Photo By Tech. Sgt. Cherish Chavez | U.S. Air Force Airman 1st Class Cherish Driskill, 319th Logistics Readiness Squadron...... read more read more
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Even as a kid, I knew I wanted to serve in the Air Force. I never wanted anything more, except to one day be a mother. I guess I just never thought about how the two would work together.
As a teenager, I flew planes in Civil Air Patrol, commanded a battalion in Army Junior Reserve Officers’ Training corps, and graduated high school early to enlist at 17. I didn’t get the job I originally wanted, but I was getting to serve my country. My plans were right on track.
After meeting the man who would one day become my husband, and getting pregnant at 18, those plans shifted a little. When I pictured being a mom, I never imagined leaving my children at daycare for 10 hours a day. Yet, when our brand new baby turned 6 weeks old, that’s exactly what I had to do.
After leaving him in the arms of a stranger, then having a breakdown in my car, I wiped my tears with my Airman Battle Uniform sleeve and drove to work. Repeating the process with our second son was easier, but the feeling of wanting to be home with them never went away.
I wanted it more than ever after leaving for deployment, just a few weeks before our baby’s first birthday, to join my husband in Qatar. Leaving our potty-training toddler and breastfeeding infant with friends, while we were on the other side of the world, was the hardest thing I had ever done. I loved my time deployed, and wasn’t ready to leave the military, but knew our family needed a change.
The Air Force Reserve felt like the perfect solution. A few months later I was out of active duty, cross-training into my dream job of Photojournalism, and changing more diapers than ever before. Two days a month in uniform didn’t feel like enough, but I was now getting to live both my dreams! How lucky was I!
As any military family knows, challenges come regardless of component. My husband and I left at the same time again when he deployed to Afghanistan and I went to technical school. Two years later, just weeks after having our third baby, he left for his fourth deployment in six years.
Taking care of a newborn and two young boys, traveling for my drill weekends with a nursing baby, completing upgrade training and preparing our family for the cross-country move we had just found out about was more than I could do alone. I needed time to catch my breath.
I tried desperately to take time off before transferring to my new unit, but was told the only way to do that would be to go inactive. I would still be on my contract, but would have to go through a recruiter to get back in. I was terrified that if I did that, I would never be allowed back due to medical reasons. I had come to a crossroads and needed to weigh what mattered most: my responsibility to my family or the certainty of my career.
I cried and prayed harder than ever, but the answer that kept coming was that I needed to care for my family. I knew this was what God wanted, but my heart was still fracturing. The Air Force had been my dream since before I was a wife or a mom; it was what made me Cherish. Taking a leap of faith, I signed the paperwork to get out, hoping it would only be for a few months.
In a new state, and no longer in the military, I felt like I had lost my identity. Wearing a uniform and learning to lead others had been part of my life since JROTC. I had always been “Driskill” or “Chavez;” now I didn’t know who I was. After getting our family situated, I reached out to a recruiter who confirmed my fears: I was not qualified to get back in! But I wouldn't give up.
Months turned into years, and my dream of serving again felt increasingly out of reach. We decided to try for our fourth baby, and moved to Virginia for my husband’s next assignment. I started to think I might never get back in, but that was getting easier to accept.
I was finally learning who I was without the Air Force, and finding new dreams for myself. Homeschooling our children, reigniting my passion for photography and getting to soak in life with our last little baby left me more content than I had ever been. I never stopped thinking about the Air Force, but now knew I would be okay without it if I had to be.
As is so often the case, my chance came when I finally surrendered. A friend from recruiting mentioned that Public Affairs was on the active duty prior-service list, but I wasn’t ready to leave my children to work full-time. When it was still on the list the next year, which was almost unheard of according to her, I knew I had to take the chance! I might never get another!
I started the prior-service recruiting process, and worked harder than ever to finally get medically cleared. I was all at once excited, terrified, and quietly heartbroken. Unlike when I joined before having children, I knew the sacrifices that would be asked of me this time.
My husband assured me that after giving so much of myself for our family and his career, it was my turn to have one. It would be a challenge, but we could handle it like we always had before. I hoped it was the right choice for our family, and after countless tears, prayers, and everything falling perfectly into place, I knew it was.
Nine months after starting the paperwork, surrounded by family and friends, I raised my right hand and repeated the oath I had first taken 16 years before. Putting the uniform back on felt both strange, and just like coming home. I was finally back.
It’s been over a year since that day, and I can say with a surety that the waiting, heartbreak and surrender were all worth it. God wasn’t taking the Air Force away from me; he was asking me to lay it down for a season. In doing so, he was able to grow me as a wife, a mother, and a leader in ways I never could have imagined. Then, he gave it back to me in his perfect timing.
If you’re standing at a crossroads, wondering if choosing your family means giving up on your dreams, remember this: choosing one for a season doesn’t mean giving up the other forever. Sometimes, what feels like the end is God preparing you for a return you couldn’t yet imagine.
| Date Taken: | 01.31.2026 |
| Date Posted: | 01.31.2026 22:38 |
| Story ID: | 557258 |
| Location: | JOINT BASE LANGLEY-EUSTIS, VIRGINIA, US |
| Web Views: | 15 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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