Lone Survivor Foundation

So i wanted to talk a little about why the Lone Survivor foundation was chosen as a charity to support. From the time that I can remember, I wanted nothing more than to serve in the military when I grew up. Ask anyone who knew me even from elementry school, and they would tell you that. It was somewhere around 6th grade, or in Jr high that I found out about the SEALs. Maybe it was because of the movie, or something, but when I found out about SEALs, I knew that I would be one. For me, it was just a matter of time. When I was 13, I was finally old enough to join the Sea Cadets. It's a youth organization sponsored by the Navy, that shows kids 13-17 what Navy life would be like. We met one weekend a month, and had opportunities to do 2 week trainings over the summer on various military bases, and naval ships. I spent almost 5 full years in the Sea Cadets, and loved every minute of it! Some of my 2 week trainings included: Boot camp, USN recruit station, USS David R Rey (destroyer) 2 different Coast Guard trainings, one at USCG station Channel Islands, and the other aboard an 81' Cutter. I also did SeaBee training at Port Hueneme California. I worked hard, learned a ton and had a blast! I rose to the rank of Chief Petty Officer, and lead my Sea Cadet Unit (Trident Patrol Sqn 65).
The one training that I was unable to participate in was the SEAL training. This was extremely disappointing to me, but it was based on things outside of my control. The navy canceled both sessions of the SEAL training that I had qualified for because of deployment conflicts with the teams and our scheduled training dates. I say qualified to go because for almost every other training with the Sea Cadets, it was simply filling out the forms and submitting the paperwork. If yours got in before it closed up, then the training was yours. But that's not how it was for the SEALs training. For SEALs, you had to do a day long physical agility test to prove that you could hack it. It included a distance run, pull up, push up and sit ups, and the pool test. The pool test consisted of a distance swim, along with a timed event of treading water. The treading water event included keeping your arms above you head with your elbows out of the water. It was tough, but I passed and was ready to tackle to the challenge that lay before me. But, like I said, it was canceled both times. After that, they just stopped putting the SEAL training on the list.
My senior year of high school, I tried to enlist in the Navy. I thought that it would be the first step in my career as a SEAL. My written ASVAB score was good, and I chose to enlist as a Corpsman (medic) and go to BUD/S (Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL). The problem was my hearing. I knew from the 5th grade that I was partially deaf in one ear. Yes, it was bad enough to get me a hearing aid, but I didn't think that it would be bad enough to keep me out of the military. Unfortunately for me, it was. The news was heart breaking to me, the one thing in life that I wanted to do was now unobtainable. It would of been different for me if I got to BUD/S and dropped out, or got injured and couldn't complete the course. I didn't even get a chance to prove myself.
Since even before the rejection by the Navy, the special operations community, and SEALs in particular, have held a special place in my heart. When I heard about the Lone Survivor Foundation, I thought that this would be a fitting way to help out where I could.
I remember the day that I heard the news about what would be known as Operation Redwing, and the SEALs that were MIA. When I got my hands on the Lone Survivor Book, I couldn't put it down. Now, that Marcus has this foundation to help fellow service members, I thought that there must be something that I can do to help them. So here it is, the Race To Robie Creek.