Join us in part 2 of our series of A Veteran's Perspective. We delve into the captivating story of Mike May, a U.S. Army veteran turned account manager at Reemployability. In this episode, Mike provides a raw and insightful account of his service during the Global War on Terrorism in Afghanistan. He explores the complexities of his transformation from a soldier to a civilian, sharing with us the harsh realities of war and the bitter-sweet journey toward disillusionment, resilience, and perspective. His riveting narrative promises to provide a unique, first-hand glimpse into the experiences of veterans, highlighting the importance of empathy, understanding, and respect for those who serve.
Moving beyond the battlefield, we unpack Mike's life post his military tenure. Facing adversity with grace, he discusses his views on entitlement, humility, and the struggles encountered by many veterans as they transition back into civilian life. His stories underscore the significant role of resources available to veterans to ease their transition. His journey is one of resilience, growth, and an unwavering commitment to serving others. Whether you're a veteran, a friend or family member of a veteran, or simply interested in understanding their experiences, this episode promises an engaging and enlightening exploration of a veteran’s journey.
For more resources and information on The Hero's Journey visit https://theheroesjourney.org/
Join us in part 2 of our series of A Veteran's Perspective. We delve into the captivating story of Mike May, a U.S. Army veteran turned account manager at Reemployability. In this episode, Mike provides a raw and insightful account of his service during the Global War on Terrorism in Afghanistan. He explores the complexities of his transformation from a soldier to a civilian, sharing with us the harsh realities of war and the bitter-sweet journey toward disillusionment, resilience, and perspective. His riveting narrative promises to provide a unique, first-hand glimpse into the experiences of veterans, highlighting the importance of empathy, understanding, and respect for those who serve.
Moving beyond the battlefield, we unpack Mike's life post his military tenure. Facing adversity with grace, he discusses his views on entitlement, humility, and the struggles encountered by many veterans as they transition back into civilian life. His stories underscore the significant role of resources available to veterans to ease their transition. His journey is one of resilience, growth, and an unwavering commitment to serving others. Whether you're a veteran, a friend or family member of a veteran, or simply interested in understanding their experiences, this episode promises an engaging and enlightening exploration of a veteran’s journey.
For more resources and information on The Hero's Journey visit https://theheroesjourney.org/
R-E-A-R-E-A-R-E-A-R-E-A Audio. R-e-a-audio, r-e-a-audio, r-e-a-audio, r-e-a-audio, r-e-a-audio, r-e-a-audio Reemployability, reemployability, reemployability.
Speaker 2:Season 3.
Speaker 1:Google says that disillusionment is a feeling of disappointment resulting from the discovery that something is not as good as one believed it to be. Are you disillusioned about anything? Have you ever been? The word carries, I think, a negative connotation, like once you're disillusioned, that's it and a story. But that's not necessarily the case, because disillusionment can actually lead to an understanding of perspective and to growth and resilience. This week we finish our conversation with Mike May, a new account manager at Reemployability, an Army veteran who served in the Global War on Terrorism in Afghanistan. If you didn't hear Part 1, I think it'd be good to go back and give that one a listen. It'll help put this part into context. We're going to be talking about what's helping him continue to re-acclimate himself to civilian life. I asked Mike about the desire he had to be of service and if that was part of the process for him and other veterans. That's where we start out today.
Speaker 2:That's teaching someone or mentoring someone or sharing our mistakes, so it prevents other people from making them. I think a lot of that is just people. They want to feel utilized, and the army really forced you to do that. So that's just like I said, it's just a hard void to fill when you go back to the civilian world, because most employers don't do mentoring, they don't do counseling. We would have quarterly counseling where it's like this is what I want, this is where you're going to be, and then you're like oh we're going to do an annual counseling.
Speaker 2:So you kind of like man, maybe it wasn't so bad. So then there's a little bit of the regret, so all of those motions kind of like bubble up over time and we weren't given any treat like counselors. There were no like hey, it's okay, we were all just no, I'm good.
