My name is Cindy Stivers.
I joined the United States Marine Corps in 1990 and I was in there for four years.
I came from a rural area of Missouri.
Where am I going to get the money to go to college?
And I was a young individual that wasn't quite ready to go to college, so what am I going to do with my life?
And I looked at the military to kind of give me kind of some structure some direction to
Where am I going to go? I'm not going to be staying working at a local restaurant for the rest of my life.
I served in Yuma, Arizona; I was with the Air Wing.
And then I went to El Toro, California, and I was with the F-18s.
My parents were very supportive 'cause if this is something that I wanted to do
they knew I wasn't ready for college, but yet I was going to go somewhere and I was going to do something and I was going to go forward.
And I picked the Marine Corps because I wanted a challenge.
I think the biggest challenge that I had to adjust to was the unknown of what was going to happen at the last minute.
And to learn to adjust and overcome.
I am a very well-planned-out person in that when I joined the Marine Corps
everything just kinda changes.
A woman is a minority in the Marine Corps, so you are treated differently
and so it opens your eyes coming from a small town of 5,000.
I was a 6046 Maintenance Administration Aviation Clerk, which I took care of the log books of the F-18s.
So if something happened to one of the aircraft, they came knocking at my door for those log books
to make sure that we were up to maintenance speed on that.
I was able to do a lot of traveling. I went to Japan and Korea, Alaska and so we did several deployments.
We were a smaller unit so it was a family going together
and you came back together as a family.
Even though, technically we're not blood related, but you do. You're six months away from your family so you make your own family.
My family is from Missouri and I was living in Arizona and California and deploying oversees. And so that became my family.
I was ready to go to college to continue on with my education and so that's why I got out.
I had no idea all the different benefits out there for Veterans
because when you get that magic day that you're going to be coming back home
you're more worried about, where am I gonna get my job?
What am I gonna do now? Where am I gonna get my money?
Where What direction Even though I knew I was gonna go to school,
how am I gonna live? How am I gonna
And I was one of those that came back and luckily I had a family that supported me.
But that was the only benefit that I knew was the education.
About 10 years ago I started working for the State of Missouri, for the state Veterans Cemeteries.
And started getting a little knowledge of all the different benefits and becoming an advocate for the veterans.
I became a Veterans Service Officer so I worked for the Veterans to help them be aware of the different benefits.
And then I just recently took on the position as a Woman Veterans Program Manager at a local V.A. health care to advocate for those women Veterans
to use the V.A. health care to understand the network of the different benefits out there and the network of the different sisterhoods that we have out there.
In the military you didn't have a choice of which provider you wanted to go to.
You didn't have a choice and you sat there all day.
And as a younger Veteran, when you have a work schedule, you can't miss a whole day at work.
And so I never utilized the V.A. health care because I didn't think it would work for me
or work for my schedule.
And to understand that not only can they take care of my general needs
but they can take care of my personal needs too as far as female issues.
I just didn't think they were interested; I didn't think that they could help me
and so I see that as a whole new generation of the providers taking an interest in taking care of women Veterans
because that's what's coming aboard.
I was one of those women Veterans that, where I go to, I was unique.
They would have to call and find out, you know, how do I do a mammogram for her?
She's so young. But you know I had wonderful providers that would call and find out.
And I was, I don't want to say a guinea pig, but they did a lot of things that they never did at that particular clinic because I was a younger generation.
And I hope to see a lot more women Veterans coming to the V.A. or coming back to see it is a great health care system
that does have everything to offer for them.
And if not, we're gonna find out how to make it better for them.
It was my grandfather's health care, but it's my health care too.
And so it's the whole view of it changing.