Both of my parents had fathers who served in Vietnam. My father's father came back with pain and memories that led him to a life of substance abuse until a few days before my father's 16th birthday his father took his own life. My mother's father came back from Vietnam and drowned the pain in alcohol. He is still alive, but for many many years, the only father my mother knew was a drunk one. My family is full of individuals who have suffered in one way or another from addiction. My father and mother from a young age warned me to be careful because for us it would be easy to lose ourselves. I've seen addiction and its effects, I've worked with addicts whose lives went from a dream to a nightmare with one hit. I want to work in the field of substance abuse to help pull people from the cycle of pain and shame and self-medication that ripped apart the foundation of the lives of many of the people that I've loved, and the people that they've loved. My father and mother never drank a sip of alcohol in front of me or my brothers growing up. They weren't against it, but they always sought to instill in us an understanding, that we needed to be careful. It wasn't until I grew older that I understood. When my brother was younger he volunteered at a drug and rehab center, and there he grew to be good friends with many of the addicts. I am good friends with the family that runs the center, and both my brother and the head of the program have seen a good friend die of an overdose hours after they said that they were doing great. Many people look down on addiction. Addicts are viewed as having no self-control, or they're viewed as people who only seek their next high because they care more about pleasure than their families. I know men and women who would give anything just to be able to help their families again, but the pain of their addiction forces them back into their habit over and over again. I'm an imperfect man, I've messed up in many ways, but I desperately want to at least have the strength to pull other people out of a pit that I've managed to keep myself from falling in. My main motivation is understanding, pain, regret, and love. Understanding the truth behind the lies about addiction, seeing the pain of losing a loved one to addiction, and witnessing regret that comes from a life wasted on a fleeting feeling of numbness. Love is one of the things that I've seen pull people from their pits. Shame keeps a person down, regret keeps a person looking back, but love pulls on the heart until it starts to beat for something other than the next hit again. I want to be someone who can help other's hearts beat again. I want to hold a rope over the pit and help others climb out.

Both of my grandfathers served in Vietnam. My father served in the gulf war in an SSBN submarine. For months at a time, he would be under the water and away from his wife and kids. He can still draw out the submarine systems from memory and it has been over 15 years since he chose not to reenlist so that he could spend more time with his family. My father is the strongest man I have ever known, and his life is one of my greatest inspirations in mine. His father served in Vietnam and when he returned from there, the pain of what he had seen led him down the path of drug addiction. When my father was 15 his father took his own life. My other grandfather on my mother's side also served in Vietnam. His experience led him down the path of alcoholism, and the hatred shown towards him and other Vietnam vets on his return only made things worse. To this day I have only heard him say one thing about Vietnam, and it was only about the smell of the latrines when they had to mix the waste with diesel. Both my mother and father's families contain members who've served, and from them, I've learned a few things. Duty is a blank check, if you fall you should get up and learn from it, and you should accept the pain, but not accept that you deserve it. My family of veterans shaped my career aspirations by allowing me to see the pains of addiction, trauma, and regret, while also seeing the strength of men who chose to rise despite their pain. I want to be an addiction rehab counselor for that reason. They are what shaped me, and will continue to shape me all of my life.