MAY 2021 • VOL . 1 • ISSUE 5
•AMPLIFY WOMEN VETERANS•
•MAGAZINE•
To grieve much is to love much
Art Heals War Wounds One MotHER's grief journey
Ways to show you love her.
BE ALL YOU CAN BE FEMALE MARINE LEAVES LASTING LEGACY
FreedomSisters Magazine
May2021 | Vol. 1 | Issue 5 Publisher Freedom Sisters Media, LLC
EditHER-in-Chief Managing EditHER Contributing WritHERs HER Life MentHERship HERstory FoundHER LeadHER HER Next Mission Woman Warrior
HighlightHER SHEro Activation Cover Photographer
Click to Subscribe Letters to the Editor Marketing Opportunities
Kerri Jeter E.V. Moore
Naviere Walkewicz | Aaliyah Al-Mahdi | Brie Burgett Jennifer Rodriguez | Carrie Hammer | Jacqueline Zappey Amy Forsythe | Diali Coll-Mercado Kerri Jeter Kerri Jeter Laura Jones | Joanna Sweatt Kerri Jeter | Elis Salamone | Andrea Rathbun Amber Valencia | Jessica Morel Dana Richmond | Jennifer Ballou E.V. Moore Kerri Jeter Peter Paullin
inside Magazine or App editHERs@freedomsisters.com info@freedomsisters.com
Copyright | 2020-2021 | Freedom Sisters Media LLC Freedom Sisters Media respects the rights of all writeHERs, Photographers, Artists, and copyright holders. Consequently, all works that appear on this platform do so with the consent of the writeHER/s or the copyright holder. No image or information display on this site may be reproduced, transmitted, or copied without the express written permission of Freedom Sisters Media. Contravention is an infringement of the Copyright Act and its amendments and may be subject to legal action. FreedomSisters, MentHERship, EditHER, SuperSHEro, highlightHER, WriteHER, FoundHER, LeadHER are trademarks of Kerri jeter.
CONTENTS
• AMPLIFY WOMEN VETERANS •
Happy and fit (not an oxymoron). Paying Respect to the Sisters Who Have Served Before Us Volunteer Vacations—Explore and Change the World Be All You Can Be
Celebrate every stripe Five Practical Tips for Work-Life Balance (even with kids) Female Marine Leaves Lasting Legacy: Be Bold. Be Brief. Be Gone. The Battle of Military MotHERhood FoundHER: Soldier to Scientist LeadHER: To grieve much is to love much. Mindset—Your Ultimate Power Tool! Dear Ruth Bader Ginsburg: Thank you! The Enduring Campaign: InfluenceHER on a mission. The Power of LinkedIn – Are You Clued In? Ditch the Booze: What are your reasons to be SobHER? Art Heals War Wounds: One MotHER’s grief journey Longing for peace Ways to show you love HER Freedom Sisters Slow Flow Yoga
• MAGAZINE•
In every issue: The EditHER's Note HighlightHER Be HER
PAYING RESPECT TO OUR SISTERS WHO SERVED BEFORE US
By: Aalyiah Al-Mahadi
E L A M EF
L E YCAG
G
M
V E SL A E L AS E N T I IN R A
BE BOLD.
BE BREIF. By: Amy Forsythe
It’s been almost 15 years since the death of U.S. Marine Maj. Megan M. McClung but her legacy continues to grow with every year since her passing in 2006. McClung was the first female Marine officer to be killed in Operation Iraqi Freedom, as well as the first female graduate of the United States Naval Academy to be killed in action since the school was founded in 1845. McClung who was 34 at the time of her death, was serving as a media relations officer when a roadside bomb killed her instantly in Ramadi, Iraq, Dec. 6, 2006. She and two other service members assigned the Army’s Brigade Combat Team, Capt. Travis Patriquin and Spec. Vincent Pomante, III, were also killed. The vehicle convoy McClung had been riding in was escorting Newsweek journalists when an improvised explosive device struck their vehicle. The Newsweek journalists were in another vehicle and escaped without injury. McClung had been escorting retired Marine Lt. Col. Oliver North and a Fox News Channel camera crew earlier in the day and were devastated when they learned the news of the attack. McClung and I were serving on the same small forward-deployed public affairs team for all of 2006 with a Camp Pendleton-based unit. We had served together a decade earlier and crossed paths during the years. I was excited to work with her again because her energy and passion for media engagements and telling the Marine Corps story was unparalleled.
