out of my crib. There's a story of a couple of poopy diapers that got smeared all over the room while my mom was pregnant with my sister. Oh no, she called my dad. Like you've got to go home right now. They have everywhere go home right now they have everywhere.
Speaker 2:So my mom said that he would carry me to her around my neck, like he just put both his arms around my neck and carry him. And so he took care of me when I was young and then I took care of him while he was old yeah, so it was uh, yeah, he's such a special person. He called me his twin one time when we were going in to change guardianship for my mom to me. My mom was ailing and, um, like no one's ever wanted to call me their twin. Like what an honor.
Speaker 1:So yeah, I treasure that moment well, and curtis sort of beat the odds too. I mean, he was born at a time where children with Down syndrome weren't expected to live a full life. Right, but he really did.
Speaker 2:He did what a blessing he never had the typical heart defect that a lot of Downs have to have heart surgery. He didn't have a hole in his heart. Of downs, I have to have heart surgery. He didn't have a hole in his heart. He was always very um, very healthy, very hyper, and my mom actually walked picket lines for special education to get so he could go to school. Yeah, and the programs they had available for him when he was like under five was at an old school house and they would put him in a straitjacket to strap him in a chair to be able to teach him and show him stuff, because that was prior to Ritalin Right, and then the Ritalin really helped as he got older and aged and went to center program. School is what it's called for special needs children.
Speaker 1:Well, if you think about the time the 70s and the 80s I just don't feel like we really knew how to take care of people that had special needs.
Speaker 2:People did the best they could yeah, that was the one thing that saddened me growing up was watching all of like the birthday parties that I was invited to and going bowling and going to the show and like people didn't take children like that out in public. It was almost a shame. Yeah, you know, and my brother, thanks to my mother, who was very involved in getting him everything and anything he could she sold, sold things for organizations and um to raise money for these non-profits that would help children and adults like that and um, I always respected her for that, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah well, he's your brother too, I mean that's absolutely yeah, so you, um, you uh, take a couple years off, you go back to working at the school, and you said you were at the school.
Speaker 1:For how long um over 35 years at the school district and you were able to, like, accomplish those things that we talked about. Then the different places you wanted to work, and all of that, yes, I did. You don't seem like the kind of person that takes no. I mean, you seem very nice, but I think if someone told you no, you might get around it somehow.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I can be a little persistent. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Surely, if you talk to my husband, I'm sure, although he sounds like he might be persistent too. Yes, he is he got the, he got the girl that wasn't attracted to him to marry him and have a family. So, yeah, so at this time too. Then you changed religions. Right, because? You were presbyterian and now you're raising your son in the baptist church.
Speaker 2:Southern baptist church yes, what happened was my father-in-law was retiring and so we were interviewing and looking for pastors and female pastor came in and took over and threw away all my husband's christian education things and files and she was just clearing house and making herself at home, without considering people's feelings and years of things. So my husband, I came home from a church elders meeting and he said I will not be going to faith church and I said, okay, can you explain to me why? Why so then? And then actually at that elder meeting that I was at, the pastor was talking negatively about my sister-in-law who was the Quaker director oh no and so I said well, I'm really glad you said that, because I don't really want to go back either.
Speaker 2:She said some things that I wasn't really fond of about Sherry and I you know, I don't know what's going on and he said you know, christmas is coming, it's right around the corner. He said why don't we just try some other churches that are within walking distance? Because, he said, when I was young, we always walked from the manse to the church. Yeah, you know, on sunday mornings. And he, he remembers doing that and he enjoyed it. So I said, I think that's great. So that's what we did. And we ended up at lakeside community church and they call themselves a a community church as opposed to a Southern Baptist, but they were affiliated with the Southern Baptist convention. So it wasn't your, you know, can't wear pants, can't dance type of Baptist church, right.
Speaker 1:And I've noticed that a bit Like there used to be South Baptist Church here in Lansing and it's just South Church now. Kind of taken the Baptist out of the name.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because it had so many negative connotations.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:That came along with it.
Speaker 1:Well, it kind of reminds me of a little joke that somebody once told me, and I'll share it with you in the audience, hopefully I don't get in trouble for this. So this this guy passes away and he goes to heaven. He meets saint peter and saint peter's gonna give him like a tour of heaven. And uh, there's this long hallway with all these doors and the guy says, what are all these doors? And the guy goes well, these are all different denominations, and so he goes. He goes I'll show you what's going on.
