I first want to apologize that it’s taken so long for another update. It’s been a rough few months and writing another update felt too overwhelming.

But… I have some GREAT news! Jolly successfully underwent a loop ileostomy reversal surgery on Monday and no longer has the ostomy bag. 🎉 He did very well through surgery and is recovering wonderfully at the hospital. Today he was started on a liquid diet to see how his body responds. If everything goes well today they will try to elevate him to solid foods tomorrow and start talking about discharging him to continue recovering from home. He’s in better spirits than I’ve seen him in months and the color is actually returning to his face already. I see his light coming through for the first time in a very long time. He’s having some expected pain and discomfort but has been able to manage it pretty well so far. He still has a long road to a full recovery and all we can do is pray the surgeries and ileostomy successfully prevent another episode of the diverticulitis but the future is bright.

We have still yet to have any meaningful progress on his claims nor in reaching out to elected representatives and veteran advocates to help us highlight the travesty that occurred on the USS Boxer in 2016. We are determined to keep pushing forward for Jolly and for every single Marine and Sailor who was on that ship.

There’s a lot of big news happening in our country and around the world right now. A lot of anger. A lot of celebrating. A lot of emotions. A lot of fear. A lot of division. And a whole lot of social media posts. What there isn’t is a genuine discussion about the treatment of our Veterans in this country. If there’s a single thing we should be able to agree on it’s that the men and women who sign the dotted line for our country should be treated with dignity, respect, and honor when they come home by the rest of us who they’ve agreed to literally die for. It should be considered a great honor and privilege to be able to work for the VA healthcare system and care for those who have served not a training facility using vets as guinea pigs. Only our nations absolute best doctors, nurses and support staff should be hired by these facilities. The VA should be a dream job not a stopping place to snag enough hours to get hired by a private hospital that pays better.

Our system is broken. Our country is broken. You can see that most clearly in the health and wellbeing of our Veterans. In the 50,000+ who will sleep on our streets tonight. In the 22 we will lose to suicide today. In the countless others who will be lost today to service connected illness, substance abuse, alcoholism, suicidal ideation not explicitly labeled suicide leading to death such as reckless driving or various forms of self harm. Our nation is bleeding and we cannot even come together to fight for those who fought for us.

Our Veterans are the backbone of our country. It does not matter your opinion on where in the world their service sends them or what it calls upon them to do. Those concerns may be voiced with our leaders who continue to send our young and overwhelming lower middle class and poor over to fight endless wars not to those who believe they are fighting for our freedoms to voice concerns in the first place.

It’s been nearly 9 years since the USS Boxer knowingly poisoned its crew for months. It’s been nearly two years since the Navy admitted it happened. No accountability has come. No apology has been rendered. They continue to deny claims of those suffering despite clear evidence. This failure has irreparably impacted our family and countless others. My husband will NEVER be the same. He now lives with two organs less than he should. He’s lost years of his life too sick to experience it that he can never get back. He’s not the only one.

This never should have happened and more Americans should care that it did. Every day my heart breaks a little more seeing the lack of support in highlighting what happened.   It’s been about 3 months since I started this petition and we’ve still not been able to breech 1000 signatures. We’ve had nothing but delays and denials in accessing care and services. We’ve received nothing but generic responses from those with power to act. There has to be someone else out there who cares enough to speak out. The Marines and Sailors aboard the USS Boxer deserve more. Our veterans deserve better.