{"id":84966,"date":"2019-02-12T12:49:39","date_gmt":"2019-02-12T16:49:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=84966"},"modified":"2022-01-13T20:32:28","modified_gmt":"2022-01-14T01:32:28","slug":"the-loss-of-chief-petty-officer-kent-guest-post-by-denise-williams","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=84966","title":{"rendered":"The Loss of Chief Petty Officer Kent – Guest post by Denise Williams"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Denise Williams is one of our Gold Star Moms.\u00a0 One of the privileges I get to enjoy from being part of TAH is the friendships that are developed.\u00a0 \u00a0I admire Denise most for her intestinal\u00a0fortitude and unimaginable ability to see beyond her own grief.\u00a0 \u00a0She sends us this post:<\/p>\n

I need to preface everything else with my deepest condolences for the family of CPO Shannon Kent.Nothing, ever, will equal the pain they feel today. It doesn\u2019t go away, it doesn\u2019t really get easier, but it does get softer and the jagged edges of your heart become less sharp in time.<\/p>\n

Grief is a tsunami that obliterates the ground beneath your feet. Like a tsunami, even if you survive the\u00a0initial onslaught, the very landscape of your world is gone, drowned beneath the waves and\u00a0unrecognizable even after it recedes. Like a tsunami, it is not one wave, but repeats seemingly endlessly.\u00a0When the ground is finally dry, when the ocean calms, you\u2019re surprised to find some of those jaggededges of your broken heart have been worn smooth by the same force that shattered it.\u00a0 It becomes bearable.<\/p>\n

Nothing you do right now can make it better.\u00a0 All you can do is hold on to whatever lifeline you can\u00a0grasp. But there are some things that can make it worse later. I\u2019ll get back to that in a moment.<\/p>\n

I understand the pain, frustration and normal human reaction of wanting someone to blame, of looking\u00a0to hold someone responsible, of crying out \u201cIt wasn\u2019t supposed to happen this way\u201d.<\/p>\n

The one and only reason I never succumbed to this line of thinking is just what others have pointed out\u2026If it weren\u2019t my loss, it would be someone else\u2019s.<\/p>\n

Who am I to say that mine didn\u2019t deserve to die, but someone else\u2019s did?\u00a0 Mine was the most incredible,\u00a0wonderful, loved creature ever put on this earth. He had a future, a bright, fantastic future and if only\u2026what? How is that any different than every other mother feels about their own child?\u00a0Should some other mother\u2019s heart be irreparably shattered, and that would somehow be just or fair? I\u00a0don\u2019t want this, so how could I wish it on another?<\/p>\n

I understand, truly, the pain. But I also understand a few other things the family of CPO Kent can\u2019t. Who\u00a0is this family? Her father is a high-ranking New York State police o8cer. Her husband is a retired special\u00a0forces soldier of 20 years. They both should understand a few things, but I know that when the pain is\u00a0this raw it is very hard, and to most people it is forgivable they don\u2019t understand or rather, forget what\u00a0they know.<\/p>\n

As a 20-year combat veteran, it\u2019s nearly a guarantee that Joe Kent lost men, and s$ll grieves brothers in\u00a0arms. The same is probably true of a ranking police officer. When those losses are because of bad policy\u00a0or command decisions, the loss turns to rage.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s certain they have knocked back a few over the years thinking of the waste due to stupid rules of\u00a0engagement seemingly designed to get good people killed by bureaucrats with no front-line experience.\u00a0Inevitably, by the time they sip the last drops from the glass, the thought that is a comfort only those\u00a0who have been there, done that, understand is said with both resignation and admiration, \u201cYeah, but\u00a0they knew what they risked, and did it anyway. Until Valhalla\u201d.<\/p>\n