Speaker 1:So you know they go to the first door and they he goes you gotta be real quiet. So he opens the door and it's the Catholic church. You know it's quiet and they're worshiping in their way of worshiping, and you know he works his way down the hall. They go to the Pentecostal church and man, you really feel like you opened the door there. And finally, after like an hour, they get to this door way at the end of the hallway, and St Peter puts his hand on the doorknob and goes to open the door. He goes, now hold on a second. You need to be really, really quiet when I open this door, because these are the Baptists. They think they're the only ones up here, so I think that's how it used to be. No offense to my Baptist friends out there, but that's one of my favorites.
Speaker 1:But yeah, so you end up finding a church that fits your needs.
Speaker 2:It feels like home to you then yes, and our, our son, felt comfortable there. The first sunday we were supposed to go, I was actually sick, so my husband still took our son and they still went. So I was really pleased about that. And while he was there, one of my dearest friends to this day asked him to join the choir. Can he sing? So yes, he can. He's had voice lessons and he's played the guitar and so he's very musically talented this guy sounds amazing.
Speaker 1:He really I'm not gonna lie like. You've really built this picture for me.
Speaker 2:Well, I'm really glad, because I don't always tell him.
Speaker 1:So now he gets to join the. Did they ask you to join the choir?
Speaker 2:Not right away, and Ian was young and I was a very involved mother. So I we had decided when we were at Faith Church with us being such a small congregation, we were involved in so many things I said it's it's not fair to Ian that we're both in leadership positions because one of us was not going to be able to go if he got sick and so on and so forth. So I said if you want to maintain your leadership at the church, I'm going to take a step down and take care of Ian and be able to be available for him and not have additional responsibilities at this time. So that worked out well.
Speaker 1:Okay, so you've got a new church and then kind of fast forward a little bit, you've gone back to work. I don't want to just breeze over. Hey, I worked 35 years at the school system. Give us some highlights about what it was like to be working in the schools.
Speaker 2:When I first started, when I was 18, I subbed and I learned what a severely multiply impaired child was, and that meant they were mentally impaired and had more than two physical handicaps. So the majority of the children we cared for were institutionalized and then bused from the nursing home to our school. So we were getting students from the community as well. But those that were institutionalized came from Warren Village at the time in Warren, michigan, and then several of them came from Clinton Air Nursing Home where my mom actually worked part-time. So it was sad.
Speaker 2:When I first started in 18, and I remember coming home and asking my mom, I said you know how come? You know these kids have to be born this way and why? You know it just doesn't seem fair. And she said well, one thing that you have to decide for yourself. She said somebody has to take care of these children and you just have to decide if you're going to be one of them. And that's all I needed to hear. So my mother is yeah, she was a wealth of wisdom and we were very close.
Speaker 1:Yeah, what a great message. Yeah, what a great way to explain it to an 18-year-old.
Speaker 2:I know right and obviously it made an impression. It stuck with me all these years.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's almost like she knew what she was doing. Yeah, had stuck with me all these years. Yeah, it's almost like she knew what she was doing. Yeah, right, so yeah. So you talked to me a little bit about the rest of your time then at the school to share some of the things that you did and the people you met along the way.
Speaker 2:So typically I would stay in positions for about five years. When I would look back at my career I'm like oh, it looks like you needed a change about every five years. I would kind of figure out what my position was and the challenges. And then I'd be at the challenges and then I was ready for something new. So I had the opportunity to work with a severely multiply impaired and then I transferred. After that.
Speaker 2:I was actually involuntarily transferred because while I was in the military my boyfriend at the time was the sister to my union rep, so he was stationed near Fort Sam Houston or in Fort Sam Houston for something, and so we were able to get together and he said you need to call my sister because they're eliminating your position. They're closing that school down because both of the nursing homes are getting rid of the special needs children, because they make more money with geriatrics instead of pediatrics, because pediatrics are there a lot longer and they require a lot more care where, yeah, I don't even want to get into that, but anyways. So I had to make a decision. While I was in Fort Sam Houston they gave me 10 business days. They gave me three choices and one of the choices was to work with severely mentally impaired adults.
Speaker 2:Well, you know, being five feet tall and not weighing very much either, I wasn't really thrilled about the options I had. But that was the only permanent one. So I knew the teacher and I knew the aid and so I'm like, well, we're just going to go with it. So I moved into a school one of the schools that my brother also attended. It's called Glenn H Peters in Chesterfield Township, and I was only there for about six months and I went to the superintendent's office and I said there for about six months.
