Our Survivor's Story Chapter 3: Orders, Discharge. Secrecy?

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“Orders, Then Silence”

My first set of individual orders for that year were complete. Fifty-two days of wearing a prototype uniform treated with a chemical no one had publicly approved for this use.

Fifty-two days of absorbing it through sweat-soaked sleeves and blistered skin. Fifty-two days of private protest and public compliance—of pain, confusion, and an instinct that kept whispering: This isn’t right.

I didn’t get a chance to recover. No medical workup. No debrief. No word of explanation. My initial training orders had ended. But I wasn’t done. I was handed another assignment. This time, to London.

I arrived one year after the towers fell. On my way from Heathrow to my flat near King’s Cross, I passed through North London—where hundreds stood outside a mosque, openly celebrating the 9/11 attacks, calling it “a towering day in history.” Their glee wasn’t hidden. It was public, unashamed, and fully visible.

That very night—my first in the city—a man nearly identical to me in build and appearance was stabbed outside the door to my flat. I stepped out moments later with friends, headed to a pub. Instead, I was slammed against a wall and frisked by London Metro Police—searching everyone nearby, checking for knives. I stood there with my hands raised, watching the man bleed out—calling for his mother. He died before EMS could reach him.

Weeks later, I was attacked. Surrounded. Assaulted. By men tied to Abu Hamza al-Masri’s network. The same group recruiting students into jihad—from the very campus I was ordered to attend.

I filed a report—with my command and the FBI—about these men, their recruitment efforts, and the assault. There’s no public record of it today. That I know of.

But I remember. I remember all of it. I have recurring dreams of the assault. I act them out—talking, kicking, pushing. And I remember what came next.

A car accident. Sudden. Violent. Too precise to feel like chance. The driver maneuvered with calculated control—evasive and intentional. I was injured.

I was treated and released from the hospital for TBI with concussion, with considerable symptoms. But the treatment never truly ended.

The injuries from that assault—and now the accident—worsened the headaches, fatigue, fog, and neuropathic pain that had begun during my exposure to the neurotoxins embedded in the prototype ACUs. Other symptoms intensified. New ones emerged. They keep coming.

The driver’s car was found weeks later, abandoned. They said he fled back to Venezuela.

Then came something else. In the second week of my fourth year, my command backdated a medical leave of absence—to the date of the accident, more than three months earlier.

It was the start of my final year of ROTC as a service-obligated Cadet and enlistee.

Cadet Command was notified. So were active Army and Reserve military medical commands. But I never saw a military doctor for evaluation or care. I was never brought in.

There was no medical board. No hearing. No exit interview.

Without any appearance of due process, I was deemed medically unfit for retention.

And just like that—I was out.

Letters appealing the decision went unanswered. There was no ceremony. No conversation. Just an email. A copy of a letter of memorandum. Both my enlistment and ROTC contracts marked "fulfilled." No further obligation to either.

And that was it. That’s all I ever got—for twenty years and four days.

I was discharged and silenced—nearly erased from the record. Though not entirely. I have survived by truth. I am still here, because I never stopped choosing to be. Because of my faith, my fidelity to the oaths I swore, and the unwavering support of family, friends, and care teams. Care teams that could not connect the necessary dots in my injuries, exposures, and the resulting cascade of disease for nearly 21 years.

I’ve faced challenges. Yes, many are tied to those injuries and exposures. But any failure in the aftermath—personal or professional—is on me. I’m accountable—not for what was done to me, but for the choices I made afterward, no matter how deeply that treacherous act influenced everything that followed. If I don’t own it like this, I would surrender my identity to victimhood. I would lose all power over my fate and surrender it to those unknown individuals in the upper echelons of my command—to the trauma they inflicted—first on the twelve of us, and then on millions more. Whether they acted in haste, misled by flawed methodologies, or fully aware of these? I'll never know. I don't have time to lose to anger or attempts to litigate fault. Neither do those exposed like I was.

