The Sacred Burden of Casualty Notification | S.O.S. #273

A knock at the door is the moment many military families replay for the rest of their lives, and the person on the porch often had far less preparation than you’d expect. We sit down with retired U.S. Marine Christopher Murphy to talk about casualty notification and what it really means to serve as a casualty assistance officer when a service member dies. Chris shares how he got “tagged” for the duty shortly after reporting to a small unit, why the training can feel like a checklist without emotional armor, and how every word you choose in that first minute can shape a family’s memory forever. 

We dig into the realities people rarely hear about: notifying divorced parents at the same time, walking into homes where the right next of kin is not even there, and dealing with situations that can turn high-profile fast. Chris explains why the military insists notifications happen face to face, how “River City” communications blackout works in combat deaths, and what it takes to coordinate dignity in public spaces like airports during a dignified transfer. He also shares how families react, from quiet shock to anger, and why you can’t judge grief when you’re the bearer of it. 

Then we get practical about the parts that feel impossible to talk through the next day: SGLI, death gratuity, DFAS issues, VA survivor benefits, funeral expenses, and the paperwork that keeps a family financially stable even when no amount of money can touch the loss. If you’ve ever wondered how military death notification works, what the Marine Corps expects of a CACO, or why this job leaves such a lasting imprint, this conversation is for you. 

Subscribe for more Stories of Service, share this with someone who needs a clearer picture of military life beyond the headlines, and leave a review so more listeners can find the show. What do you think should change about how we train and support the people who have to make that knock?

Transcript

Why This Duty Gets Overlooked

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Within the armed forces, it doesn't matter what your duty is. You could be the lowliest E1 in the military, like in the Navy, an undesignated seaman, or you could be somebody who is entrusted to perform medical care. But one thing that all of these duties have in common, even an undesignated airman, is that there is a degree of training that you have to do, whether it's six months of a in the Navy, we have what's called A school or C school or specialty school. I know for me to work backseat on an aircraft, I had to go through about a year and a half of different schools. And then, of course, our commissioned officers need to have an undergraduate degree. They often go through specialty training in their officer designator. And then there's of course multiple times throughout their career where they have to go back, get their graduate degree, get joint officer qualified, all this different education. But the one duty in the military that so many military members get tapped to do, they receive very little to no education on. And that is notifying family members that their loved one has passed. And I find that to be so astounding that you could be entrusted with a collateral duty that is so sacred and could be so traumatizing and not receive anything other than some computer-based training, a two to five day course, or you've got to learn by doing. And that's what we're going to talk about today with somebody who had to learn by doing and some of the experiences that he had while performing this sacred duty of casualty assistance officer.

Meet Christopher Murphy

SPEAKER_03 1:50

So, here to talk more about this, I've got Christopher Murphy. Christopher, how are you doing today?

SPEAKER_01 1:55

I'm doing great. How are you?

SPEAKER_03 1:56

I'm doing good. Thank you so much for coming on the Stories of Service podcast. For those of you who are not familiar with my show, welcome. Stories of Service, ordinary people who do extraordinary work. And to get us started, as we always do, I'll play an intro from my father, Charlie Pickard.

SPEAKER_00 2:14

From the moment we're born and lock eyes with our parents, we are inspiring others. By showing up as a vessel of service, we not only help others, we help ourselves. Welcome to SOS Stories of Service. Hosted by Teresa Carpenter, here from ordinary people from all walks of life who have transformed their communities by performing extraordinary work.

SPEAKER_03 2:39

And there are for many families, there are moments in military service that will never leave you. And that worst moment of many families' lives begins with a knock at the door. Standing on the other side is a service member carrying news no one wants to deliver. And today we're going to be talking to retired U.S. Marine Christopher Murphy about one of the most difficult and sacred responsibilities entrusted to those who wear the uniform, casualty notification. Christopher began his military journey in 1994 when he enlisted in the United States Air Force. He later commissioned as an officer in the United States Marine Corps in 1999, serving a combined 24 years in uniform. His career took him around the world, including deployments to Iraq, Afghanistan, and the Horn of Africa. After retiring from military service, Christopher continued his commitment to public service and today works as a federal civilian. But today we're not going to be talking a lot about his resume. We're going to be talking about the mission most Americans never see. If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend his powerful essay in the War Horse, where he shares the emotional reality of serving as a casualty notification officer, the weight carried for those chosen for this responsibility, and the importance of dignity, compassion, and humanity during a family's darkest moment. Welcome again, Chris.

SPEAKER_01 3:51

Thank you again for having me, and it's a great opportunity to be here.

SPEAKER_03 3:55

Well, thank you so much for agreeing to do this. So, first off, as I always ask all my guests who have served, where were you born and raised and what inspired you to initially join the Air

From Air Force To Marines

SPEAKER_03 4:05

Force?

SPEAKER_01 4:05

I was born in Nashville, New Hampshire. My family was originally out of Boston and Cambridge, Massachusetts. My father was a Navy man. I had several brothers who also served. And I had a grandfather who was in on Okinawa during World War II. And I had several great uncles and so forth who served during World War I. So it was kind of part of the family lineage. And I've always had kind of a pull towards it, but I was always kind of torn like, where was I gonna go? Because it seemed most of the people on family were Navy. So I was kind of like, yeah, maybe maybe. So it's all good.

SPEAKER_03 4:45

What was your uh job specialty in the Air Force? And then what was it in the Marine Corps?

SPEAKER_01 4:50

I was security police, which became security forces, which is just uh MPs in the Air Force, and then when I uh went to the Marine Corps, which was a real culture shock going from what that service to the Marine. Oh, I bet it it was it was really it was quite traumatizing, I'll say, when I was at OCS, especially when they mentioned in our class we had about 52 guys in our platoon that said, All right, 28 of you are prior enlisted marines, and one of you is prior Air Force. So I was like, oh man, I'm a dead man.

SPEAKER_03 5:21

What inspired you to do that, though? I mean, because the Air Force, of course, as we know from a cultural standpoint, they're sort of called the Chair Force, and sometimes people say they don't necessarily have it as hard as some of the other branches. So were you just looking for a bigger challenge?

SPEAKER_01 5:34

I was looking for something different, and they pursued me a lot more than the Air Force did when I was looking around. And I was like, you know what? I'm gonna take an opportunity and and just go with it. And I don't regret it at all. I I've had some great experiences. I've been around this world several times over. Six of my children were born while I was in the Marine Corps, and I've had phenomenal experiences. I've never been stationed at the same place twice. So I've had multiple different duty stations, and and I would never trade it back. Um, but there were difficult moments, as you know, when you're on active duty, you get pulled in a lot of different directions, you get a lot of different strains, and then you get a couple of curveballs thrown at you, like I did when we were stationed up in just south of Seattle, Washington on Fort Lewis on inspector instructor duty, which is known as I and I duty.