Speaker 2:And I went to the superintendent's office and I said this was an involuntary transfer and I am not meeting my students' needs because I'm afraid of them and so I'm really doing a disservice. And I said I go home and I cry every night because I'm so upset and disservice. And I said I go home and I cry every night because I'm so upset and I just need to know when there's going to be another opening somewhere else because I really need to transfer. It's not fair to them and it's not fair to me. And shortly thereafter I had taken my nursing entrance exam and that's when I got transferred to the severely emotionally impaired adolescent building. It's called neil reed high school and that's in clinton township, michigan, and that's where my husband taught, so he was running the algebra program while he was working on his master's for special ed. Oh so.
Speaker 1:So now you got? You said you got your nursing degree. Is that what I heard?
Speaker 2:No, oh, okay, when I was working towards that, oh, okay. Yes.
Speaker 2:And as time went on I realized that in order to be a nurse, you become an LPN back then a licensed practical nurse and it would have been a lateral move from being a teacher's aid to being a nurse's aid and I would have to go back to working weekends and holidays and summers. So it kind of was I'm like, do I really want this career? And you know, then my husband and I decided we were going to start a family, so we didn't have to worry about that aspect anymore and I continued to take like one class a semester here and there, not while my son was young, but after. Like I said, it took me 37 years to get my first general studies associate's degree and then I continued on and got my degree in mass communications and digital video production and photography.
Speaker 1:Wow. And so how? How old were you when you got your degree? Let's see your bachelor's degree.
Speaker 2:All right, you know I don't do math, so that was. It was 2009 for the general studies and 2011 for the production degree. Video production degree.
Speaker 1:So did you find it easier going to school at an older age or easier going to school when you were younger? Which one did you prefer?
Speaker 2:Oh, much older. Yeah. Yeah, I still had way too much energy before Ian was born. Well, he took care of that. Yeah, that's what kids do?
Speaker 1:I was just curious. I got my undergrad when I was 38, and then I got my master's when I was 50. And it was just a different experience than when I tried going to college when I was 18.
Speaker 2:Yeah, was it easier for you.
Speaker 1:It was easier for me because I understood the game, but it was a little bit difficult too, because I had to show some restraint, uh, when it came to some of the things that people would say that hadn't had the same life experiences that I had had. Right.
Speaker 1:So I had to show people grace, sure. So I think I learned that wasn't part of the curriculum, but I certainly learned it. But it was a very tough, tough lesson to to learn to be honest with you. So I enjoyed it. I wouldn't I don't think I'd do it differently, that's for sure. So how'd it feel like finally get your degree, though, after all that time?
Speaker 2:It was amazing. I'm I'm so glad that my dad was still alive and he my brother was able to bring him in a wheelchair, so he got to see me get my my first general studies degree and, um, god bless his soul, he passed in 2010. So he passed in between my two finishing my two degrees and, um, I didn't have money for a computer, so I was going and taking all these digital photography classes, photojournalism, video and I didn't have a computer. But they had computers at the college, so I was actually trained on a Mac and a PC, which was beneficial, but I always liked the Macs better.
Speaker 1:I was just going to ask that question because I'm a huge mac fan yeah, apple, if you're listening right but yeah, they're just more intuitive and there's like they have a lot more power to them.
Speaker 2:I think yeah, and I I can't remember if it was the 80s or 90s. It might have been the 90s when they came out with uh, it looked like a spaceship kind of like and it glowed yeah yeah, the first one of the first max, and they started getting them in at the school for the students but also for the staff and grades, and you know the plethora of things that we use our computers for today, right they we were just getting started.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, I, yeah, I learned on the Mac spaceship. That's what I'm going to say.
Speaker 1:It's funny because my younger brother owned a computer store in Minneapolis and we went to visit him and so this would have been in the 2000s, because my kids were still little. And anyway, he had those. He had a couple of those in the back room. And he gave them to my kids and they just loved them. They were so cool. They're like had the cool colors.
Speaker 2:I know Right. Yeah. Yeah, we also had a gateway when our son was young with the cow patch gateway logo.
Speaker 1:I was at my sister's house a couple of weeks ago down in Arizona and she's got a gateway computer and I'm like you got a gateway computer they didn't make these anymore.
Speaker 2:I know I was shocked to hear they were still around. Like that name is still around.
Speaker 1:And they're great. I guess they're great computers. She loves hers, yeah.
Speaker 2:With the, with the ginormous towers.
