What is the most you ever cried in your life?

I still cry internally over lost parents, oldest brother but never shed a tear. When I lost Smedley I shouted in lieu of tears. He was like the little brother I never had. Him and Molly, his larger mate for life.

When I hit rock bottom with PTSD. I did not want to live anymore. I wanted the pain to disappear.

I would say almost 2 years daily.

It was directly after my mom passed away and my second fiance split up and through me out just months after.

Admittingly, now I can understand then, I was in shock, my mom was a major part of me thinking I could keep a successful marriage. I was in shock. We were arguing. I was drinking a little. I was going into my shell. I did not know how to have her trust me this was just a phase.


I did not know how to make her believe I was in it for the long haul, just like Navy service, through darkness, something I started at 18.


How could someone go from being a High School Varsity letterman athlete, and Meritorious bootcamp graduate and in a 4 year span this happen, have so many medical issues you can not even transfer into the Army?

The recruiter said I could go to college and by 22 have a degree and commission as an officer, The American Dream!

My dad was missing. I was going to be the next man up! I was going all in!


I was in the Navy with a roadmap to be an officer similar to ROTC.

But in this program I found out there were no college liaison Navy Officers similar to ROTC.

After Bootcamp you were assigned to a ship just like nearly everyone else. But you were just part time

You just had you, and the 200 million dollar ship you reported to, your requirements of pay grade etc on the ship, and.a Buch of serious full-time guys that were serious, quite a bit to walk into, like a weight you must balance and if you drop it then you pay the price.



By 22. I was blanking out I was so confused. Every month on the ship was an ass kicking mentally physically shocked to be confused by and also attempt to decompress when I was considered a civilian again off duty. Back and forth to an active duty ship with a reserve enlistment. College failed. All the things I had thought might come true failed. No leadership was even monitoring me for this stress.
The income compensation was far below poverty leading to bad housing off duty off the ship
Life degraded. My fiancé must of been confused. I was so caughtt off guard. I was enlisted living in cars, and seedy hotels, moms house, in between duty on the ship, trying to recover from motion illness monthly, watching veterans day in the largest military city in America San Diego my hometown, too broke to eat decently. I was in a Navy Reserve enlistment assigned to a ship. Now I was 22.I definitely could not date and have a lover with the income I had. I had yet to have an education for a real job. .. I was supposed to be a courageous Navy young man going to sea monthly.

I had tried to forget I tried to even transfer into the Army to get off the ship I was assigned. The transfer was medically disqualified permanently. I was 22. I was sent back to the ship. My first fiance broke up with me right after. I was in shock. I cried for a good year or more. I was still in the Navy assigned to a ship.
This was all within 10 year span.



I always knew something was odd but had no answers until I started to research recently on the internet on key words and found reports stating this.

“3. To increase integration of Reserve Forces in active forces missions
B. Test manning active Navy Destroyers with a mix of 80 percent active personnel and 20 percent reservists in comparison with 100% active manned ships.”


“Another more important initiative is our plan to man some of our active surface combatants at 80% of active manning, relying on selected reserve personnel to fill the remaining billets upon mobilization.”

Admittingly, there are some potential problems involved in the 80/20 concept, most of which center around the interrelated factors of maintenance and operational tempo.”

No one wants to question their military service. At 18 you are taught to follow orders and every senior above you is perfect and scary and even god like.

I also had just met my father after Navy discharge. I was the son of a real life injured Vietnam Era 66-68 Army Infantry Combat Vet. He could not raise me as a result.


I took that honorable discharge paper down to the VA.

At the bottom, I started a VA claim. When that was denied I started a BCNR. I needed a homeless housing voucher.

The VA was denying anything because I had a reserve enlistment and never got enough active duty over the 8 year obligation. That is quite an amazing thing to learn. I was assigned to a ship and it qualified for nothing.

I had accepted a housing situation with another older Navy Veteran who had a house to fix it up for rent trade barter. He instantly the first night was on my jock no joke. I was telling the VA hospital I was desperate and a sexual tool for housing because I had no money. There was never a welfare check placed into the system.

Both the VA and BCNR were being denied routinely for any change in my records to get a homeless housing voucher and benefits to live. 2015 Oakland Regional VA was headline news for not processing up to 10K claims, as investigated by OSC. 4 years went by.

The BVA would grant me the housing voucher and benefits to restart. I was now 40.

The BVA did its job. I had a VA apartment now. My dad passed.








I keep on finding so many reports and I have all the answers now. It was a well studied situation. It is even a new one discussing the exact beginning and ending of my ships and my SAM enlistment that the Air Force and Army outcompeted.

This is what affected me and there is a quote directly discussing it in the report.

“impracticality of rotating part-time personnel to deployed units made employing reservists, other than full-time support (FTS) personnel, to operate ships unworkable,”

It was very impractical and unworkable mentally physically and emotionally. The benefits and income compared the requirements benign assigned to a ship with that SAM enlistment starting at 18, would crush almost anyone.



https://www.ida.org/-/media/feature/publications/e/ev/evolution-of-the-militarys-current-activereserve-force-mix/d-4968.ashx

Evolution of the Military's Current Active-Reserve Force Mix




U.S. Navy (USN) The Navy Reserve has evolved over time from a semi-autonomous strategic reserve in terms of platforms and trained individuals to what is today a strategic and operational reserve that is a mix of individuals and unit types that either complement or mirror elements of the AC. In the former case, the RC provides “skills and expertise to complete the Total Force inventory of capabilities”1 and in the latter case, the RC provides “skills and expertise that match the AC to offer greater capacity at lower carrying cost.”2 This evolution can be traced back to the aftermath of WW II, when the Navy had a large number of ships and aircraft and trained the Navy Reserve to staff them in anticipation of a need for a large force to wage war with the Warsaw Pact. By the end of the Cold War, this scenario had become obsolete. In the case of ships, as the size of the fleet declined, the Navy moved to a policy of fully manning all its ships so that these ships would not require RC augmentation in the event of war. In addition, the problems of maintaining ships in standby status with part-time personnel and the impracticality of rotating part-time personnel to deployed units made employing reservists, other than full-time support (FTS) personnel, to operate ships unworkable, and the Navy Reserve Fleet (NRF) disappeared.

To meet the demands for experienced petty officers as the fleet expanded toward its goal of 600 ships, the Navy relied, in part, on voluntary recalls designed to draw prior-service sailors into the Reserves and then back onto active duty. To backfill the petty officers who went to the fleet, the Navy initiated the Sea/Air Mariner (SAM) program to attract new recruits to the Naval Reserve by offering tuition assistance. However, this program proved unsuccessful because its benefits and 6-year obligation compared unfavorably with Army and Air Force programs.66

I started to read this as well. The first thing you do before bootcamp is swear and Oath to Defend the Constitution. And The Preamble says this


1788 The U.S. Constitution: Preamble
"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

Did the VA and BCNR have to deny me things to save me from living in that house where I was being sexually taken advantage of because I had to deal with medical issues that were call connected to being assigned to the shp?