DaX: This will be a difficult post for me to write; I'm not writing it for me - this is for you.

Many people walk away from the military happy, healthy and glad they chose the path they did. Many more don't. My experience is atypical and most people don't have anything like the experience that I did but I believe it is important to know what can happen - no matter how unlikely. What I experienced, though perhaps rare, is telling because it shows the military serviceman and woman's worth to the military. Before I get into that though, let me say that after bootcamp and specialty training, I'd guess that something over 90% of servicemen and woman can take online, and in some cases, brick and mortar classes. Sailors on board ship or any member of the military in a war zone or certain remote locations cannot, but this is an exception rather than the rule.

Okay, so here's the deal: I joined the Navy at seventeen years old with the idea of getting into nursing school. My recruiter assured me that this would happen. It didn't. In fact, once in, I was ridiculed once in for being so naive as to think that they were going to send me to school just because the recruiter told me that they would.

During boot camp, at a swim test, we were asked if anyone wanted to try out for the SEAL team. None of us knew what that was but after the 'best of the best' talk, twelve of us raised our hands. I was one of three that passed the swim test designed to weed folks out but as the third place person, and knowing that I didn't hold back at all, I knew I wasn't going to succeed in their next test. Next test though was an interview.

During that interview they discovered that I scored a 99% on my ASVAB (entrance test) and that I spoke fluent Russian. We were in the middle of the Cold War at the time. "You don't want to go into the SEAL's," they said, "We've got something better for you!" I ended up an enlisted translator attached to a Force Recon (Marines) team. First mission out, the corpsman (medic) was killed and two other men were seriously injured. The attending doctor when we got back credited my first aid with saving their lives and I was sent to corpsman school for further training before rejoining my team.

Six combat zones, two purple hearts - we were everywhere we weren't suppose to be. During our last mission, I was captured. I spent about nine months in a cage in the former Soviet Union. My legs are horribly scarred from that stay and I have severe nerve damage. The military declared my entire team AWOL (Absent Without Official Leave) because we weren't 'officially' supposed to be where we were. So they didn't try and rescue us but let us languish there. Politics at its finest.

So, when I got back, I was given a general discharge under other than honorable conditions - the only discharge (besides a bad conduct discharge) that would be consistent with their position that we were not authorized to be where we were captured. I assure you that we were following orders. So, my general discharge did not allow me to get VA medical help for the severe injuries I suffered during my nine month stay. No GI Bill, no nothing. I served honorably but it served the military's purposes to deny me an honorable discharge and so they did. Four members of my team died in the Soviet Union and never made it back.

Will something like this happen to you? Probably not. BUT...if it serves the military's purposes to throw you under the bus, they will - without hesitation. Today, I would not choose to be in any type of relationship with someone who values my life so lightly.

Good luck in whatever you choose.