Getting Tagged For Notifications

SPEAKER_01 6:25

It's considered a non-fleet tour. And um it's it's kind of non-basically we oversee a reserve unit. We ensure that they get the training and mobilization takes place, especially when I was there from 06 to 09. Uh OIF and OEF were in full swing. So we would have reserved mobilizing and then coming back from deployments. And our job was to ensure that they get trained and mobilized and prepared properly. And at the same time, we have a bit of a reduced staff than you would see in a normal uh unit. Like we were the battalion headquarters, but we're not manned like one. At any given time, we might have had 25, 26 active duty Marines serving with us. And then you had your collateral duties. That list was quite lengthy. And one of the ones I got I was warned about, but I didn't really think about it too much was funeral details and casualty notification. And in the casualty notification hit hit pretty quick when I wasn't there two weeks and I had to do one.

SPEAKER_03 7:27

So wow, you were only there two weeks, and then you were told that this was going to be one of your side hustles. What was yeah, what did you and at that point, did they tell you that there would be any training? Did they just give you a bunch of instructions? How did they prepare you for this sacred duty?

SPEAKER_01 7:46

Well, what happens when you check in, when you finally check in after moving to the area, you know, you get your house ready, you get your family settled, then you you you walk into the office and say, Hey, I'm here. And you know, you're you're going through, get familiarizing yourself with the unit. You're saying, okay, this is going to be my responsibility. I was going to be the assistant inspector instructor, which is basically the battalion XO was going to be my job, but I was also going to be the S1, the S4, and several other primary duties. In addition to this one, which a Marine came in and said, uh, sir, we have a personal casualty report or PCR. And I'm like, what are you talking about? Yeah, so we have to do a notification. And I'm like, oh, well, excuse me. And being that it was we it was a summer rotation, several of us were new, got just got there, and I was on the hook. I mean, I just got there and said, Tag, you're it. Yeah, there is training you can get. There's some guidebooks, and uh, but unfortunately, uh, you know, your first two weeks, you're trying to do so many things, this just wasn't uh met yet. This requirement to to attend this training. And after the first time, uh the training, you don't need it anymore, even though it doesn't make the job would have made the job any easier. Because it just kind of tells you what you need to do. It gives you a checklist and all these links and stuff, what to do, but uh to actually have to perform it, because there were a lot of changes came up about uh not long after I arrived there. Like we no longer had to do it in our blues, we were gonna use it, wear our service A uniforms, which is our long sleeve jackets and so forth, and that the time frame that between midnight and 5 a.m., we are to no longer do notifications. But anytime after those two hours, uh we we were to do it. That as soon as you got the notification, you had to get ready, you had to pull a bunch of administrative data on whoever is deceased, find out who was in the area, whether it was the parents or the wife or whoever. And then you got ready and you know, looking around,

The Checklist And Hard Rules

SPEAKER_01 9:45

like, oh man, what do I do? What do I do? And one of the guys who was there who had performed it, he said, Hey, he gave me a few pointers, uh, what to do, but he says, Hey, you just gotta do it. Like, what did he give you? Like, what did what were some of the advice he said? One of the things is that never refer to the to the person as the deceased, like you the deceased will be here, the remains will be brought, will be flown in on this day. Always refer to it as their name. Never lie, always be completely honest. If you don't know an answer, say, I will find out for you. But you have a checklist. He goes, the checklist that that has been created has probably been refined over the years. And it was really good about all the things we had to do. Like the first day you notify them, you verify who they are. Like, hey, are you the parents of so-and-so? You know, are you, you know, Michael and and Jane? And you say, you know, on behalf of the Commandant of the Marine Corps, I'm sorry to inform you, but your son, whoever it is, passed away, whether it was a traffic accident, an untimely medical emergency, killed in action. I I had several that were killed in Afghanistan that I had to notify. And then the shotgun, usually on the person, the spectrum of that goes from very calm to one, we got chased out of the house by one enraged father. But you let them know that you're going to be back the next day, and that's when the checklist starts, where you have to go over so many items where you have to sign because all the benefits that start to get processed and released to the next akin, whether, like I said, it's the parents, a sibling, the wife, or or so forth, where it's like the SGLI, the service uh members group life insurance, last pay and arrears, the personal inventory of uh personal effects, which is that that's miserable when you have to do that. So, like I said, there's a checklist, and there's the deskratity where you you need their bank numbers, you need their routing numbers, because these are going to be direct deposits, and just asking them for this information, you'd never remember it. But that checklist that you have, you bring it with you, and you don't try to constantly reference it, but you keep it handy because sometimes you have to explain it because one, they don't want to hear it, two, they may not truly understand some of the death benefits that are going to be coming to them. All they have in their mind is seeing me listening to me try to explain. And you know, they want more explanation about why their son or daughter died, how they died, and so forth. And many times I didn't know even the next day, I might not have the full details.

SPEAKER_03 12:23

Yeah, that's probably one of the hardest parts is a lot of times these these deaths are followed by a line of duty investigation or or something along those lines. And especially if it's a suspicious death or or something that is is controversial or it's making. Did you have any cases that were making news and you had to get ahead of the news cycle of when that notification would be until you might unfortunately see the family member might see that that that particular unit was involved in an accident?

SPEAKER_01 12:54

There were two that kind of fit that. So we we went

When Families React With Shock

SPEAKER_01 13:10

there, and this was just you know another Keiko, even though each one is unique, but at the same time, I was pretty familiar with what I had to do, but I still didn't like it and didn't make it any easier. But when we got to the door, there was some frosted glass on the side of a side panel, and we could see someone approaching, even though it was blurry, and the it was a ended up being the mom, and she just started screaming at us. We could hear her like, get out of here, what do you want? And then just going off. And I I finally got her to open the door, and she said, Hey, you know, my husband is a retired Marine, and I know what it means when two Marines show up in uniform. So she eventually let us in and she was busted up real bad. And her husband, who wasn't home at the time, worked for uh the Seattle Fire Department. So I'm thinking to myself, Well, this may get some attention uh just because of it it may turn out being high profile. And it did. It ended up getting a lot of attention up there. But unfortunately, she didn't know which department which firehouse he was at. So she was able to get a hold of a friend, but she couldn't talk to him. So she gave me the phone and I explained to him, I explained who I was and what I had to do, and that we were trying to find which firehouse the father's at, and that he can't let them know that we're coming. Because the last thing you ever want to do is find out that someone got informed by a telephone call or just some rumor mongering going on. It was unbelievably important that this was done in person and we do it as soon as possible. Because unfortunately, when OIF broke out, families out at Pendleton, they were receiving these prank calls of, hey, you know, your husband got killed yesterday and so forth. So no one needs a phone call like that because what it's do is just gonna freak people out. But if they see two Marines in uniform, you know, they're not gonna like it, but they'll know that it's it's legitimate. So we got up to Seattle and we we found out which firehouse he was at, and we pulled up curbside, and we got out, and the father actually happened to be outside putting on his outfit because he was going out on a call, and the mom walked out from behind us, and you know, he sees us like, oh, what are these two Marines being here? And then he sees his wife, and he knew right then he he knew right away why we were there, and so we we basically did a notification in the street without a word being said, and they embraced for a few minutes, then we went inside, we let them know, and I said told him that we'd be back the next day. So moving forward a bit, when we when the their son, a marine sergeant, was flown into McCord from Dover, probably about 300 members of the Seattle Fire Department were there. Wow. And it was an unbelievable presence. So, you know, we we had to make sure that regardless of why or how uh someone may have died, the the care and attention that needs to be given, whether you have several hundred people there or just the immediate family, that everyone is treated the same. And any type of slip up or miscue could have quite a quite a reverberation on us. And you know, we we had it was our duty, and you know, it's not just our reputation, you know, this the Marine Corps' reputation of you know taking care of their own.

