Well, the news was not good. My deployment has been scrubbed because of that incident in my medical record. The Army is not in the habit of making personal exceptions, so they don't care about all the doctors' recommendations I have on my side. I tripped their red flags with a single phrase in my records--because I was naive enough to answer completely and truthfully--so the whole thing is not going to happen.

To say that I am embarrassed, and humiliated, would be a supreme understatement. And disappointed and angry, but those feelings will pass sooner. Ah well. As Victor Frankl, a survivor of Auschwitz, said:

"Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom."

So I will choose to be optimistic that this door has been closed to me because an even better one is opening. Thanks for reading!