Veronica Teer and her family had just moved into their home near Offutt Air Force Base in Bellevue/Omaha, Nebraska.
Veronica loved the retreat she attended at Offutt Chapel that morning. “I had the best experience and feeling from these amazing women while there,” she recalls. She wanted to spend more time with them, but – those boxes. “I deeply hesitated to go due to my deployed spouse, my kiddos, it was getting late in the day and oh, those boxes that had been calling my name!” she says.
Veronica stared at the unpacked piles of boxes that reached to the ceiling. The phone rang. It was Tammy and Teasia, two volunteers she had just met at the Stonecroft Military retreat that morning. The volunteers invited her to where they were staying for more fellowship and snacks.
Veronica works full time in IT Security as a manager, so she tries to spend every bit of her free time with her family and at home. After a few more minutes of the volunteers pleading with her to join them, Veronica and her twins went and had the best time ever. “I met some pretty amazing ladies!” she recalls. She also got to participate in a new Stonecroft pilot event called “Pretty Hurts,” where women get real about the hurts they have experienced in their life.
She cherishes these relationships and understands how important they are for military wives. Veronica knows military life. She was born and raised as a “military brat” while her father was in the service, and later she married a man in the Air Force. Now she’s also a military mom with her oldest son serving in the Air Force.
“My life changed when I became a military spouse and my path changed, but the things I have done, the places I have been, and the people I have met have kept me on a path with God that no one could take away from me,” she says. “The memories are amazing and so rewarding.”
Wanting to give other military wives similar opportunities to build healthy relationships, she is putting together a team to help organize small gatherings like she has experienced. Veronica wants to provide moments where women can have honest talks in non-judgmental, welcoming settings.
She recently attended the Stonecroft Military Bootcamp in Wyoming. There she learned hands-on skills of how to lead various outreaches Stonecroft Military is launching across the nation. She also met more military women she stays in contact with through Facebook, phone, mail, and email.
Veronica says would love to see more military women, especially younger women, experience these types of connections.
“It will give them a time to get out of their homes and a break from their normal routine,” she explains. “It will be like giving them a fresh start, and they can get more involved and meet amazing women, like I have, who they can relate to.”
Robyne Baker
Writer, Editor, Grant Research
Stonecroft Military