SPEAKER_03 16:30

So absolutely took care of this, you know, and we talked in our pre-call about what the right answer ought to be with something like this, and then who should do it and how they should do it.

A High Profile Seattle Notification

SPEAKER_03 16:46

And while I think that there needs to be more support for the people who are performing this task, and it's tough to square the fact that this is a collateral duty, but there is something to be said about the fact that the military takes the time to find people to go to the door, no matter what the death is. And that that's another thing, is that some people probably who aren't in the military mistakenly think that this is just for people who die in a combat zone, but it's not. I mean, if someone gets into a traffic accident, if somebody any anything that happens, this is the official notification process that gets carried out, correct?

SPEAKER_01 17:30

Yes. I mean, whether it's a traffic accident, suicide, an untimely medical emergency, even it's happened where someone's died during a criminal act, that you know, we still have to do it to include for killed in action in one of the combat zones. So the process is the same. Now, depending if someone was committing a criminal act, that could have uh a reaction to what kind of benefits may get paid out. But thankfully, that I didn't have to do that. One of the other guys that I served with at the time, he had to do one of those where a Marine was committing a robbery and he was killed. And I I don't I don't really remember how it washed out, but some certain benefits I believe were withheld because of that, because it wasn't an honorable situation, so to speak. Right. Yeah, there's an invest a line of duty investigation would be done. And if I recall correctly, some of certain benefits weren't paid out. But again, I I don't remember specifically. It was it was 20 years ago.

SPEAKER_03 18:33

So the the person who gets notified, is it it's always the person, like it's either going to be a spouse or a parent or a sister or a brother who's ever listed on the SGLI, right? As the friend, how does

Divorced Parents And Timing Mistakes

SPEAKER_03 18:46

that work?

SPEAKER_01 18:46

Actually, the the red data, which is the record of emergency data, that lists the primary next to kin. Uh, they're the ones who are you're supposed to tell, but sometimes they're not home, which happened on my first notification, where the parents were divorced. So we had to send two teams out, and you have to do the notification at the same time. And thankfully they both lived in the same town. So I went with a Marine to the father's house, and another Marine and another two Marines went to the mom's. So before we got there, we called each other on our cell saying, Hey, are you there? Yes, I'm there. Okay, let's do the knock. So I got to the door and a woman answered, and it ended up being the new wife. The father had remarried. And she sees us and she completely freaked out. She started running up and down the stairs, crying, just really upset. And didn't I'm standing in the doorway, like, do I go in? Do I stay here? Do I just try to get her attention? So uh when she was on the phone, I could hear her talking to someone, and I ended up just stepping inside with the other Marine. And she handed me the phone, and the voice on the other end was the father. I mean, he's like, you know, who are you? What are you doing here? Is this some kind of joke? And I was like, no, I explained who I am. I go, if you can come home, I really need to talk to you, even though it was obvious why we were there. And unfortunately, like the the stepmom, her name wasn't listed on the red data, just the father and the mother, his biological parent, his biological parents. So a father gets home like within five minutes, and he was very calm, just trying to ask me again, Am I sure that it's his son and so forth? And I told him it is, and that you know, I'd be back the following day. And when I got a hold of the other team, like the mom wasn't home either. And and it just it got ugly because the the unit where the Marine was serving called us up and said we screwed this up. And he he the guy was just screaming at me, and I was mad. I I I was pretty close to saying something back to someone several grades above me. Um, because I I didn't need this, because one, this is the first Keiko I've ever done. So the stress factor was was really high. And I was my my nerves were frazzled because you know the father wasn't there, this it was a stepmom, and it's just things just felt like they're going sideways. And I had to go back the next day to explain to them the benefits and get them to sign forms, ask them for account numbers and routing numbers for benefits. So then Quantico called Cash League branch and Quanico calls me and says, Hey, you need to write up a report and explain what happened. So I kind of barked at the guy in the other phone because I was I was still frazzled because all of a sudden I'm getting phone calls of complaints basically. So I I was not happy about this because this is just something you're not prepared to do. I I even if I would have attended the training, you're not prepared to do this because it becomes so overwhelming. There is nothing worse than telling someone that their kid has died. And the parents want answers, and you you just can't give them because you don't know. And if you lie, make something up, or kind of be you know, wave it off, oh, there's gonna be repercussions and and things will get ugly.

SPEAKER_03 21:55

Did you notify parents more than you did spouses?

SPEAKER_01 21:59

It was all All parents. One of the other guys. One of our our our CEO actually had to notify the mom and sister of someone because of a there was a senior officer who was killed in Iraq. For one of the ones I did when I got chased out of the house of the father, the the Marine, his wife lived nearby. And unfortunately, she wasn't I think her name was in the red data. Yeah, it was because she got the the death gratuity, but the SGLI went to the Marine's brother. And there was and and my admin, every time before we deployed, you know, each person sat down individually and you went over everyone like is this accurate? Re-sign right here. Sure. And sometimes there's even units, they do that anyway, every year. That you'll go over all that information. Oh yeah. Update SGLI, update this, you know, your next akin. Are you are you married? Right. There'll be things like that. And sometimes, and also on this, there was another one where there was no record in the Marine's file that he he was married and the and the Marine was, and he had died, that one of the other guys had to do. So that that's a whole that's a big mess, too. Where sometimes by law, certain things will will shift. But on this one, like I said, the SGLI went to the Marine's brother. And you know, I I people were they got into my case, like, hey, why is this? How is this right? You need to do something. I was like, listen, I can't change a thing. If that name is on there, it it is way beyond my authority to do anything about it. And and people get mad, and it it's it's sad that they're fussing over money because many times a lot of them didn't even want to sign it to get the money. Others, like, how much am I getting? And it's like, oh yeah. It's it's it's shocking the reactions of some people, it's crazy.

Death Benefits And Money Questions

SPEAKER_03 24:02

Yeah, well, I don't think people understand how much money it is. Like, I I was not prepared for those numbers until I bec got went through the training. So I'm not someone who has kids. There was a lot of times during my career I was not married, and I was still giving all this money to the SGLI. It's a lot of understanding that they already covered $100,000 death gratuity, just straight off the bat. And then I believe there was a few other payments.