It would be easy enough—perhaps even understandable—to do just that: to give up, to get bitter instead of better. But what purpose would my life amount to if I had chosen that route and stuck to it? What would happen to the others? To the country and people we love enough to give our lives for? Nothing good. That’s what it would amount to. My life would serve no greater good, not in this context and it would destroy those around me. Around us.

Instead, I’ve learned to sit with those thoughts and emotions that come from this human trial, and all that followed. To sit with them long enough to see them to the door each time they visit, giving them less and less time—except, of course, for love, for joy, for grace.

What if I had succumbed to fear instead of facing it with courage and curiosity?

Death. Not just my own, but others just like me.

I chose to persevere, shielded by the very anonymity they forced on me. What is victory for me? It is knowing that I have helped bring solutions to the table—not just for survivors like me, but for the DoD. Solutions that enable us to keep one of the most effective weapons we have against vector-borne disease while mitigating collateral costs. One that honors those we've lost. One that offers others avenues to recovery, to a better quality of life—for themselves, and for the generations I hope descend from them.

We all know it, that no one is going to hand you victory. You must fight for it.

The remainder of this entry is for anyone directly effected, or supporting those who are.

You are not alone. It isn't in your head. It's okay, not to be okay. It serves no one if you do not ask for the help you need.

If you feel lost or adrift?

You want your life to mean something?

Then go out and make it mean something.

If you want to leave a legacy?

Start by leaving a legacy of love.

These are choices you will have to make daily. Moment to moment. And I’ve made them in the darkest of places.

I know rock bottom. The feeling of drowning, of being adrift, gasping for air, for hope. I know addiction and the precipice we often reach between destruction and restoration. I know the diseases, the recurring symptoms, the road to malignancy these toxins and traumas inflict on us. The days you can’t make it to work—because you're stuck in a doctor’s office or battling symptoms, injury, and disease no one else can see.

I know what it’s like to be rejected for jobs—not for lack of skills or performance, but because you are a cancer survivor. Because you've been told directly: you might need time off, your cancer could come back, your care could cost us, your risk profile threatens the bottom line—and we know because we profiled you online.

I know what it’s like to face those moments with no recourse. 

I know what it is to be used, abandoned, and kicked while down. To be shamed for even attempting to reclaim the title: U.S. Veteran. To be denied your Honorable Discharge papers. Papers that reflect the truth. Papers that might have helped mitigate the growing list of increasingly severe conditions being diagnosed—in my case, knowing exactly where these records are at the NPRC the entire time.

I know what it means to be treated unfairly—and unable to say a word. I know what it means to be denied protections in the workplace. To be denied educational, vo-tech, business, and home ownership opportunities you earned.

But I also know what it means to choose. To choose sobriety. To choose gratitude over fear. To hear the words “you have cancer” and still find hope—to choose hope and love over anger, over grief.

I know what it is to lose fertility because you served, and I know what it is to not be able to afford the IVF that might bring you closer to the simple dream of having children—and still, I believe.

When others call me a victim, I correct them.

I am a soldier. And I will fight like hell. Not to be judge or jury—but to live long enough, and learn enough, to be part of the solution. To help our country. Not to blame it.

I tell them I am:

A soldier—not a whistleblower.

A soldier who, despite injury and illness, and despite abandonment by the very institutions I swore to serve, still refuses to abandon them.

I still love this country and our people—even those who simply did what they felt they had to, to win a war. I still revere our founding ideals and hallowed institutions.

I still believe that we are—at our best—a good and noble people, empowered by generations before us. If only we choose to be. If only we commit to that choice and remain committed to it—especially in times of trial and peril.

I’m still here. Because I choose to be.

I’m still here, by the grace of God, because I never truly fought alone. And neither will you.

I’m still here. Because I believe.

And this belief fuels my faith. This unwavering tenacity—this defiant hope—lights the way and reminds me:

Better days still lay ahead.

Not just for one.

Not just for a few.

But for all.