Thread by @DadaBaseThought, In the wake of the fort hood papers, a lot of people [...]

In the wake of the fort hood papers, a lot of people are coming out and sharing their stories. First, I applaud their courage, as even just thinking of a trauma, let alone talking about it, can feel like it’s happening all over again.

It takes incredible strength and courage.

While I can not raise my voice as a victim, I can attest to the struggle of being a first line supervisor to a victim. The number of failures I experienced trying to support her and get her basic needs met was probably the hardest thing I ever did as an NCO.

She called me prior to the first formation crying, saying she couldn’t get out of bed. I had been her first line for around a week and hardly knew the team (I was covering while their normal NCO went to school)

I informed my platoon sergeant of the situation and went to her barracks room to go see what the hell she was talking about.

When she answered the door she appeared intoxicated and I could barely understand what she was saying between the the slur and crying. After a few minutes of this it was clear I was out of my depth and called the PSG

He showed up with on of her peers in the squad who she was friends with. After about another 10 minutes of cry talking with her friend she started to calm a bit and we were able to understand the word “rape”

Me and the PSG looked at each other blankly in shock and disbelief for a minute. Neither of us had handled anything like this, being always in all male units before this, we were vastly unaware of what to do

Luckily the current unit our commander and first sergeant were both female. We contacted them and waited with the solider. We spent the next few hours outside the soldiers room with the CO and 1sgts phones answering all the absurd called they received.

Let me tell you, the number of calls they received stating what they needed was urgent and to interrupt the 1sgt or CO was insane. They all literally believed what they needed was the most important thing, and the unit would collapse in a few short minutes if it was delayed

When they emerged, I received little detail, she would say it was someone within our unit,but would not identify because a similar thing happened to her friend, and it ended worse for her everyone around said friend. She wanted to inform us of the rape but do it anonymously.

They were able to convince her to go to the ER, submit to a rape kit, blood tests for drugging agents, exam, ect

I felt helpless after. She returned to work and tried to act like nothing happened. She did her job, but didn’t really talk anymore. I would regularly check up on her at night or on weekends to see if she needed anything, it was always “no but thanks”

This dragged on for a month or so, each day she was a fraction more like her old self. But you could tell, she wasn’t always in the moment. I’d regularly give updates to PSG, 1sgt and co but with her not wanting to push the matter (as is her right) there was little to be done.

One morning I received a phone call from her much like the previous time before first formation, I preemptively grabbed the command teams bad we headed over. She didn’t say a word, she just cried and on the counter was a positive pregnancy test.

This is a subject in every training up to this point, I don’t believe had ever been discussed. Again co and 1sgt took lead and I sat outside the room with their phones. Eventually they contacted battalion and the response from that level was less than I could have dreamt.

I couldn’t hear the full convo but things like “this girl has sucked up enough of this commands time” and “get an abortion or live with it” were used.

I spent the week taking her to various doctors appointments, Chaplin, what have you. The medical staff was more than accommodating with getting her in quick.

The following week I was called a number of times to various meetings where I got my ass reamed for hours because I had reports not getting done, or done improperly, the other soldiers under my watch were abusing my lack of presence and a number of other different things.

Within the confines of each ass reaming was a statement along the lines of “let her deal with it, and do your damn job” I responded each time with “the morale and welfare of my soldiers is my job” ass chewing a continued. This went of for weeks.

Instead of anyone figuring out a way to pick up any of the slack, it was purely my fault and my fault alone. I can not speak for every first line leader who’s been in a situation like this but, I can totally see how people could knuckle under.

Luckily, I had less than 6 months left in the army and had little they could do to threaten me. Put me on CQ/staff duty more? Gues your reports won’t get done. Try to find ways to flag or bar me, cool I don’t need an award, promotion or to reenlist.

I continued to push for my soldier. I hope she knew that.

After another month or so I got a late night call from her “I need a ride to the ER” I quickly got her and took her to the ER. Once there I had no information why she needed to go and was unable to get any information.

I notified the PSG, and command team where we were. A couple hour later she came out and I was informed she had a miscarriage. A third scenario I was wildly uninformed on.

I updated the leadership, took her home, and she was put in quarters for 72 hours. The responses I got from a number of staff offices was “well now that’s over with you can get you fucking job done with no more excuses”

There is little that happened from this moment on. I continued to make sure she made her follow up appts for the miscarriage, checked in her regularly, offered her resources. But in the end, there was little more I could change.

I’m not saying I handled everything perfectly, nor to pat my own back. All I did was try to do what I could, and offer support.

The amount of bullshit I received from above me, times I was told to let the issue go, ect was beyond absurd to me.

I’m not saying that being a supervisor over one of these is equal to the difficulty of being the victim.

Merely that there was a system to discourage me from doing the absolute best for my soldier. And I was lucky enough to have 2 females in my command team.

I can’t imagine how much more pushback I would have received if the command would have been different.

Anyhow, that’s my story. I hope that this culture changes so everyone gets the support the need and deserve.

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