Speaker 1:I bet in certain moments if a counselor was offered to you.
Speaker 2:You'd probably be like, yeah, I'm good.
Speaker 1:I'm not in that situation and sometimes I'd be able to say, oh, I don't need that.
Speaker 2:So that was kind of the thing that really set the tone for the deployment. And then from there we all realized that like okay, this is like there's people trying to kill us. Right, and we need to be, we can't let ourselves get complacent. And I think a lot of us like grew together as a unit and that like really bonded us together and then we were able to all make it back.
Speaker 1:So were there any good stories while you were deployed? You mentioned wanting to help people. Were there ever that you know? I read about the American soldiers giving out candy to kids in Germany in World War Two. Right, yeah, yeah. Any situations like that, for sure.
Speaker 2:So I don't know if you've heard of a coin, his counterinsurgency. So I think that was David Petraeus, general Petraeus, his model. So in the beginning of the global war on terrorism it was all about just kill the Taliban. If we kill the Taliban, they won't be able to fight us. But for every one we killed, three more respond. So then we pivoted to this counterinsurgency model where we would go into towns and we would give them, like you said, books, coloring books for the kids, backpacks. We give them rice, we give them money, we would hope, like, try to fix their mosque and build wells and have provincial reconstruction teams that were just designed to build infrastructure in schools and things, and a lot of that, I think, made us feel like it looks good. Cbs News came out and did a whole story on our platoon, on our company, and it was just to the point where a lot of us were already kind of in that type thing and the caveat a lot of there is the village elder would steal all the money and make his house nice and not give any, or they would take the money and say the Taliban took it when they did it, and so there was a lot of things, that kind of like burst your bubble. So, like I will say that the good stories tend to just be the ones where, like we all made it back, type things we tried our best, we did what we had to do and, at the end of the day, like, your mentality is how many days left around the deployment? You know, like there's a saying it's better to be tried by 12 than carried by six. So if you're thinking, man, am I following the ROE? Am I? And bam, you know, like, so just react and then we'll, we'll cross that bridge later. You know, so, the support that you get from your unit command, as far as, like, these guys are in the trenches, that was the decision. They pulled the trigger, let's not punish the soldier for, you know, reacting Right, so that, I think, made us feel a little bit better as far as, like we did have the support from our higher ups.
Speaker 2:I will say that that's probably one of the most uncommon things, like you've heard of Boeberg dog, where he walks off the base and and his whole spiel is all my unit was all eight up. No one was, you know, helping us, no one was looking out for us, so I wanted to go blow the whistle Right. And I'm fortunate enough to say that I never felt that. Like I said, that that day we got hit by the IED, that next day we had another million dollar MRAP signed for and ready to go. So I that's, you know, I never felt like we didn't have the support of our chain of command or our first line supervisor. All that was clear that, you know, the mission is to get back.
Speaker 2:So I think, like that kind of like spoils a little bit of what you can do for the folks in the country, because when we were there in 2009, it was an election year for Afghanistan, like they had their presidential election to reelect Hamid Karzai as their president. So we did a lot of poll security. We would sit on the hill and we would pull security to make sure that the polls weren't attacked and that people could vote. So there's our, you know, like we were able to, in that short time frame, have a democracy and I think that's what a lot of people felt like we were making inroads. They have a government, they have an army. At the end of my deployment, we were in Kabul training the Afghan army. We were doing their basic training, so we were showing them how to become soldiers. So I think a lot of us felt like we were making an impact on the country and I think a lot of that. Just as reality set in time sitting there's an Afghan saying the Americans have the watch, but the Taliban have the time. And it's true, we have all the money and the resources, but they can just outweigh us. And that's what they did.
Speaker 2:And I think that was a hard year for a lot of us when it kind of just pulled out and it is what it is and it's not one person's idea, but it does kind of make a lot of the Vietnam veterans feel like why did 10 of my buddies die on this hill for us to just get on the chopper and fly away and the NBA come and take it back the next day?
