Photo By Kyler Hood | Second Class Petty Officer Sonar Technician (STG2) Rickaiya Diggs from Afloat Training...... read more read more
When Sailors get injured or disease takes hold, some may see it as the end: the end of a career, the end of a healthy, active lifestyle, or worse.
But one Sailor sees things differently. Second Class Petty Officer Sonar Technician (STG2) Rickaiya Diggs, 40, experienced medical symptoms from various medical conditions, which put her on light duty during her ongoing treatment in 2021. That’s when she joined Project Ohana, a non-profit affiliate of Navy Wounded Warrior with enriching experiences that helped with her recovery. The following year, Diggs joined Navy Wounded Warrior, a decision, she said, that has helped her to heal her mind, body, and spirit and improve her occupational skills so she can continue to be an asset in or outside of the military. Previously known as Safe Harbor, the program offers support to active-duty Sailors, Reservists serving on active duty, and Coast Guardsmen who are wounded, ill, or injured in the line of duty or off duty.
Diggs said she knew the Navy Wounded Warrior was special when she started the onboarding process where she received detail oriented, individualized attention. She urged all wounded warriors to join the program.
“They match you up with a counselor and the counselor is usually somebody who is active-duty or maybe reserve or a veteran and now they’re doing civilian work and they understand who you are as a military person,” Diggs explained. “If you feel something in your body, don’t ever let someone tell you all you need is air and pushups.”
Before going on light duty, Diggs worked as a sonar technician aboard the USS Wayne E. Meyer (DDG-108), where she maintained the sonar weapon systems, tracked combatant ships and submarines, trained other sailors in the ship's damage control and sonar, repaired computers and various areas of the ship, and assisted with the safe navigation of the vessel. She transferred to her current command, Afloat Training Group Middle Pacific (ATG MIDPAC), where she began light duty.
Diggs thanked Navy Wounded Warrior partner organizations like Wounded Warrior Ohana for offering social events like surfing, canoeing, sailing, and even a luau, which lifted her spirits.
“It just makes for better morale when you’re feeling low because you went from being this super person — I can do anything — and life happens and now it’s like I can’t do anything. They’re just giving that life back to you,” she said.
Navy Wounded Warrior stands out from other programs as the Navy’s only organization for coordinating nonmedical care of seriously wounded, ill and injured Sailors and Coast Guardsmen, and providing resources and support to their families. The program’s motto is Numquam Navigare Solus, Never to Sail Alone.
Marc Puco, region program director for Navy Wounded Warrior, explained how the program helps service members navigate the medical board process, which might lead to a permanent transition out of military service and require them to find a job. The process can be overwhelming, especially in the midst of ongoing medical treatment.
“We provide support to service members so they know that the Navy still cares about them,” Puco said. “We’re going to lower that anxiety about the process if they’re going through the medical board by answering their questions and making sure they understand the different between the Navy programs and VA [Veterans Affairs] programs.”
Puco also highlighted a unique feature of Navy Wounded Warrior: a personalized comprehensive recovery plan created for the service member in the program developed by an assigned recovery care coordinator, so enrollees benefit from individualized and ongoing care with the goal of retention and return to duty.
In 2022, Diggs joined Operation Warfighter, a Navy Wounded Warrior program that provides federal internships with companies looking to fill jobs. The program develops each participant’s occupational skills and provides professional networking opportunities, according to Puco.
“You end up working for a minimum of four months for about 20 hours a week. It helps service members build a skill set and it gets them to feel like they’re part of the team,” Puco said, explaining that Sailors can add the experience to their resume or build professional connections, which might help them get a job in the future.
Before enlisting in the Navy, Diggs worked in logistics in Chicago, Illinois. She left her position after earning a Bachelor of Arts in audio design and production in 2017 and later moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where she worked various temporary jobs and pursued her passion for music engineering in the evenings.
Diggs discovered a different kind of inspiration, a call to the military life, from her Philadelphia roommate, a retired Army veteran who shared his positive experiences in the military.
In January 2018, Diggs joined the Navy through the delayed entry program, which gave her three months to get physically fit, learn basic military bearing and store her belongings before embarking on her own exciting military career.
In light of her medical conditions, Diggs potentially faces a future career transition from the Navy. To prepare for that possibility, she joined Operation Onward to Opportunity, a free career training program offered by the D’Aniello Institute at Syracuse University for veterans and military families. The program enables enrollees to gain professional certifications and job placement support as they transition to civilian life.
This program has provided a plethora of professional development opportunities for Diggs including a federal resume writing course and a project management professional certification course along with two internships.
In August 2022, Diggs completed a five-month remote internship with the Northern District of California United States Probation Office, where she maintained client profiles and ensured that client requirements were up to date. She also helped with the completion of required paperwork for various judicial functions.
The following year, in January 2023, Diggs interned as a transportation assistant at the Defense Logistics Agency, where she coordinated and scheduled daily transportation routes for goods and personnel, monitored and reported on transportation costs, and assisted with shipping documents and packaging.
The programs that helped Diggs are among the many resources available to wounded, ill, and injured service members, their families, and those who care about them. Former Secretary of Defense Robert F. Gates established Warrior Care Month on Nov. 5, 2008, to highlight these types of programs as well as the strength and resilience – physically, mentally, and spiritually – of our wounded, ill, and injured service members, as well as their families and caregivers.
Puco emphasized how important Warrior Care Month is for all commands on Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam to help service members and for service members to seek out help themselves.
“Warrior Care Month is important for our leaders and our shipmates to know about the different programs and the support that is out there for our recovering service members, he said, highlighting how the program is customized to meet each service member’s needs no matter the type of qualifying injury or illness. “It’s good for them to know that the Navy has a program specifically for them,” he said.
For Diggs, Warrior Care Month is a time to acknowledge past wounded warriors who advocated for more services, which inspired the development of today’s outstanding Navy Wounded Warrior program.
“Warrior Care Month should mostly be to acknowledge the people who came before us and didn’t have access to programs like this and fought for us to have better benefits,” she said. “I am grateful for the help of everyone who was and is there for me. It is comforting to know that life can go on.”
To date, Navy Wounded Warrior has helped over 7,600 seriously wounded, ill and injured service members throughout the country. An estimated 4,000 Sailors and Coast Guardsmen are currently enrolled in the program.
| Date Taken: | 11.18.2024 |
| Date Posted: | 11.18.2024 19:50 |
| Story ID: | 485622 |
| Location: | JOINT BASE PEARL HARBOR-HICKAM, HAWAII, US |
| Web Views: | 167 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Warrior Care Month: Out of the Fight, but Still Sailing, by Kyler Hood, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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