SPEAKER_01 24:36

Yeah, the death gratuity you get within 24 to 72 hours, tax-free. Yep. SGLI at the time I was in was raised to 400,000. I think it's higher now, if I'm not mistaken. There's last pay and arrears for the final month. There's certain benefits you you can start getting, like indemnity and dependency payments or social security, uh, for and especially if you have children. All the you rate all the education benefits from the VA. And that was one thing. We were also like the connective tissue between the family and the VA for all the for all the benefits that they're going to start getting. And you have to talk to them about it. And if I didn't really, if I wasn't as familiar with some of the programs, I would try to find out. And if I still couldn't get the answer, I would give the family the numbers of who they needed to call to talk to these counselors. But the the money part is what was crazy that the families were going to get, even though, you know, at the end of the day, it doesn't replace anything, but it sometimes they're just shocked at how much military will pay out.

SPEAKER_03 25:46

I mean, I was just I'm just looking it up right now. I believe the SGLI has gone up now to $500,000. Wow. And I want to say there's even so there's there's so there's the $600,000 that you get with the SGLI and then the death gratuity. And then you also get funeral expenses that are covered as well. Is that correct?

SPEAKER_01 26:05

Yeah, the headstone. Yeah, so yeah, you die on active duty, that is all paid for. Now, not everyone will want to do that, but typically that you'll go into a VA cemetery, a national cemetery. Now, if you want to do a private one, I think there's I think it can be reimbursed. It's been a long time since I I've had to handle some of that because not all the funerals for the uh casting calls I did were at the National Cemetery in Auburn. A handful of them were out in town. One actually one was in Arizona. We had to go meet the family down there. I had to have an interpreter, the the Marine who died, she was a reservist who was activated, went to South Carolina, was crossing the street after after the Marine Corps ball, and she got hit by a car and killed. Wow. And her husband was an active duty soldier on Fort Lewis. And we got this, we got word in the middle of the night. So at like 4:45, we're we're at base housing outside this guy's house, waiting 15 minutes to go inside and inform him. But her parent, her family was from Arizona, from outside of Phoenix, if I recall, and they didn't speak any English. So we so one of the INI Marines down there had to go with us to translate for us, um, even though they were already notified. But I had to let them know who I was. I was there for the funeral. It was just it was just a crazy time of some of the traveling that we had

Distance Travel And Being On Call

SPEAKER_01 27:34

to do.

SPEAKER_03 27:34

How many uh years or months did you do this duty?

SPEAKER_01 27:38

Three years.

SPEAKER_03 27:39

Wow. So for three years, how often would you do it, would you say?

SPEAKER_01 27:43

Over three years as a site, we did 24 of them. I did six. A Marine that I showed up with at the same time, he did six. And the rest were kind of a mix of the other officers who were there. But we we did the most while I was there. Him and I, we did we did half of them because it was just like our time and the rotation. Or if someone wasn't available, hey, who's next? Right. Guess what?

SPEAKER_03 28:10

You're would you do notifications all over the continental United States? Do you do them overseas? If if a if a next of kin lives overseas, how does that work?

SPEAKER_01 28:21

Well, well, the the experience I had, the parents were from New York, but they were on an Alaskan cruise. So the I and I out in New York went to the family's house and a couple of the siblings were there. And they said, no, our parents are in Alaska. Uh, we we were able to determine that the family, the cruise ship was gonna be docking in Victoria. So we actually had to fly to Canada. We got a hold of the ship's captain on a sat phone. I told them who I was, what I had to do. And when they docked, they let us on before they let anyone off. So, so tech so we did do one in a foreign country, even though it was Canada right next door. Uh, we still had to go to a foreign country. Now, if say something happened in Europe or other places, I'm sure there is a marine debt at at the embassies, but I'm not exactly sure what procedures are in place for some of these locations that may not have a regular active duty marine presence. So, but I guarantee you it's happened and there's a process in place for it.

SPEAKER_03 29:27

Absolutely. Yeah. So, what would you say if if you, you know, looking back on those six times that you had to do it, what would you say was probably the most challenging aspect of it?

SPEAKER_01 29:39

Oh the hardest thing was knocking on the door. Because we would pull up to the house, I would just sit there for a moment saying, This sucks. Because you just did not want to go do it, because you know the kind of reaction. And again, I'll never blame someone on how they react, even for the the father who chases out of the house, threatening, I'm gonna kick your ass, I'm gonna kick his ass, and just make you know one threat after another.

SPEAKER_03 30:03

But I'm like, that's he's in his grief, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:07

Yeah, I I understand that was just unbelievably hard. The the following day was always very brutal because not just the parents were there, they might have other family there, and they're just looking at you, and their eyes are right on you, and and they want answers. And you're sitting there saying, Oh, could I have your bank routing number and your account number?

SPEAKER_03 30:28

Yeah, asking the most personal information, and they they break down, they start crying.

SPEAKER_01 30:35

It's just it's just horrible. And then once we're done, you know, I'll say, Okay, I'm gonna be back at this point. If we could talk about if you're gonna have a funeral, can we go? Do you want us there? You you always ask them, never just assume that you're gonna go to the be at the funeral home, be at the cemetery. Because it's it's just never assume you you always ask the parents.

SPEAKER_03 31:01

So you you stay the whole the because I was gonna ask another question is how long do you typically stay in that particular city? Because sometimes it takes uh probably a week or two, maybe to get to get the body home, to go through the funeral home process. So, how do how does that get managed on your end? Do you guys just stay there through the course of that process if the family needs you, or how does that work?

SPEAKER_01 31:24

Yeah, well, it's it's always local within driving distance, except for one. When we got there, one of the other guys, when we first checked into the unit, one of the other guys got one up in Forks, Washington, which is where the Twilight series was based. That's like a four-hour drive. So they had to go up there, do a notification, drive back, go back there the next day with all this paperwork, and then essentially be on call. Where when you get assigned one of these, usually that first week, this is all you're doing. You're making phone calls, you're trying to process paperwork by getting it sent straight to Quanaco, getting it sent out to wherever. You're doing follow-ups to make sure like the death gratuity gets paid. Because if it doesn't, we had one where the death gratuity didn't get paid in the mandated time frame. And I got, and it happened to be the soldier on base. He's like, he calls me on a Friday, say, hey sir, I didn't get paid. And I'm like going, oh, and of course it had to be a Friday. And I'm on the West Coast, and D FAS is located, uh where were they Ohio? Cleveland, I think it is.

SPEAKER_03 32:30

Yeah, no, well, they were Columbus, Ohio. I don't know if there's maybe you're right. Maybe it is Cleveland. Here I can find out.