In the immediate aftermath of an operation gone bad, good commanders both police and military, set\u00a0about the most important task of examining what happened, what went wrong, and what can be done\u00a0to prevent it from happening again. Sometimes, too often, everything went right but the wrong thing\u00a0still happened. Someone died. The task of every mission and objective, even if not overtly stated, is\u00a0always the same\u2026get the job done and bring everyone home. If every other part of the mission was\u00a0completed and the objective reached, the mission may be a technical success but is still ultimately a fail, because that most important component was not achieved. Everyone knew the risks, everyone\u00a0understands that no ma+er how well planned and executed, it is possible not everyone will come home.\u00a0Yet, they do it anyway.<\/p>\n

Those who bear the loss are consoled by these words. They are bracketed and held upright by the honor\u00a0and respect shown their loved one by their brothers and sisters. That support will be there for them as\u00a0long as the memory of their loved one\u2019s loss haunts those who served with them. In other words,\u00a0forever. But, they may not see or feel that support in the future because of what they did or said while\u00a0in the grip of the pain and rage of their loss. No one holds it against the mother who screams at those\u00a0tasked to deliver the words, \u201cMa\u2019am, it is my sad duty to inform you\u2026\u201d. No one faults her if she pushes them o5 her porch, launches herself at them or slams the door in their faces, as if she can make the words and their presence not real. There is less grace given, however, when says, \u201cIt should have been you\u201d, or \u201cIt is your fault\u201d. When those statements are made, or ac$ons are taken weeks, months or\u00a0years later, it is no longer something said in the shock of grief, it is a character statement. And it is\u00a0remembered.<\/p>\n

Now, that loved one won\u2019t feel the support of the honor and respect carried in the hearts of those who\u00a0served alongside the one they lost. The brothers and sisters who want to share the load the family\u00a0carries can\u2019t go to them to remind them their loved one is remembered, because they are being blamed\u00a0both for that family\u2019s pain as well as their own. They too are grieving, and the ones with whom they\u00a0most need to share, the ones who will benefit most from that sharing, have rejected them. As the years\u00a0unfurl, knowing others share your loss, feeling that bond with others, is what soothes those jagged edges\u00a0of the broken heart like nothing else. It literally is the lifeline you will come to rely on when the\u00a0unexpected rogue wave of grief washes over you and threatens to tear you from your moorings.<\/p>\n

It is sadly too common that when one service member dies in battle, they are not the only casualty.\u00a0When one family\u2019s loss is trumpeted in the media, when one family\u2019s loss is the lead story on every\u00a0newscast, the impact on the other families can\u2019t be described. Not only is one family saying it shouldn\u2019t\u00a0have been their loved one, the implicit message is the other family\u2019s loss is deserved. Their loved one is\u00a0just as dead. Their grief is just as raw. And there loved one doesn\u2019t even matter enough to be named.\u00a0They are just one of the \u201cothers who died\u201d. If not for the title of this piece, without looking it up or\u00a0scanning to the end, could you name the \u201cother\u201d service member? How about the DoD civilian or the\u00a0private contractor? It is almost understandable that you can\u2019t name the Syrian civilians killed, but it is to our collective shame and the shame of the media their names aren\u2019t at least mentioned.<\/p>\n

I am sad over the future lack of support I fear the family of CPO Shannon Kent will experience in the\u00a0future. They truly cannot even begin to grasp the magnitude of what they will experience. While that\u00a0breaks my heart, I am more sad and heartbroken over the apparent lack of support for the families of\u00a0Army CWO2 Jonathan R. Farmer, DoD civilian Scott A. Wirtz and the civilian contractor whose name I haven\u2019t been able to find anywhere. Please know, it shouldn\u2019t have been your loved one either. It\u00a0shouldn\u2019t have been anyone. But it is war, and people die in war. Please be comforted in the knowledge\u00a0they are remembered, they are honored, they knew what they were doing and did it anyway. It is a cold,\u00a0hard comfort but your loved one\u2019s legacy will not be a+ached to a change in policy that makes some\u00a0losses greater than others.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Denise Williams is one of our Gold Star Moms.\u00a0 One of the privileges I get to … The Loss of Chief Petty Officer Kent – Guest post by Denise Williams<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":667,"featured_media":84967,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[332],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-84966","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-guest-post"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84966","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/667"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=84966"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84966\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/84967"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=84966"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=84966"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=84966"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}