Speaker 1:Nope, nope, I remember those a lot. Uh, I think my dad, my stepdad, bought a gateway. He was a cpa so we were like the first people to have computers on our block when I was a kid.
Speaker 2:but I remember the great big boxes yeah, gateway computer that looked like cows well, my brother-in-law is an electrical engineer, so he kind of came over and helped us get told us you know kind of what to buy, where to start and yeah because my husband was also teaching, so he was learning the computer on the job, as was I yeah, so you're kind of building the plane as you were flying it at that right, exactly, exactly.
Speaker 2:But I thought it was fascinating because I always was interested in electronics. In fact I I tried to get into the air force and the navy because I wanted to go into communications or learn some type of electronic skills, because I knew electricians made a lot of money, right? Yeah so I thought well, if I could get that training.
Speaker 1:But my math skills thought so yeah electronics, math, they all kind of go hand in hand. And it's funny because I was terrible at math. But when I went into the navy I was a guided missile computer technician and so I learned math really fast because I didn't want to get kicked out of my school. But yeah, it helped me get my job at Consumers Energy that background so yeah, I got the draw to the computers and all that. So you spent 30, so 35 years in the school system. When did you retire?
Speaker 2:Retired in 2018 at the age of 55. Nice yes.
Speaker 1:That's a good age.
Speaker 2:Yes, the contract said 30 years service at the age of 55. Those were the two criteria in order to, you know, get your full pension Right. And unfortunately, at 47, I went out on disability. I was severely emotionally impaired myself after working seven years with severely emotionally impaired adolescents. Yeah.
Speaker 2:At the high school level. That was a split position. So I was the gym assistant at the high school for four hours. Four classes in the morning, and then at lunchtime I'd get in my car and drive over to the middle school and then I had eight classes in the afternoon because we did two classes at a time. Because they were, because they were severely emotionally impaired. The class size was a lot smaller and you had.
Speaker 2:You had aides that came with them, so that was very helpful. But in the seven years that I served in that gym position, I had 12 teachers come and go. I survived seven. Only one of them survived three years was the one that was long. They're the longest. So 12 teachers, seven, you know. Yeah, yeah, I'm getting all mixed up. How did that? How did that?
Speaker 2:impact your, um, your home life it was very challenging, especially my son's tumultuous teen years. Um, he started gaining weight in the fifth grade and then by the time he got in middle school he was um, teased a lot, yeah, and for any mother that's heartbreaking when your kid's being picked on and so on and so forth.
Speaker 2:But we got through it and when I went out on disability he was just finishing middle school and getting ready to start high school and I was on and off disability for three years so I was able to take him to school and be more attentive to him, because usually when I start something or get involved in something, I give 110%. Um, and I've learned through the years that there's repercussions for that. And um he said yeah, mom, I didn't like you too much in the middle school years. I go, well, most middle schoolers don't like their parents at that age, I said, but I was becoming out of control emotionally myself and I didn't know what to do and my body started attacking itself. I came up with a lot of these autoimmune that they couldn't identify anything and you know, uh well, what's the fibromyalgia?
Speaker 2:yeah that's, that's everybody's go-to, and they can't find anything, at least with women and um. So they said I had peripheral neuropathy in both my feet and the carpal tunnel in both my hands and I had neck problems and I was a pitcher for several years in my 20s and then when I got the gym position, well, I love softball, so we played softball more than we did anything else. But with this population you couldn't just hand them a softball and say pitch it to your classmate, because they'd throw it at them, or whatever, and a lot of them hit off of a tee.
Speaker 2:So I was the designated pitcher and I didn't realize what I was putting my body through, because then I would go play softball at night on my teams and my principal came up to me he said how many pitches do you think you pitch a day? I said, chris, I I don't really know and I said I wish you'd never asked me that question.
Speaker 2:Now I'm really starting to think about you, know yeah and so I do have some degener, some degeneration on my neck, inside of my neck, but anyways, I'm aging and you know all kinds of job hazards and I'm like, yeah, all I got to pitch. What a job hazard, what a bad job hazard. Yeah there's a lot of worse things out there.
Speaker 1:I'm just curious. So when you were off on disability you were kind of having some emotional problems. Was there ever a part of you that wondered if you were going to have like the same problems that your father had?
Speaker 2:Absolutely, absolutely, and especially because at 40, my dad retired when he was 47 from Michigan Bell he was offered I think it was called a zip package at the time because they were weaning out the old and bringing in the less paid younger ones.
Speaker 1:I'm familiar with that concept.