SPEAKER_01 32:36

Yeah, somewhere out there. And I call Quantico first, say, hey, you got a number for DFAS because I need to I need someone who's actually gonna pick up a phone and who can help me with this. And of course, it's probably two or three in the afternoon on a Friday West Coast. So when you're looking at five or six on a Friday, where you know what it's like on a Friday. Who wants to stick around? And thankfully, I got a hold of somebody and the uh the the husband Indiana. They're in Indianapolis, Indiana. And uh thankfully at midnight Friday night, so into Saturday, he got the payment because he said, Yeah, I'm I told some of my family I'm paying for them to come out. So they're you know, needling him. Hey, you know, when are you gonna pay for our tickets to come out there? And it's just these little things where I'd say, Well, that's not my problem. Well, it it actually is right, where right all these things, so like your first week, all your other responsibilities at the unit when I was on INI get pushed aside because this will completely consume you for everything you have to do because you're gonna get calls from the family who just want to talk to you, who just want to because all they know is you. You're their you are now their connection to the Marine Corps. Their son or daughter has passed.

SPEAKER_03 33:55

Do they get calls from their commanding officers or from from leadership? I bet they don't a lot of times.

SPEAKER_01 34:00

Um a few, I'm aware of a couple on this. I would hope so. Right. I I would think they they would. I'm I'm aware of a few, I know that for sure, where there's follow-ups from the units. Like one of the Marines who was killed in Afghanistan, uh, they wanted me to call them to sit to let them know when I did a notification. Um, because I think they called afterwards because they obviously are not going to call first. Because when you're overseas, when there's a death, when Iraq and OIF and OEF, they go into river city. I don't know if you've heard that term before.

SPEAKER_03 34:35

Yeah, we go radio silent.

SPEAKER_01 34:37

Yeah, yeah, radio silent until the notification is made. So that's why they wanted to hear from me directly. They didn't want to hear from Quanico because that could be a delay of me calling Quanico. Yes, I've done the notification. Sure. They said as soon as I got back, they and they gave me the overseas line, and I got a hold of the XO and said, hey, notification's been made. So then River City got lifted, and I would assume one of them called the family for that. So it I I would think so. And I would like to believe everyone did, but again, I I couldn't verify it.

SPEAKER_03 35:10

You you don't know with with each case.

The Toll On The Officer

SPEAKER_03 35:12

What do you think is probably the most rewarding aspect of doing it?

SPEAKER_01 35:17

Once it's all said and done, you you are one, you're physically and emotionally exhausted afterwards. You really are, because it just consumes you. Right.

SPEAKER_03 35:27

You're taking in all that pain, like you're you're absorbing all the things that these people are coming to you with and concerned about, and you are the frontline person who's bearing the brunt of what they're going through.

SPEAKER_01 35:39

Yep. You're the face of the Marine Corps today.

SPEAKER_03 35:41

Right, you're the face of what has happened.

SPEAKER_01 35:43

Yes, and I'll I I've got a story for that. But once I'm all said and done, and I know I did everything I was supposed to. One thing the Marine Corps does in their CACO guide, that checklist is phenomenal. It tells you exactly what you need to do. The only thing it doesn't prepare you for is the emotional part of doing it, of doing the notification and all the follow-up and follow through and so forth. But you you feel proud afterwards that you know you did what you needed to do. You you did it with uh honor and integrity, and you gave it the attention it deserved because the family deserves it. Because you can't help but think, what if this was my family? Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 36:26

What if someone came to my door and if I find out some screw up just you know, kind of you know being oh yeah, it's one of those things that you you you it doesn't matter who you are, you know this is something you have to take seriously and right.

SPEAKER_01 36:42

Yeah, the the dignity that you want to have during it, that you know, you always I always refer to the the the decease as their first name, like you know, Michael will be flown in on this date and he'll arrive at this location and and we can meet him there. Like on the first one for the first remains, he was flown in the CTAC and the airport was wonderful, allowing us in through one of the side gates. We got the hearse in there. But the pilot when the plane pulled up, the pilot wouldn't let any of the passengers off. He said that there had to be a dignified transfer. But I had to actually climb into the cargo hold. I'm in uniform because the coffin was covered with cardboard and plastic to protect it. So I was in there cutting it and get all off. And then we once we got it on the little conveyor belt, it had the American flag already on it, and we walked it to the hearse, and up in the passenger terminal was just wall-to-wall people staring at us. Wow. And it was really when I look up, I'm going, oh my God, look at all the attention we're getting right now. So for people who don't understand this, you know, if they see what look looks like a screw up or just you know something haphazard, they're gonna remember that. Yeah, they are really it's it's it's in our best interest to do it and do it right, even though we're really not trained for it. A lot of this, as I said, is a collateral duty. So we we would get the the circoph the coffin to the hearse, push it in, and the two parents who were divorced were there, and you know, I waved them over, and the uh the the mom just collapsed. Oh, it was oh, it was so sad. And the father picked her up and we're able to, you know, kind of get everything controlled and get it placed, and you know, it was time to leave. But you know, as we're leaving, we're looking up at the passenger terminals because they're all just glass, and everyone is looking at us, and it's just like, oh my god, look at all the attention. So, you know, if something went wrong, the first bullet was coming at me. I can I can guarantee that. But you know, you have to make sure it doesn't happen. And thankfully, there were never any screw-ups, even though the one person in Florida felt we did because we we screwed up the notification. Well, I'm sorry, the parents were divorced, the father remarried, and none of them were home when we got there because you don't call in, hey, you home? Who's this? Never mind. It's like right. No, no, you have to show up. It we show up cold, and it's and that's how it hits the family. And it's just it's miserable. I felt miserable, I'd feel miserable for days, but afterwards, I I felt proud.

SPEAKER_03 39:19

You felt proud that you did it. Yeah, did it did it have a lasting impact though, like weeks and months later, would you start to just think about it or ruminate over it? I mean, how did it impact you?

SPEAKER_01 39:28

I would still it would still be in my mind because I would make sure that my uniform was kept in a ready state after wearing it for all that, because you didn't know when you're gonna get called again. I would review certain aspects of it to make sure, okay, you know what? I need to make sure I give this part a little bit more due attention or read up on this more, but especially on some of the benefits because people are gonna ask you, like, well, you know, what is this benefit you're telling me? What does that mean? And you try to explain it as much, never make something up. And if you don't know, it's like, I'll I'll get back, I'll get you the answer on that. I will let you know. And sometimes I I've had the parents just call me out of the blue, and then I was for part of a follow-up on one, I actually had to hand off for a couple of days because my wife had a baby, but the father called me and I and he says, Oh, I was just gonna call. I was like, Well, let me call this person, he can get you the answer. I'm I'm out at the army hospital right now. He's like, Why? I was like, Oh, my wife just had a baby, and he felt bad that he called me. But I told him to listen, if you need to call me, he had my personal cell. You call me at any time, it doesn't matter, what no matter what I'm doing. And he appreciated that because you know, he just lost his son, but then he kind of felt bad that he was interfering with the birth of one of my children, but but but he wasn't, and and it it was sad, and you know, when when that happens, like you you start to empathize differently with them. That here here I am celebrating while they're in mourning, right? It's kind of a juxtaposition of yes, the emotional struggle is is overwhelming at times because it it it consumes you, especially when you're like, God, another one.