Speaker 2:So I think we learned a lot of those lessons, but then we just really didn't follow through with it. So I know that a lot of after that really had an impact on us. And then a lot of us had to deal with folks who I have just the same amount of people that I know were killed in combat in my unit that had committed suicide when we had gotten back. So that is also a little bit of the knife in and twist. We made it back, but it's still impacting us. So I think a lot of us have kind of our out of the woods, for lack of a better term, but it's something that took a long time for a lot of us to get through. I wouldn't say everyone has, but, like I said, the two folks that I'm close with and that were in my fire team are people that did, and it was a lot of self-figuring it out.
Speaker 1:I mean, I know that there's VA resources. Now I imagine there's gotta be private resources, like a bunch of you guys just get together and come out for a beer.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, there's retreats and those types of things that support groups, but a lot of it is. It's a lot like the workers comp, though, like when you hear workers comp right, you think, oh, this person's malingering, they're just milking it, right. So that's what? A lot like.
Speaker 2:A lot of people who have their own issues still judge other soldiers with issues like oh, he didn't go through what I went through, so he is, you know, his depression or anxiety is real, like mine, and so there's even that kind of like hitting one person against the other instead of us like kind of coalescing, saying, yeah, your experience are different from mine, but we kind of still had the same traumatic effects from it. So I will say that there is like still a lot of stigma around, kind of just like I'm gonna go sit around a campfire with a bunch of guys in the Air Force and talk about how it was tough when they were, you know, sitting behind a desk and flying a drone, you know Like. So there's still this kind of like macho, it like like you are in the infantry what did you expect? Type thing, right. So now I'm just gonna sit around and dwell on it and ruminate, and that's not good either, you know. So a lot of it was just like buried.
Speaker 1:I know that there's some folks some guys again from my reading and things guys that come back from Vietnam, who served in the same units, went through the exact same things together. One guy comes out and becomes an alcoholic and his whole life is ruined and maybe he commits suicide. The other guy opens up a business and makes a million dollars.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's me and Mark.
Speaker 2:Like Mark was the the can't get right, you know, has too much to drink, gets in trouble, gets into fights, gets arrested type of stuff.
Speaker 2:And here I am, like I'm going to college, I got my degree, I'm working, I bought a house, you know, I got married like I have a a fenced in back, you know, like I have the like. So I always kind of felt like a little bit of like what you're saying is just like you know it could always like I'm not gonna talk about myself because I got it made compared to what some of these other guys are going through just to get out of bed in the morning. So I think that's another thing too is like kind of like. Like I wouldn't say it's rationalizing it, but it's like minimizing your own stuff because there's always somebody who's got it worse than you. So I think once we all kind of understood that like there's kind of levels to it that it really allowed us to, I think like feel a little bit better about doing things like this. Like five, 10 years ago I don't think I would have done this right, but I don't really see what good it does to just like not share.
Speaker 1:Well, you know, the thing is, man, some people there may be somebody out there, and this is just a crazy way of thinking. But you know, I think everything happens for a reason and there could very well be the reason why you're working here. It's so we could meet to do this, so you could record this, and somebody obscurely listens to it out of the blue and it's like, man, that guy is exactly. I'm going to try to talk to him or find somebody else or something. You never know what you do, how it's going to help people, and especially with it seems like the way you are, your attitude is, since you've been here, in the short time you've been here, the desire to be helpful. You don't know how you're going to impact people.
Speaker 2:You don't know how, what you say to an injured worker or anybody or somebody just walking around here in the office is going to impact them, right?
Speaker 1:Right, especially when they know your story. But I completely understand how hard I mean I can't empathize with it. But I can do my best to understand how difficult it is. I've not been through that but I can think of many instances where I'd be like screw you, I'm not telling you about this Right, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm going to push through it you know, I hear that.