Speaker 2:It was recommended to him, instead of going out on medical or mental disability, to take the zip package. It was much more beneficial and there wasn't all this follow up with doc, their doctors and all that, so, um, it was a good decision in some ways. Unfortunately, my dad didn't have any. Um, he, he didn't really do anything, didn't have any hobbies, hobbies. That's why I couldn't come up with that word um yeah so he sat around and that just gave more time to drink and smoke yeah and um and my mom.
Speaker 2:When I was in middle school, my mom went back to work, um, and that was really hard on me, being the oldest daughter, me starting middle school, like that's a whole new season of life. You're getting exposed to all these new kids, and so I I mean my dad was home in the evening, but he would come home and take his couple shots of scotch and eat his dinner and as soon as he was snoring, we partied in the basement all night long till my mom. My mom wouldn't be home till, so we had to go to school. But still I wish that I would have made better decisions in high school. But I know I have a guardian angel, because things could have gotten a lot worse.
Speaker 1:Yeah, could have gotten really out of hand.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, do you see? Do you draw like some parallels between? I see some similarities between like how you grew up and then how it was when you were raising your family right? Your dad left work at 47. You were on disability at 47. Uh, your son was pretty angry with you through, you know, junior high, middle school because you were sort of absent for him, sort of like how your mom had to be absent for you.
Speaker 2:And I put that together.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, we, we. I think there's a part of me that always has. You know, I strive to not be my parents, but the older I get, the more I realize that those paths sort of run parallel in some instances.
Speaker 2:I just wondering if you kind of that that brings me some comfort, because I didn't know how to parent that age, because I wasn't being parented when I was that age Right, and actually my mother-in-law helped me in that parenting arena because she would tell my husband remember what you did when you were that age. And so it's really nice when people bring us back around to reality instead of what we want our reality to be.
Speaker 1:Right. Yeah, we have our own idea of what happened, but then there's what really happened. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And well, my sister has struggled, as all of us do, with mental health throughout the years and when she gets in a manic state, I automatically go oh my gosh, am I like that? Am I talking incessantly like that? And I, you know, how do people see me? You know that has been a concern of mine throughout my life and trying to make my way in the business world and starting my own um media montage production company, um, I just realized I, I am not cut out for this and the business world teaches you different things and different leadership styles. Right, that it, it didn't always like jive with me and I would think, well, that's an interesting statement. I, I don't think I agree with that. And so it actually gave me the opportunity to see things for what they really were and to establish my own opinion as an adult and go oh okay, you don't need people to keep validating you all the time, but I do. I stay in counseling for that simple fact because I don't want to go back, you know, into the wrong mindset.
Speaker 1:I should say Right, right, well, no, as a suicide survivor myself, I can tell when I'm starting to go down a rabbit hole again. You know, I don't want to be there. Right, yeah, so you retired at the ripe old age of 55.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:And then you. So you went into business for yourself.
Speaker 2:Yes, while I was on disability, I found out that I had a gluten intolerance. A chiropractor diagnosed it and I wasn't celiac but had had a build-up, and it always had digestive issues my whole life. Right and um, it had reached its peak and so my body was like you can't keep doing this to me. I'm gonna fight you back like I'm in control, you or, and yeah. So one of those years when I was on disability, my motto was I'm so not in control, and in a way, it was a time of peace, because then I could say oh, this is what it's like to let God lead you and not think that you've got it all figured out, or that you have to get it all figured out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, and you don't have to be perfect, you don't have to fit into every little box that people want to put you in.
Speaker 1:I used to work for someone who said she actually sent me a picture. I think I have it in my office somewhere, but anyway it's. It says you know, I know that blessings are coming my way, but the how is none of my business, Right?
Speaker 2:Exactly.
Speaker 1:Yep, so you sometimes. Well, control is just a fallacy. Anyway, it's something to make us feel better, but we're never in control of anything, right?
Speaker 2:It's just not how it works.
Speaker 1:So you learned that hard lesson. I mean, this sounds like a lot of stuff happened at 47 and um, so what made you decide to go into business then?
Speaker 2:well, I wanted to have a plan b and I thought well, if I'm going to be doing photography and video? Fortunately, before I had our son, we had rented a small little. It was a cottage. It was 500 square feet and they put a furnace in in the middle of the house and you had to walk sideways to get into the bathroom. And anyways, the neighbor Kitty Corner from us, had his own video company TerraVisions is what he called it, you know and he had the big old VHS cameras, put it over your shoulder, yeah, like a boombox kind of yeah.