Maj. Megan McClung KIA Dec. 6, 2006 First Female Marine Officer and First Female U.S. Naval Academy Graduate to be killed during Operation Iraqi Freedom.
FoundHER
By: Kerri Jeter
To greive much
is to love much
By: Kerri Jeter There are a certain number of National Holidays that impact the Veteran community deeply—Veteran’s Day, Independence Day and Memorial Day. As the end of May approaches each year, most people are looking forward to the kickoff of summer, but millions of other families face the reality that another summer will come and go without a loved one who died while serving our nation. Grief is emotionally exhausting, and last year the pandemic had global impacts, especially for those struggling with grief and trauma following the death of military loved ones. However, there is an organization that stands in the gap, leading the bereaved families with compassion, care and much-needed support. Since 1994, the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors (TAPS) has provided comfort and hope every hour of every day of the week through a national peer support network, programs and grief resources at no cost to surviving families. Over 27 years ago, the LeadHER of TAPS, Bonnie Carroll suffered the loss of her great love, her husband, Brig. Gen. Tom Carroll. He perished in an Army plane crash in 1992 along with seven other soldiers. Bonnie turned her tragedy into a purposeful effort to create what is today the major national program providing compassionate care for all who are grieving the death of a service member. “You know, at that time life just ceased to be. It just stopped. His life ended physically and my life ended in a different way. Everything we had planned for, hoped for, just came to an end,” recalled Carroll. “ So, it was over the course of the days and the weeks and the months to come, that I struggled to find the kind of support I knew existed for other types of loss in our society. And it didn't exist for the military. So that began the journey to create an organization.”
Dear Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Thank you! Read how RBG was able to rise in a male-dominated profession and how she used her knowledge of the law to benefit all women, especially servicewomen in the ranks of the U.S. Military.
By: Joanna Sweatt
It’s been nearly eight months since Ruth Bader Ginsburg died at the age of 87. Although we had never met, the graceful petite lady nicknamed, ‘The Notorious RBG’ has been a huge influence on my life and her death hit me terribly hard during an already taxing, politically charged time of year—the 2020 Presidential election which included a woman, Kamala Harris as the VP nominee had just begun. I was immediately affected and deeply saddened by the loss of RBG’s vision, voice and reasoning about our laws in the United States of America—specific to improving women’s rights and equality. In 1948, President Truman signed the Women’s Armed Services Integration Act into law. This Act legally permitted women to serve in the U.S. Armed Forces in a number of official capacities and the act allowed women to serve in all four branches of the military—RBG was 15years old in 1948 and I can only imagine what that impact had on a young girl growing up at the time. By 1956, at 23, RBG had graduated from Harvard Law School, was married and had her first child—a daughter.
There are five specific laws that RBG helped to pass to achieve gender equality in the U.S and three of those laws are especially impactful for women — especially to those who have served or are currently serving in the U.S. Military. Even though I had never imagined joining the military growing up, I relished in watching progressive women on television being ‘unconventional’ like Mary Tyler Moore, Cagney & Lacey, and Laverne & Shirley. I couldn’t wait to become an official ‘working’ woman one day and I also dreamed of being a ‘shot-caller’ boss in those future spaces. I remember the first time watching Who’s the Boss and being introduced to Angela Bower, a woman who was an executive at work and a <inset gasp> single mother with a house maid-man named Tony. Those examples were so out of the box for me living and growing up as an Air Force military brat because the standard norm in the late 70s and early 80s was still prominently working dads in the military with stay-at-home moms, who maybe had a part-time hobby job on base when the kids were at school.
The Enduring Campaign: InfluenceHER on a mission. By: Kerri Jeter
Rachelle LaFleur is a Marine on a mission to serve transitional veteran centers that offer critical services to veterans including housing and re-integration programs. The Enduring Campaign, her nonprofit is actively building relationships with centers across the nation to provide them with the items that are needed to support the veterans in their care. She has an incredible presence on Instagram and we love following her to see the impact she is making as an influenceHER and we are so here for it! Freedom and Fleurs is clever and cute, how did you come up with your handle? RL: My maiden name is LaFleur, which translates to “the flower” in French. I have always loved this name and so naturally I knew part of my handle had to incorporate something personal. Freedom felt like a natural choice because I have fought for it and I believe in it. Voilà, Freedom and Fleurs was born! You have a pretty big following on IG, when did you start using IG? RL: I have been using Instagram for 4-5 years now, but really only used it for personal photos. It was really during COVID’s quarantine that I started to realize there is a broader network of very like-minded people that I had the potential to connect with, so I started actively using it with a purpose. When did you realize you were an influencer? RL: I feel as if it is cliché to say, “I don’t feel like an influencer” because that is not true. What I am a strong believer in, however, is that the number of followers someone has does not dictate whether they can influence others or not. I have been influenced by IG users with 500 followers and I have been underwhelmed by individuals who have 500,000 followers. As it relates to my story, I knew that the Freedom and Fleurs platform had some type of influence when small businesses and non-profits were benefiting from my recommendations to those that do follow.
