Stories from Drill (#1-SFC Stace)

So, I thought it might be fun to share some stories I've heard from the guys during my drill weekends. Military stories are always interesting.

I'll start with my favorite story from my drill sergeant/recruiter. I think it's his favorite as well when talking about how we really are making a difference over in Iraq. He was a medic while he was in Iraq (another cool thing about the military, you aren't stuck in one job all the time, my drill sergeant is also a recruiter and a combat medic which is pretty cool). He was on post and a man came in with a little girl in his arms who was obviously having issues. He couldn't speak English and just kinda put her in the arms of one of the soldiers there (I don't remember if it was SFC Stace or not, I'm writing these from memory so details may be off). They got him an interpreter while checking out the baby. One of the medics in the group there was a pediatrician and was able to address her properly. (That's another thing I like about the Guard- you can have a regular job as well which allows for a huge mix of skill sets. I'm not positive but I doubt the military specifically trains in pediatrics since we don't have our kids fight but in the Guard it totally makes sense.) They found an abscess on her side and were able to treat it before putting her and her father on a Blackhawk to Baghdad for surgery. After the operation the doctors were sure that the abscess had been within hours of bursting and would have shot toxic crud into her abdomen and almost certainly killed her. In short, they without a doubt saved the life of this young girl. All of this of course was done with no charge to the father. Now, I don't care who you are, that's pretty cool. The only thing I don't like about that story is the fact that it was never reported. A group of Idaho soldiers did that and not even our local paper reported it. That's life I guess but it's still too bad.

I've decided to divide these stories individually so this post doesn't end up too long, so there's going to be a lot more to come.