SPEAKER_03 41:13

Yeah, right. And you just know you know what you're walking into, and you know it's going to be painful, and you know you're gonna be delivering the worst news that that person will receive in their entire life. I mean, it there's just nothing that compares to that.

SPEAKER_01 41:31

In my 24 years, it was the worst. I mean, I deployed, I was in Iraq in 04 in Baghdad when the insurgency started, and you know, it was hell's bells, and that was bad, and that's a different kind of of bad. Uh, but then doing this, it just it was oh, it it it just sucks the life out of you, it really does. And if it doesn't impact you, then uh as far as something wrong with you, there is something wrong if this isn't bothering you, because many times I would picture that that's my family, so that was a little bit extra motivation. Where if someone showed her the house and they and they you know they literally screwed up, you know, how would how would that make me feel? I'd be furious, right? Oh, yeah, it's such an important job. Yep, and you know, one of them I ran into the mom out in town for one of these notifications, and it was really awkward. We kind of ran into other it's like, oh hello, uh, how's things? Things are good. How you been? Um, I've been good. And then it's like, okay, we'll see you later. But um just afterwards, you're like, oh my god, I had to walk in here today because you you just don't want to, you don't want the reminder. But we had another one where again, I'll never fault someone for how they react. I I swear the mom had daggers for me because I was the I'm the one who notified her. And and I don't falter because she is I think she was associating her son's death with me because since I'm the one who who did the actual notification, and it's just it it was a horrible feeling. I was like, Oh my god, this woman hates me. I I just I want to leave. Please someone get me out of this room right now.

SPEAKER_03 43:14

And it was just oh what made you decide all these years later? I mean, when was when did this duty end? What year?

SPEAKER_01 43:21

I served this duty from 2006 to 2009. Okay, so this was yeah, so starting 20 years ago.

SPEAKER_03 43:29

Yeah, yeah.

Why He Wrote About It

SPEAKER_03 43:30

So my key now, that's my curiosity about this. What made you decide, A, to write about it and B to wait so long to write about it?

SPEAKER_01 43:38

When I retired in late 2018, two funeral details I had to perform kind of sparked this. I I've always kind of wanted to tell tell the story because you don't usually hear too many of these stories. You normally hear about veteran stories about their their problems to get back into society. Transitioning, getting benefits, other things like that. PTSD, PTSD, fighting with the VA. Sure. I'll admit I never had any issues with the VA, and I'm very glad for that.

SPEAKER_03 44:11

Me neither so far.

SPEAKER_01 44:12

Yeah, so I I've been I've been very uh grateful for that.

SPEAKER_03 44:16

Very thankful for the Blocks E VA. I've had good service as well.

SPEAKER_01 44:21

But I I when I wrote the first one about the funeral details, it was about these two details that were just so opposite of each other, where the woman who showed up for her father's funeral didn't cry until she saw all of us because she hadn't been around, she grew up on Marine Corps bases, but she hadn't been on a base for like 30 years. And then she saw all we were the most Marines she'd ever seen in 30 years. And she she got upset and she she started crying. And the other one was where one of the sons stood away from the funeral. He wouldn't, he wouldn't stay graveside because apparently his father ran his house like he was like he ran the Marine Corps with his unit, and he had a he never reconciled it. So after writing that, I wanted to write, I was like, well, you know, I did those casualty notifications. And while nothing I did, what I did wasn't unique at all. Many other people have done it, and they all have their experiences. I'm not gonna say mine was any better or worse, but these were my experiences, and I wanted to put them out there so that people can get an understanding of this. Because I don't know if you recall, I think it was 2004. There was a story came out and a movie was made called Taking Chance with Kevin Bacon. And when I retired, I I was thinking about that and I was like, and that kind of spurred me to write the funeral details. And I was like, you know what, I need to do the casualty notifications. And and Warhorse, you know, I'm so grateful for them. Uh I wish the casualty notification could have been longer, but I was restricted by words because it it really had more, my original story had a much more emotional impact. I really got down into the details of just having people collapse on me, cry, chase me out of the house, watching people up in the passenger terminals, having 300 firefighters show up on McCord Air Force Base for when the Marine arrives. Because when during that, when he arrived, his father and his father's friend, who was still active duty, flew from Dover, Delaware, all the way to Washington State. And we met him out on the tarmac. Uh, the hearse was there. Um, and again, I felt very proud because how many people were there, they were watching us, and it and it really went seamless. The Marines I was with, we we it was it went really well. One of the things that was weird when we got to McCord, Fort Lewis and McCord are our joined bases, but we had to go around on Route 5 to get into the main gate with the Hearse and our vehicles. And we had to go through, we had to go inside, we had to get this passed. You know what can you like to get on bases at times? It's it's never really fluid, especially if it's an unregistered vehicle, an unregistered military vehicle like a civilian hearse. So once we got all that taken care of, it was during the lunch rush. So as we're pulling out, I'm I'm there in my uniform. I just go out and I block traffic while I'm directing all our cars to go in, and then you know, people start seeing the hearse, and I think they realize why we were there, that we were there to retrieve someone. You know, we're getting kind of these looks like what why is this marine stopping traffic? Who who is he to do that? And then they see the hearse, and I kind of jump in that the last vehicle to get in there for that. So I wanted to, like I said, I wanted to write something that gave the emotional impact, but at the same time, the feeling of pride you have, where what you represent to the families, to the nation, to the to the rest of the Marine Corps is something that wants to be people want to emulate, that they they want to think about because 20, 25 years from now, I never want them to look back and say, boy, those Marines were a bunch of clowns. You see, remember that that idiot who showed up at our house, rah, rah, rah, rah. I never what would want that. I I would just if I if I were to know something like that happened, I would just be devastated to this day, saying, I'd never want to show my face in public.

SPEAKER_03 48:07

Yeah, I mean, that that would stick with you for the rest of your life. I mean, if you had a bad experience with it with a casualty assistance officer, I mean, it would, it would, it would just, it, it just compounds the devastation. It's kind of like the moral injury thing where I talk about when you already have a bad thing happen to you in the military, and then the military covers it up or they retaliate or they do something to to just make it worse, they just compound the hurt instead of and that's that's what this would have, that's what that would have done is if it's not carried out properly or in a way that's dignified, it just compounds an already extremely volatile and traumatic situation. So that's why it's so important to get it right and do it. And the more we talk about it, the more I do realize that I think it is important to have a military member do it. Now, that the challenge does become what what support do we give to the people who are performing this duty? The military, to their credit, does do quite well in in terms of providing various counseling services. So service members who who are doing this duty and who are struggling with it do have access to people that they can talk to. But I mean, to carry this kind of grief, I know this even just my time as a podcaster. Some of the stories that come to the show and some of the cases that I follow, and I get updates. I stay pretty involved in a lot of a lot of the cases of people who have appeared on this podcast and then where their cases are and who you know how things are going today. And it can it can be really sad. It can be so sad to see somebody blood dry fighting a legal case and just constantly not getting anywhere, but still running up exorbital fees, for an example. And it's just it makes it very, very tragic and and very hard, hard to handle. When you look back on it, what would you say is probably the case that of all the of the six cases that you did, which one do you think stands out the most and and why?

