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My name is Peggy McCann Mikelonis and I served in the United States Army Nurse Corps
from the years 1970 to 1972. I served one year stateside at Huntsville, Alabama
in a 52-bed hospital and my second tour was in the republic of Vietnam.
I was in a Third Surge Army Hospital way down in the Mekong Delta.
I was a very young, new nurse. I had only been out of nursing school a year.
I had spent a year stateside. I think probably one of the greatest challenges was
feeling my comfort zone working. I spent a lot of my time working in the emergency department.
I was trained by corpsmen, I was trained by surgeons, I mean, we were literally on
the job training. It was like, see one, do one. That was, you know, when I look back on it now,
it was, you know, a great challenge but we were all so young and we were all soÖ
We werenít concerned about the war aspect; I mean we were there taking care of the wounded.
We took care of both Vietnamese as well as American soldiers.
I guess now, especially at my age, because you know, weíre talking about the
Vietnam War is when I was deployed, so we begin to look back.
There are certain times that you rememberÖ I vividly remember the time it was Thanksgiving,
you know, and we were all supposed to have this huge Thanksgiving dinner in the mess hall
but then the alerts went off and we heard the helicopters and it was, you know,
the wounded were coming in, and so I worked in the E.D. So I never got my Thanksgiving dinner
but I do remember vividly, you know, taking care of a young soldier who came in
and had half of his face blown off and who was still conscious and, you know,
all I could do was hold his hand and tell him everything was going to be fine.
But then we were able to follow them after, you know, where weíre at weíd then send them
forward to Saigon and weíd treat them; they were with us a while and then weíd move them on.
I was able to find out later that, you know, he had reconstructive surgery, he survived,
and so itís just sometimes trying to get that final piece together to know what
happened to those that you had taken care of.
I was stationed with a lot of the Dustoff pilots so we partied together, we ate together,
we worked together, you know, and then, a lot of times, we cried together over,
you know, what we saw and what we faced. When I first came back home,
it was during a time when no one wanted to talk about the war.
None of my friends knew what I had gone through. I had one friend who
had been deployed with me so her and I were the only two who could talk.
My family support system was my system but when it came to friends out there,
they didnít know what was going on with me. I didnít know for a while what was going on.
I used to find myself underneath the bed when I would hear helicopters or
if Iíd hear noise, you know. And I remember my father was probably very instrumental;
heís the one who told me donít go back to work for a while,
you need to have some time to, like, um, decompress, andÖwhich I really did,
and then I moved from Iowa to Florida and went to work at the VA
and thatís where Iíve been ever since.
Probably one of the greatest things I learned from my time in the service is collegiality;
how, itís incredible, you hear of how people who served in the military
come away with an entirely different sense of family. Some of the nurses I served with,
this past October, weíre all in our 60s now, about seven of us plus one husband
got together and all went to San Diego, renting a beach houseÖwhere many of us
hadnít seen each other since Vietnam. We spent a whole week together and it was
like we were back in Vietnam again and the things that we shared,
the things we had done back then. It was so comfortable.
It was the most comfortable relaxed time I think Iíve ever had.
And that to me was a testament of what it was like to endure a very uncomfortable
situation being in a war, but we came away with some very great, valuable friendships.
When youíre deployed together and youíre in one unit you do become a family.
Youíve got to take care of each other, you know,
and itís a lot easier to do it when you get along, so, and we did.
Early on, in my VA career, I mean, I didnít acknowledge a lot that I was a Veteran either.
There wasnítóthere were no women Veterans there, so why did I even want to,
you know, do that? I was a staff nurse. I had some difficulty coming back and
transitioning into the VA nursing where they really werenít recognizing what
I had done in a combat zone. It was like, here, I remember the first time when they
asked me to start an IV on a rubber arm to certify me to start IVs. And I went,
This is a rubber arm, Iíve been inserting subclavian catheters, Iíve been, you know,
suturing, putting in chest tubes.í You know.
It was just that they didnít value what we had done.
Over the years as I transitioned, we started developing womenís committees
and then I was asked to be a part of them. Initially I didnít want to be,
and then I transitioned into it. I said, ëOkay, Iíll become a member of your committee,
and then it was once I was a member of the committee, then I realized I had a voice.
I always thank every Veteran, whether itís male or female, for their service,
because itís not something that every American does.
Itís a very unique group of people that do serve their country.
And then let them know what the VA is able to do for you and especially for women is,
you know, let them know weíve changed. We didnít have anything many years ago
and I tell them, from an honest standpoint, I know we didnít because I was there,
I was part of the VA that wasnít providing for you, but weíve come a long way.
And uh, come back and see what we have to offer.