My oldest brother decided to join the service with the inspiration to give back to our country. It was hard to see him go, but nothing was as hard as his first deployment.

When members of the service are deployed, they only get so many opportunities to use a phone to call friends and family. Anyone who misses someone knows the feeling of what it’s like just to hear the voice of a loved one. Every call we received was a blessing.

When he returned home, my brother told us that our calls were the best thing that kept him going. Unfortunately, we also found out that even though we were lucky enough to connect, there were many of his friends that could not afford to call loved ones. I decided to make it my mission to raise money to help ensure that everyone can have the same support on deployment.