SPEAKER_01 50:13

I think to me, always the first one, because it was the one that really left its mark on me. All of them were were unique, some weren't as like we had one uh to answer, probably the first one for sure. The one where the I had to go into Seattle to find the father and you know, having all the firefighters there. I mean, just a massive crowd of people. You you see that the support and everything that's out there. So they they all hit me in a different way. You know, father chasing me out of the house on one, it's like, you know, some of these things you just can't make up happening. But that first one, you know, the parents were divorced. I mean, everything that could that could have really gone wrong and worse could have happened with that because you know, the parents were divorced, divorced, father remarried, you know, the the the marine was flown into CTAC, you know, where they're getting the coffin out of the car. We were getting the coffin out of the cargo hold, not the airport staff, having all people up in the passenger terminal staring at us, and then actually performing the funeral uh for that. And you know, before we did the seven-gun salute, we warned everyone, hey, this is gonna be loud, but it's still shocking.

SPEAKER_03 51:28

Oh, it it's it's what it what tell tell people that don't aren't familiar. What is that salute?

SPEAKER_01 51:33

You you there's a known as a 21-gun salute where seven riflemen will give a salute at the end of the service to someone and and they're they're firing blanks, but it's very, very loud. There's no suppressors on the ends of the barrels. So we we would warn them, or we'd have the chaplain or pastor, whoever's giving the service, say, Hey, you know, now there's going to be a military salute with rifles to conclude the ceremony, and we'd call out and the rifles would go off, and the the impact of you know, just the noise would hit someone, you'd that you'd see them squinch down and it it hurt, and it kind of gives it a little bit of finality too. Sure. And and it's just to send a message we were here, you know, we're we're gonna remember you, we're gonna do everything we can to make this as uh easy of a situation for you as possible by by by rendering a proper military honors. Um and and it's it's not easy. Believe me, it is not easy, even though it sounds pretty simple to line up and fire, just because you you see the family there, and it's just it's just miserable because we all and I'm sure going through the Marines who were there in their heads, what if this was me over there? What if I'm the one sitting there next to them watching this? And you know, like those thoughts always go through my head. And and there was a pretty good crowd for that one. And it was it was very upsetting. Actually, the the sister of the deceased, she was she was a a Navy ROTC at the time and she was out out on board a ship. So she ended up being flown back and um and she arrived and she was busted open uh when she got to the funeral. Two of her friends had to pretty much carry her in. Wow. Yeah, it was awful. It was just absolutely tragic. Um go ahead.

SPEAKER_03 53:23

I was just gonna say, do you think it's also changed your relationship with your family?

SPEAKER_01 53:27

Like Yeah, at the end of each take, you know, I'd get home and and I'm spent because I'm just my mind is mush. And my wife would always greet me. Um and I appreciated that. And I I just needed to sit down, take off the uniform, and just and just decompress because it's just I just felt so overwhelmed that I gotta go back tomorrow and do this again. Right. And so when I wrote both of them, I told my kids about it. I said, hey girls, because they're older now. My oldest is 26, my youngest are 17. Um I it's six girls. So I told them, hey girls, you know, um I wrote about some experiences, and and you girls were really young because when this started happening, my oldest was only six years old. So they don't really remember any of this over those three years. And you know, they appreciated and they're like, Oh, we never knew you felt that way. You know, we we appreciate you, Daddy. I'm like, oh right, right. So the the the impact, I mean, it's like I said, it's still impacting me today. And and when I retired, I I wanted to write this, and it obviously took a few years before I finally put pen to paper and decided to write the funeral detail. And then I was like, you know what, I want to do the casualty, but unfortunately, I couldn't put everything in it because I was limited for for by word count. So I, you know, I I expressed as much as I could in it, just to, you know, I I wanted to put the story out there that while some stories have come out about this stuff, you you just don't normally hear about it. It's it's all the other items that we already met, we spoke about momentarily uh momentarily ago.

SPEAKER_03 55:05

It's an aspect of of military life that really doesn't get discussed. We talk about people being killed in action, we talk about, like I say, veteran disability, we talk about transitioning, we talk about mental health. There's a lot of issues within the veteran community that get discussed, but casualty notification is not one of them. No, and it's just not, and it happens probably almost every day, right? It sort of reminds me of like the veterans' homes. Like, no, like there's no podcast out there that talks about the services that are provided to veterans as they age. Yeah, and I and I find that fascinating. Like, we just we there's an entire aspect of of the VA, uh, I think it's called funeral services or burial services, and it deals with all the different national cemeteries. Yeah, and and then, of course, the VA has aid in attendance services and care. I was just speaking to a gentleman today at the chamber, for an example, at a chamber ribbon cutting, and he works for a company that provides companionship and other tasks around the house for people that want to stay in their homes instead of going to a nursing home. And he was telling me that there, that the VA's aid in attendance benefit will pay his company. And I thought, yeah, and I thought, wow, those are just like things that people don't really talk about. Like in when it comes to the veterans, and I think it's also just a function of social media and the fact that the most of the people who are on social media are either people like myself who are Gen Xers or there's millennials. So the veteran era, I mean, Vietnam veteran era veteran, or let's even say the Gulf War veteran, those people usually aren't using these tools. They're not, they're not on the podcast, they're not, they're not, they're not a lot of times doing these things. So we don't really hear a lot about the services and the benefits and the things that they're that that are available to them or that them or that are provided. And and casualty notification and death benefits while on active duty, those are just not things that that get discussed too much. And I'm and I'm really it's really unfortunate because I can tell you that the survivor benefit plan took me by surprise. I had former spouse coverage that I didn't know about. And it's only because when we updated my divorce decree, my husband didn't bother to to let them know that he was no longer taking a cut. And it wasn't on purpose. He just he he made a claim to it when we divorced and then didn't bother to update it. And I didn't know, I didn't understand what the SPP was. So I was getting charged 500 bucks a month for about four months, and I was really worried that I was gonna be paying into some, I mean something that my husband and I don't want, and I just kept at it with DFAS over and over and over again, trying to get that reimbursed. And and thankfully, after about six months, I got a reimbursement and did not have to pay into it anymore. But that but but if I'd been educated about SBP throughout my military career and known that I was automatically opted into it, you know, without my permission, by the way, like this isn't anything I signed for to say that I knew about or anything. I mean, that's a whole nother podcast, but but it's because it's just not discussed.