Speaker 1:How has, other than kind of your desire to be helpful to people, is there anything else through your experience that you feel like has made you a better person now than when you were, when you were 19 years old?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that being able to like deal with adversity, I think it's a big thing that. Tell me about that. What?
Speaker 1:is it?
Speaker 2:So, like I said, when stuff happens overseas, on deployment, when you're, you know there was an evening where the Taliban like to attack at sunset and sunroof I'm sure you've read that and it says the dawn of time. That's been the time to attack. The Indians did it, everyone does it, and they're we same with us. And we got ambushed wasn't really too long, too serious and then they were like all right, we're going to send you guys out right to where we just took contact from.
Speaker 2:So I always think about that Like man, if I could, if I could go outside the wire after that, like I can do anything, like there isn't any situation where I'm going to feel like, oh man, this is too much, or like how's it going to be, you know?
Speaker 2:So I think my resiliency towards just I mean like adversity today pales in comparison to the adversity that we had to, that we were expected to overcome, and that it wasn't even like you had the option to be like oh no, sorry, I'm too scared to go, or like I don't really, you know.
Speaker 2:So I think like that's really made me able to. I think part of it is I kind of get a little annoyed by folks when they make a mountain out of a molehill. But then part of me steps back and says you know, we're all not, you know, have these same experiences. But I will say that, like that's another big thing is like adversity, hard times, you know, like those are the things that I just feel like I'm prepared for and like if I can do that, then I can stand up in front of a group and speak. You know, I can hop on a call with some folks I've never met and do something. I can learn a new skill, like I can be okay being vulnerable in a situation because, like you know, whatever, like I mean, it doesn't matter.
Speaker 2:About perspective, yeah definitely gave me a lot of perspective. But I think that the that really like the resiliency and like realizing that like you know, it's everything now is like a walk in the park. So I think that was a. That's why I try to tell a lot of folks who whose kids are interested in joining the military and stuff is like I know it's scary, but like I mean you want a kid who can be, you know, you know have to worry about and be able to take care of themselves, like that's a great place for it, because you have to learn how to get back on the horse and to pick yourself up. So that's really kind of like just put a lot of things in perspective. So I feel like I don't ever really feel awkward or uncomfortable or intimidated. I don't ever really feel like and I think a lot of that too is kind of it's like a balancing act, because sometimes you can develop a sense of hubris, like you're invincible and I think some of those moments where the RPG lands right where you were just two seconds ago is like a reality check. So I think that that kind of also puts things in perspective for me to where like yes, I can handle a lot, but that doesn't mean that like I can just go through life being an asshole and just blowing people off or not giving a shit, because that's really like that's not constructive either and that's like a consequence of kind of going through that and sometimes you think like you're better than other people or like you don't know how it is like type stuff like that. So the perspective really allowed me, I think, to be proud of that but at the same time like not let it kind of like dictate how I kind of went through life, thinking stuff was owed to me.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of entitlement when it comes to veterans. There's a lot of folks who think that they deserve a lot of these things when really they don't. And that's a hard pill to swallow for a lot of folks. It's like you're not special, like no one cares, and I don't want to say that in a bad way, but I think a lot of times people want to say, oh, but I need special accommodation, I need a special, you don't know what I went through, type thing. So I think the resiliency and the perspective, but also kind of like the humbleness of it too, because I mean like if it was up to me. Like I said, I probably wouldn't be here. So I have to be humble enough to realize that you do need other folks to kind of keep you in line or to at least be like a sounding board for things. So that's something that I kind of carried with me.
Speaker 1:If you're a veteran or know someone who is, know that there's assistance to help in re-acclimating to civilian life. Retired Lieutenant Colonel Scott Mann is a close friend of re-employability, so I'm gonna provide the website to his not-for-profit, the Hero's Journey, in the show notes. It's a great place to start and I know that if this not-for-profit isn't the right one for you, the folks at the Hero's Journey will be happy to point you in the right direction. Thanks for listening and we look forward to having you back in a few weeks.