Speaker 2:So one summer, when I met him and realized that he did, that he needed some help, and realized that he did that he needed some help. So he took me under his wing and he was a retired Border Patrol electrician and he also served in the Navy, and I don't know why. I didn't find that significant, aside from the fact that I never viewed myself as a veteran and I never owned or claimed or touted that I was combat medic in the army national guard.
Speaker 1:I just did what I did because I did it right, you did it, you got out and you moved on yeah and uh.
Speaker 2:it wasn't until 2018, after I retired, that I started tapping in, re-tapping into the veteran community, met a woman who helped me on my veteran status and I was told that guardsmen aren't, you're not a veteran Like, because I don't, I'm not eligible for benefits. And I said, well, I still served in the regular army when I did my training, yeah, you know. And later on I found that the person that said that to me didn't know what they were talking about, or they just didn't want to deal with that at the moment when I came into the office.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Well, here's the thing too, and this is something that I've changed the way that I talk, because I was a veterans program manager for four years, and so I don't ask people if they're veterans anymore. I ask them, if they served, okay Right. If they served, okay Right. Because there is that thought process that, unless I was in combat, I'm not really a veteran, which is totally not true, um, but if you ask people if they served, they served, you served. I mean, you're a veteran but you served, and so that's a lot easier question to answer. You know, hey, did you serve? Yep, I did, I did, um.
Speaker 1:People are much more likely to right to come out and talk about it at that point, but that the word veteran has a lot of different connotations. I mean, I know it's in our name veterans archives but, um, the first question I ask people is did you serve? And I talked to people who, um, who. I interviewed a guy a few months ago, um, who didn't make it out of bootcamp he served for, for he was in bootcamp and he got injured really bad, so he was in the military for a while recuperating Um, and he's now at the Michigan veterans home, uh, because he was on active duty and, because of the time, the amount of time he was in he qualified for benefits, which is a little bit different, but amount of time he was in he qualified for benefits, okay, which is a little bit different.
Speaker 2:But my, my point is that I talked to people who served for 40 years and I talked to people who served for a year and a half and, um, they're all veterans to me. Well, I have a girlfriend, dawn. That same way I don't know if she completed basic or she left, it doesn't matter I said, dawn, you signed on the dotted line, you gave your life for your country, you laid your life down for your country. I don't care how long or where you, what you did or why or anything. And so she's finally coming out to female veteran events and, um, yeah, she's just, she's like the life of the party. Yeah.
Speaker 1:I just love her to death, yeah, I mean anytime, that anytime someone has served, they've signed a blank check for their country, right, and that's the important distinction. Now, people may disagree with me, and that's okay, cause we're not all going to agree on everything, so yeah. Right, so anyway. So you meet this guy. He does video production, he was in the Navy and at some point someone talks you into the fact that you are a veteran.
Speaker 2:Yes. So having that background, with my neighbor, macomb Community College put in the newspaper that they just had this state-of-the-art studio put in at the college and they were starting video production degrees. Wow, and like that's what I want to do.
Speaker 2:That's what I want to do when I grow up. So, and I never want to grow up Right, of course not, but um, so that was my plan B. If I was to retire at 55 and I would have I would still have a purpose and have something to occupy my time, something to challenge me and still serve. Yeah, you know, and and I really did not have this part of my life planned, I didn't have, you know, aside from, like, finishing my degree and loving photography and video and wanting to be a part of that industry, um, even though it's predominantly male, um, that didn't matter to me because I, I felt like I had an eye and a and a feel for it. Yeah, so, um, where are we going from?
Speaker 1:there. So we're talking about. You started your business. Um, it sounds like you learned some things from that and realized that that's not necessarily what you wanted to do.
Speaker 2:Right when I was diagnosed with the gluten intolerance, my good friend, simone I spoke of her earlier who invited my husband to sing in the choir. Yeah, her and I have stayed friends and we raised our kids together but she had invited me to this health and wellness class that she was part of. She said I just joined this organization, it's called Arbonne International and it's a health and wellness company. And she goes I'd really like for you to come, because it's all plant-based and it's gluten-free. And I said, well, another, another, divine I look at them as divine intervention right, like was something I needed at the time. So I'm like, yes, I'll be there.