What Culture Avoids Talking About

SPEAKER_03 58:24

Like we we have this adversion to death in our society, and so there's a lot of hard conversations that about dying that we just want to stay away from. And of course, on the Stories of Service podcast, I love talking about hard issues, and so I will not stay away from these issues. In fact, I will lean into them as far as I can go so that we can one day have these kinds of conversations, just like the one we're having today. As you're looking over your notes, is there anything else that I didn't bring up during this call that you'd like a chance to tell our audience about? I want to give you that opportunity just to take a look and not leave anything on the table because this is such an important topic. And it is unfortunate that not more shows take it on and more people don't have the opportunity to talk about the death process. And I and I think this may be something I'll even lean even further in as as time goes by because it's so important.

SPEAKER_01 59:20

Um, just that by doing these, I learned a lot about the Marine Corps, their benefits, and the VA benefits that became available. So kind of really by accident, I I found out about a lot of things, especially like the educational benefits that my family would be entitled to, even if I didn't pass. This is the fact that I retired or have a certain VA disability rating. That these casualty notifications, while hard, uh are are very necessary, doing them right is necessary. And I think the Marine Corps uh, as I mentioned earlier, that did does a great job with their echo guide and giving the list of what to do and in the order that it needs to be done. Now, sometimes circumstances may move that around a little bit, but you you just adjust uh on that. But I think it's just it's it's an unfortunate and uh the uh the mindset of oh I have to do this, I'm gonna do it well, I'm gonna do it right because the family deserves it and that they need to be treated with the respect and dignity they deserve. And at the end, you can feel proud about it, but I never set out to do this job. I had no idea I was gonna be doing it when I was a got the my duty orders to this location. I just like people to know that because normally you don't hear about notifications, you might see stuff in movies and the the movie notification, how they portray it, usually makes me mad. Especially when they show them how they're they're which uniform they're wearing, you know, they're walking information up to the door, you know, side by side, right? Goose stepping, and I'm like, I was like, oh, come on, that's not how they do it. Right. Or they're just very like a drone uh, I am so and so, we're here to tell you, blah, blah, blah.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:09

It's like, no, you talk to them like you're a human being, like a human being, like every like they're just making it over dramatic and they're hyping it up for the cameras, but that's not really how sacred takes place.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:22

And it just makes me angry. I'm like going, man, that it's such a bad representation of something that's just so important. Yeah, and it's not like this is gonna end at any time. People die on active duty orders, whether it's by accident, a medical emergency, combat operations, or whatnot, that you know, you still gotta treat the family the same way and go through all the steps. And it's just it's hard. And people who've done this job, they know exactly what I'm talking about. They they know the physical and mental toll it takes on you. And then, like I said, one day I I decided to express it. I I wish I could have put more in. Then I found your your your name on LinkedIn one day, and I'm how you how your name popped up on my feed, I have no idea. Whatever voodoo algorithm LinkedIn has, you you drop down. I was like, oh, you know, maybe here's here's my chance.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:15

Well, it blows my mind how people find me. I had a case about four months ago where an army father, he a retiree, lives in the Philippines. His friend was doing a chat GPT search on pod military podcasters who are either whistleblowers or speak truth to power or whatever. And somehow through a chat GPT search, my podcast came up. And oh my god, I mean, his story was very similar to yours in that it's just nothing anyone ever talks about. And it was about the business of organ removal and how the father swears up and down that it was a known family policy that nobody in their family was an organ donor. And the hospital produced some document that to this day, Keone, the father, does not think, or Eddie, sorry, Keone's the son, who Eddie thinks is not a legitimate document, and tried his best to keep his son alive, and doesn't trust the brain death test, doesn't trust the hospital's determination that there that his son was brain dead, and thought that he had a chance to survive. But it's a pretty contested issue, and it's it's when playing out through various courts and injunctions and other things, and I had no idea there was a whole movement around it and advocacy over it. But he's the first known case I know of where it's hit a military family, and so that was that was a fascinating topic, but again, just somebody, I mean, randomly found me. It wasn't because I did any, I was, you know, in his circles or we had mutual friends, or I had, you know, nothing, nothing like that. Just somebody who knew him who was doing some searches on his behalf found me, and that's how I got the show. But I'm so glad you did reach out to me, and I'm glad you got a chance to expand some of these stories and kind of bring them out into a little bit more texture and color, because this is such an important topic and that deserves attention. And people need to know why we do it, they need to know how to do it, they need to understand how important it is, and they need to know the toll that it takes on the people who are not only on the people that have to get this terrible notification, but the toll that it takes on the people who are entrusted to do this duty. And so what you've done today, Chris, is that you're not just speaking for you, you're speaking for every caco that's ever had to do this duty. And you're saying, I understand you, I appreciate you.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:56

Yep, yeah. And again, I I appreciate the time you took to invite me on. And uh, like I said, I'm not gonna say my experiences were any better or worse than anyone else's, but if you've done these, you know you can absolutely understand and empathize with exactly what I've talked about and some of the crazy situations, whether you've done one, you've done six, or you've done more than that. Um, and I'm sure some people have done more. Like I said, at our site, we did 24 total in three years. Wow. So we have one every other on average, like every other month. And it was just it can just be overwhelming. And but when you do it, you got to do it right. Yep. And the train, no, and no amount of training beforehand is really gonna prepare you. It's really not. What it does, it familiarizes you with the with the guidebook and the checklist of what you need to do. It's the emotional aspect of knocking on that door, whether it's 5 a.m. like I did one time, or the middle of the day on some of the others. And it's just or on a cruise ship, on a cruise ship that's stocked in Canada, which is which I just I still can't get over that. When I tell people that they just laugh at me, and I'm like, I had to do it. Yeah, I had to I had to intercept a cruise ship in Victoria, Canada, and then go up to the upper cabin areas, and that was the first time I've ever been on a cruise ship. I don't know why so many people on those things. But uh yeah, we did it, and it it was crazy going to Canada to do one. I'll never forget it. I mean, I'll never forget any of these, but that's just one of the ones where I just shake my head as like, wow, Canada to do one.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:32

Yeah, it's

Final Takeaways And Goodbye

SPEAKER_03 1:06:33

pretty crazy. Well, thank you so much, Chris. I appreciate you taking the time to come on the Story as a Service podcast. I'm gonna go full screen and say goodbye to the audience, but I'll also say goodbye to you backstage real quick. So please hang on the line. But thank you again.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:46

Thank you.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:48

All right, guys, that's a wrap. Thank you so much for taking the time to join the Stories of Service podcast. I have a show pretty much about once a week right now for the next few weeks for the summer. But I hope you guys are enjoying the hot heat. I know there's a lot of heat going on here in Mississippi. I think we're getting into the 90s, upper 80s most days. Thank God we have a water park pass that's been very enjoyable for these last couple months. But please take care of yourselves. Please take care of each other, and I will see y'all later. Bye bye now.