What did you do to grow your impact on IG? RL: If I had to summarize my growth into three words it would be consistency, honesty, and vulnerability. From a consistency standpoint I always stand by my message of being a good human, as well as showcasing my genuine care for my veteran brothers and sisters. Just as significant is being genuine in that consistency. If I repost content I do it because it was compelling to me and I oftentimes write a message of WHY it is compelling. That is oftentimes a conversation starter with the content creator, which has lead to many friendships. Next, honesty. I post the good, I post the bad. I write captions that many would regard as too long, especially if you’re Googling Social Networking 101. That’s just not who I am; I am dramatic, I talk a lot, and I want my entire thought heard as opposed to one catchy sentence that makes zero impact on anybody’s life. Finally, honesty. Going off of the last sentence I wrote, I have always been a firm believer that if I can improve or inspire even ONE person I am doing what I should be doing. Therefore I am brutally honest and vulnerable in a lot of my content. Whether it is my mental health, my Dad’s suicide, parenting, or day-to-day life, I want to be vulnerable for others to know that they are not alone. How do you decide which brands to represent? RL: I seek and support brands that are giving back to a cause I believe in. Many of those causes are veteran-related, but I have supported causes such as COVID relief and domestic violence. Those brands inspire me to be a better person because of their willingness to give back to communities and groups that need it the most. You have a giant heart for veterans. I was so excited for your enduring campaign to begin. RL: Thank you so much! It has been a wild ride to say the least. 😊
Rachelle's Son, Landon packing up essentials for a service center. (courtesy photo).
Packages loaded up and ready to go! (courtesy photo).
Are you missing out on one of the most powerful social media platforms in the world? LinkedIn was started in 2002 as a business/employee orientation website. Today the platform has over 650 million members, 250 million active members and it is used in 250 countries. LinkedIn is a professional networking platform that when used correctly can open incredible employment and networking opportunities. Does your profile garnered attention to you as a subject matter expert or do you still have a selfie as your profile picture? Just like any professional circle of influence your LinkedIn profile is the first look into you as a brand. What does your profile say about you? If you want to maximize your profile to find those unique professional growth opportunities or to expand your network or business, keep reading. Let us start with the basics, your profile picture! Yes, a picture is as important as you are wearing an appropriate interview outfit.
Warrior ongs
This song was written by Army VetHERan, Clarissa DiPietro.
From the recording Women at War: Warrior Songs Vol. 2 Source: Testimony and writings of Army Veteran Carissa DiPietro, mother of Ashley Guinta who was killed on 08/21/2001 Lyrics by Dave Nooe & Carissa A DiPietro Music by Dave Nooe Lead Vocals: Jenny Anne Backup Vocals & Guitars: Dave Nooe Keyboards & Percussion: Joseph Lekkas Bass: Scott Harrison Drums: Erin Nelson Engineered & Produced by Joseph Lekkas at Greenland Studios - Nashville, TN on 05/23/2018 * Dave and Jenny Anne Nooe, father and stepmother of Charlotte Nooe 02/28/1989 - 01/11/2012 © Warrior Songs - facebook.com/jennyannemusic/
Through her testimony and journaling, she was able to be the voice of her slained daughter, Ashley Guinta who was tragically murdered on August 21, 200 Many Veterans find healing through the incredible mission of Warrior Songs. Get your free download here.
Happy Mother's day 2021!
LIKE MOTHER,LIKE DAUGHTER SERVICE IS A FAMILY BUSINESS! Join us for some amazing conversations all month long on the Freedom Sisters Podcast. We talk to five mother/daughter duos who served this nation. Swipe right to meet all the amazing ladies we chat to this month! New episodes drop every Monday! Subscribe so you never miss an episode.
Dynam i c Duos