Speaker 2:And I had been so sick that week and I was starting to feel better I was hesitant to go, but it was like you need to go and I was pretty low because I'd been on disability and I was starting to get back to work. And she invited me to this thing and I fell in love with Arbonne International and they offered you could become a consultant for $35. And they had Arbonne University you could learn all about this health and wellness. It's exactly what I needed to get my body back, you know, and my mind. But, um, so I am still a consultant for Arbonne International. That was in 2012 when I was introduced, became a consultant shortly thereafter and I'm not a salesperson I give the farm away before I make any money and so that but I thought it was going to be a good business foundation for me to learn how to order things online, how to keep track of a client list, how to find leads. So there was a lot I learned along the way that was totally different than teaching special ed.
Speaker 2:And I'd been to a seminar and they were talking about this wheel of occupations and they were saying how sometimes our wheels aren't aligned and we're in a position that we're really not cut out for and sometimes we don't know how to get out of it because we can't afford it.
Speaker 2:You know, or you know, multitude of circumstances. So, anyways, I was grateful that I had that experience and basically at the end of my Arbonne consulting or trying to get the business part of it going I was asked to step down because I totally did not agree with my upline and how she lied to customers and tried to upsell them about this and that and I mean these were my close friends and relatives, you know what I mean and I had a totally different relationship with people than she did. Yeah and um. So I found out that I could bow out for six months and then I could come back in under somebody else. So that's exactly what I did and that's. I'm still with the organization because I really do believe in the product. I just don't believe in their business model. Right and yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah yeah, so we're um this is right like, right around.
Speaker 2:What like 2018, 2019, then is that kind of where we're at um time timeline wise that's when I retired.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and um, I had met a girl by the name of shelly rude. She runs the female peer support groups for the state of Michigan. It's a grant program and there's several chapters that have started around the state, and so she hired me for $14 an hour to help recruit women vets. And I had started going and working and volunteering for resource fairs and this and that.
Speaker 2:And one of the resource fairs I ran into, jeffrey Devere to me to volunteer for a non-profit veteran organization to do pro bono photography and video, and he and he said you just found one with his big, deep voice. And, uh, so Jeffrey has been one of my, um, I want to say counselors, because he really has, you know, counseled and he always checks up on me. You know, he's just one of those people that also came home from the air force and wasn't able to make good decisions for himself. And, uh, one of the treatment court um, I don't know if it was the attorney or the judge, I'm thinking it was one of the judges and she saw the potential he had and so she fed him and gave him what he needed to get his life back in order, and so now he's doing what you're doing.
Speaker 2:Yes, I was doing the resource fairs and volunteered for Michigan Veteran Affairs Agency as a buddy to buddy and because I love people and it's just like I don't want to do sales. And I tried a couple of jobs. I worked at Selfridge for four months and I worked for the Michigan veteran trust fund for four months. I was nuts and my husband's like you know, you really don't have to work and I'm like, okay, I just needed to hear you say that, right.
Speaker 1:So we have talked about a lot of things in life. Yes, we have Tons of stuff and, you know, as we get close to wrapping up, I want to make sure that we've covered everything you want to talk about. So is there anything that you want to talk about that we haven't talked about?
Speaker 2:Well, I can talk to the cows come home. So I think you have guided me and led me and got me back on track. I guess the one thing that you know, the one message that I would like to get out is it's okay to not be okay like you're saying. I know it's kind of cliche now, but it's in those moments when we're not okay that we need somebody else to tell us that it's okay to not be okay. And you know you're not crazy. No, you're not crazy. And even if you were, it's just a season in time. You're not crazy. And even if you were, it's just a season in time.
Speaker 2:And I've been in and out of the craziness in my head so many times and you need to go back to those times because you're a survivor, you're resilient, you're strong and you don't want to give up. Nobody wants to give up, but be the person that cares and that listens, and that's what we do for each other as veterans. You know, just be the listening ear and you don't even have to say anything, and that's what I'm learning more and more. I'm learning how to be a much better listener, because I don't need any help talking, that's for sure, but, um, I don't know, I don't, I don't really know how to end this, because I've enjoyed it so much. I've enjoyed getting to know you a little bit as well, and, um, I'll look forward to listening to your interview.
Speaker 1:Yes, that's coming up.
Speaker 2:Is it? Oh, I thought maybe it was already on your website.
Speaker 1:So there is a on our podcast. There is an interview that I did with Talking Dog Pictures. They're a video production that works for nonprofits, so that's out there. But my son is coming to see me for Father's Day weekend. He's a veteran and so my plan is we're going to record his story and then he's going to interview me, so that'll be the one to look for.
