I have always loved my family, my Country, my God, and my faith. After graduating High School in 1999 I had a huge wake up call of how to pay for college. Not wanting to compete in applying for scholarships, I decided to join the Utah Army National Guard as a Combat Engineer. I primarily picked my MOS, so I could see my family on the weekends that I had drill. I served an LDS mission during my IRR time to Chile, during which time 9/11/01 occurred and when I came home my unit was deployed. I served about an 18 month deployment to Iraq from Feb 2003-May 2004, spending most of my time in Baghdad. For the most part I loved serving with my fellow soldiers in Iraq. The closest near death experience I had, was an IED hit the first vehicle on our convoy back to Baghdad airport. It hit an uparmored hummer, I was in a soft shell hummer in the 2nd vehicle. My unit did not have armored plates until after being in Iraq for about 4 months (or so?). I was in the 1457 unit attached to the 1AD. I know for some miracle I was preserved from death that day. My heart went out to the soldiers who were wounded, missing fingers, etc. We thought one would lose an eye. My greatest challenge came in 2010 when I started Graduate school for an MSW, with 2 kids, a part time job at UPS, school Full time, church full time, big research project, and other challenges I was neglecting my family. My life was a mess and I suffered from anxiety, severe depression and it even got to the point of contemplating suicide. I had too much on my plate and no one seemed to work with me so I ended up dropping out of Grad school and looked for full time employment for about 3 years. Until I finally got the opportunity to become a driver full time at UPS. I am grateful to God for my life and blessings.

Kurt
Payson, UT