Photo By Amabilia Payen | Sgt. Terry Speck, combat medic with the 333rd Engineer Company, redeployed Feb. 28, to...... read more read more
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FORT BLISS, Texas – When duty calls, many U.S. Army Reservists leave jobs and family to serve their country. It is the duty of a citizen soldier that has been honored since the days of the minute men during the American Revolutionary War. For Sgt. Terry Speck, a combat medic with the 333rd Engineer Company who just redeployed, here, Feb.28, it seemed more challenging when he had to leave his fiancée who was pregnant with his second child.
Today, we have great technological devices that help us as a human race to communicate around the world. Just use a computer, with an internet connection and a good camera, log into Skype, and within seconds, you are talking and seeing your loved ones on the other end.
Speck did this often while he was in Afghanistan. However, on Sept. 4, 2013, logging into Skype was an emotional must, when his fiancée went into early labor, and he was able to witness it from thousands of miles away.
“It worked out pretty well,” said Speck. “I was on edge. I knew it was going to happen. We had a mission the next day, so I talked to her the night before, and she went into active labor. I told her we have a mission tomorrow and I hope it doesn’t happen when I’m on the mission.”
Speck left his forward operating base that morning in Afghanistan, when he received the message that his wife was about to give birth.
“We got to Kandahar Airfield on a support mission and I got to the (Morale, Welfare, and Recreation) tent and as I got there, I got a message she was going into labor,” said Speck.
“Luckily I got to the computer lab with enough time, but the computer room was full. I actually went and asked somebody if I could jump on the computer they were on because she was in labor.”
Speck could not recall the gentleman’s name that let him on the computer. Without this brave unknown soul’s generosity, Speck wouldn’t have been able to experience the chance of a lifetime.
“He said yeah absolutely no problem,” said Speck. “She gave birth at a birth center, she did it all natural. So it was agonizing for me to be hearing the yelling and the pain and the screaming. I did have headphones on, so it was an experience. Just to be able to witness it from so far away, technology had given me a chance to witness the birth of my daughter in a situation I wasn’t going be able to otherwise.”
Upon hearing his daughter’s first scream for life come out, Speck welled up with tears and had overwhelming feelings of joy.
“Her first cry was just heart wrenching. I cried. I can’t lie, I did tear up. It was just a surreal experience. I will cry again when I hold my daughter for the first time. She is six months now, sitting up, rolling over, and giving audible sounds,” said Speck.
Speck will be home in a few days to Reading, Penn., as he finishes up the demobilization process with his unit. He can’t wait to hold his daughter for the first time.
“The emotions I have going home, being nervous, being excited. It’s hard to explain. We were in the airport the other day, and I saw a man carrying his daughter looked about six months old, he was walking around with her, soothing her, and it hit me. It really hit me hard,” said Speck. “I just want to say that I love (my family) a lot and I can’t wait to be reunited.”
Speck did many combat missions in Afghanistan with his unit, moving continuously from one location to the next. Speck will return to his civilian job, as a Holiday Inn Express director in Reading, Penn.
| Date Taken: | 03.07.2014 |
| Date Posted: | 03.11.2014 10:47 |
| Story ID: | 121825 |
| Location: | FORT BLISS, TEXAS, US |
| Hometown: | READING, PENNSYLVANIA, US |
| Web Views: | 849 |
| Downloads: | 1 |
This work, Soldier recalls daughter’s birth via Skype, by Amabilia Payen, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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