Speaker 2:Wow, that's amazing. I just assumed that yours was already done. I mean, I know you said you have had opportunities to tell your story, but I don't know if any. I didn't know if anybody just assumed you. Somebody recorded you by now.
Speaker 1:Well, yes, so if you go out to themothorg, I have a couple stories out there. They've featured them during Veterans Day actually. And then there's the USA Today Storytellers Project. There's some stories out there as well. But just to sit down and do what we've done I haven't done that yet because I'm the interviewer, but I've got to get somebody to do it for me, and I think my son will be interviewing me very soon, so I'm looking forward to it.
Speaker 2:What a great Father's Day present. Yeah, that's awesome. I've had some great ones over the years. I mean I think my son will be interviewing me very soon, so I'm looking forward to it.
Speaker 1:What a great Father's Day present. Yeah, yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 2:I've had some great ones over the years, but I think this will be a really good one.
Speaker 1:How old is your son? Oh gosh, he was born in 88. So he will be 37 this year. No 30. 1988, 25. 37.
Speaker 2:Yeah, 37.
Speaker 2:37, yeah, 37 yeah, you got it right the first time I did. I see, your math isn't all as bad as you thought it was, is it? No, and that was one thing that I realized when I was selling or trying to sell our bond. Like, my math is fine when I need it. Yeah, you know, I, I convinced myself, you know that I just couldn't learn it. You know da-da-da-da-da. And that was one of the things I gained from doing that little aspect in my life. And I want to put a plug out, if that's okay. Oh yeah absolutely.
Speaker 2:I'd like to put a plug out to the Woven National Women's group of veterans. Women Veteran Network is basically like the acronym or whatever, but the word woven, it keeps us. We're all entwined together in our lives, especially veterans, in a very unique way and they offer peer support, training, but they also keep us connected, keep us woven, and I mean I have friends in North Carolina that I've never met. They're all over the United States. In fact, june 7th, woven is having a women recognition opportunity because it's on a Saturday and so we do like Woven birthday celebrations on a Saturday, like from 10 to 2. And you don't have to be a member, you can just get on and you just go to wovenorg, w-o-v-e-norg and all the information. Just keep doing all the drop-downs and you'll find the information you need to become a member or to get hooked up with a buddy.
Speaker 2:There's also the Women Veteran Peer Support that I mentioned, that is available throughout the state of Michigan and that you can find at Women Veterans Strong. I believe that's a com, or you can just Google Shelly Rood and she's the one that started the program. I don't know who wrote the grant, but she's the one that's maintaining it as well. And then there is she's the one that's maintaining it as well. And then there is I mentioned no Veteran Left Behind with Jeffrey Dovrow in Detroit. And there is WINK Women in Combat, which is located in Lexington. No, not Lexington Ludington. I get those mixed up because I live near Lexington. No, not Lexington Ludington.
Speaker 3:I get those mixed up because I live near Lexington, so I say that one first but it's Ludington, michigan, for the women in combat and you don't.
Speaker 2:You don't have to have served in combat, it's for all women veterans. It was just the acronym when that was created, because it was created by a woman that suffered severe trauma and created that organization to help support women vets. And she, her name, is Zanetta Adams. You may have heard of her. She was the director of the Michigan Veteran Affairs Agency.
Speaker 1:I interviewed her when I did a podcast for Consumers Energy. I know Zanetta.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's wonderful.
Speaker 1:I've got to get her back in here to do her whole story though.
Speaker 2:Yes, well, she's making strides for all of us veterans in Washington because she was replaced by somebody in Michigan, because she had this other awesome opportunity that was given to her to, uh you know, get a voice for us women veterans. And I want to mention Alexis DeRizzo, who runs Motown Women Veterans and, um, she is. She wants to get women out because we isolate ourselves. All veterans can get into periods where we isolate and just want to stay in our own comfort zones, and so she plans trips. There's a Myrtle Beach trip. There's this retreat I'm going to this week, four nights and five days in Petwater, michigan, and we just did a first-ever female veteran fashion show down at Masonic Temple in Detroit, which was a blast and a lot of work for Alexis, but I can't say enough about what a great experience it was.
Speaker 1:Oh, very good. So lots of organizations out there to help veterans.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:That's great. Well, I appreciate you coming in. It's been great getting to know you. You kind of flipped that over on me but, yeah, great getting to know you. Thanks for spending a Thursday afternoon with me and have so much fun at your retreat and I look forward to kind of hearing how that went.
Speaker 2:Thank you very much, appreciate you.
