[upbeat R&B music] - Welcome back to Fatherhood, where we aim to uplift voices and redefine legacy by highlighting the strength, sacrifice, and stories of Black fathers shaping our communities every day.

Today, we're honoring a group of men who have served something greater than themselves.

As veterans, these fathers answered the call to protect and defend their country, often sacrificing time with their families, and facing uncertainty, and carrying the weight of service long after their uniforms were folded away.

Today we're exploring the intersection of service and fatherhood, the sacrifices, the lessons, and the legacy these men bring from military life into their homes and communities.

Joining us today are four remarkable veterans who continue to lead through fatherhood and mentorship.

Will Richardson, Michael Reid, Toshinar Moody, and Keith Watson.

Thank you, gentlemen.

I appreciate y'all being here today and spending some of your time with us.

- Thank you for having us.

- Thank you.

- Looking forward to the conversation.

How y'all feeling?

- Good.

- Good.

- It's good, man.

- Good to be here.

- Good, good, awesome.

Well, what I'd like to do is start from the top.

What inspired your joining the service?

What was that like?

- Yeah, like for me, man, it was, it's just about always seeing this picture of my grandfather who was a Marine, and I used to just admire that picture.

I didn't get a chance to meet him, but I used to always look at that picture, and my mom just had it showcased.

She was very proud of it.

And I decided, hey, if I'm gonna go to the military, then I wanted to follow my grandfather's footsteps, and so I joined the Marines.

- Okay, okay.

- With me, it was just making my own way.

I graduated Central High School in '08, didn't really know what I wanted to do.

I had my first child a couple of years after that and found myself in a recruiting station.

Said, "Hey, started my own little family and I wanna go about it the right way."

So year after that, found myself doing basic training at Fort Leonard Wood, and the rest is history.

- Okay, okay.

- Similar to what Will said, I grew up, and I watched my great-grandfather, and he was an Army veteran, and he got drafted in the World War II.

But coming outta high school, I was an athlete, pretty high speed guy, and I wanted to go to service, and I wanted to pick one of the most prestigious and toughest military organizations that was known at that time to me, and that was the Marine Corps.

- Still is though.

- Oh, now.

[Toshinar laughs] I didn't want to get in.

- Okay.

- So my dad, my dad was in the military for 28 years.

He served, but I ain't look up to that.

I ain't want to be a part of that.

But he made an agreement with me when I was in the ninth grade.

He said, "I don't care how you get to it.

If you don't get a athletic scholarship, academic scholarship, you gonna go to serve."

I was good in football, but playing with the girls, not going to class, doing the things, I didn't have the GPA to accept the scholarships that I had.

So I ended up making that decision, and 18 years later I fell in love with it.

So it most definitely changed my life.

- What was it that you fell in love with?

- I didn't know, I fell in love with the structure, the camaraderie, and just the excitement to do cool stuff, do things, jump outta airplanes, all that type of stuff.

You see it, but when I was a kid from Memphis, I ain't think about life like that.

But once I got into it, that was the opportunity for me to do it, why not make the most of it?

- Yeah.

- Our family always tell us, don't be the person that's on the front line, but once you in there and you drinking the Kool-Aid, it's kind of hard not to drink the Kool-Aid and want to get a part of it, 'cause you see what comes with the reward, the respect, the privilege to be a part of the 1% of the 1%.

It's a different lingo and code.

So I fell in love with that, for sure.

- I think one thing I'll add to what he mentioned is, not only the organization that occurs within the military ranks, but it's also the support that you get from your fellow enlisted members that are around you as enlisted personnel.

And it takes each and every person that's on that particular squad in that particular space receiving those courses of instructions to make it through.

- Yeah.

- And I don't think you get those in the neighborhoods in which we see around in our various communities in which we grow up.

- Yeah, absolutely.

- That's a good point.

And so I'd love to hear from you gentlemen, building off of that, right, the structure and the discipline, how does that translate into how you've gone about fatherhood?

- I think for me it was about just having the discipline piece, you know what I'm saying?

The patience piece that's required to be a great father, and just being able to motivate your children, and bring them up in a situation where they have that confidence to be able to do anything.

And I think that's what the Marines instilled in me was the fact that hey, you could do anything you put your mind to it.

And so once you go through that process, it's easier to teach your kids that same exact example.

- Absolutely, I agree.

With me, like I said, I came from a military background, had uncles in the US Navy, US Army, so I knew the discipline piece of it.

But when it comes to fathering your own children, you can think about how you came up and say, okay, well I'm not gonna do that.

I may not go about it that way as far as showing my children like, okay, if you make a mistake, I'm not gonna punish you by picking up a belt.

But something being in the military taught me was the different ways of going about it.

Just a firm talking to, raising two girls, sometimes using that voice as a father was enough for them to be like, "Okay, I don't wanna make my dad upset, so I may not make this mistake again."

And then if they did make the mistake, okay, I'm gonna have you sit on that wall, hold a couple of books, you know what I'm saying?

- That's torture there.

- I need to do that.

I got two girls, too, I think I'm gonna try that.

- Absolutely, it works, it works.

It builds the core and everything like that.

But it also gives them a sense of, okay, my dad is not going about it how we may have heard how they were raised back in the day.

"Spare the rod, spoil the child."

That's how we went about it.

But these days there are children who respond to just verbal just having that conversation with 'em.

If you don't want to grow up like this, then these are the steps you have to take to have a successful life.

So that's what I got from that, and that's how I instilled it in my children.

- Okay.

I'd love to turn that on its head, that question that I just asked, and get an idea of how your role as fathers shaped your service in the military.

- So for me, I'm grateful for the organization that was shared during that particular time, my service to the country.

But when it relates to your child, right, and the patience that you must hold within when you engage and or teach that child, right, it needs to be structured, it needs to be demonstrated, and it needs to be celebrated.

And I think I walk away from my service in the military with that mindset as I went through my journey in raising my two kids.

- Okay, Michael.

- I feel like I became an adult when I got a child.

I only had one boy, he's 10 years old, and I didn't feel like I became the husband that I am, the father that I am, the man that I am until I had my son.

But the thing that's even make it even more deeper is, through his journey, him having brain surgery at six months, years old, finding out he's autistic, ADHD, dyslexic, like that made a perspective on me how to go into his life different.

But then through going in, having that, 'cause before I didn't have the time to be present, 'cause I was gone.

So when I had the chance to be present with him, now come to find out I take him to his autism therapy, they saying, "Hey, he's not supposed to be doing it."

I'm like, I do that.

So through me becoming a father to him, it helped let me find the father to myself and let me become better in who I am, 'cause I didn't realize I'm autistic.

I'm on the spectrum, I have ADHD, I've done, and I didn't have these therapies and stuff to learn.

So it altered, what I learned from the military, how to manage things I didn't know I was dealing with, but I was dealing with.

- Right.

- To now how can this thing, because now he has a name for it, how can this same structure applies for him, but now he understand why behind the purpose of it.

- Yeah, gotcha.

- So it makes the training and delivery of it different.

He still get the structure, but that structure is what saved my life.

- Yeah, wow.

- Absolutely.

- Love it.

- Not knowing that's what saved my life.

So now showing it is the structure, you don't like it, but at the same time, you gotta see what it do for you.

Pay attention to the fruit, not so much what you don't like about it, 'cause in reality, everything you like or wanna do comes with something you don't want to do.

So it's just changing the perspective of how you see the discipline or the structure.

That helped me.

- Absolutely.

- I agree with that 100%.

And it's all about preparation.

And in the military, in the organization, in the support there's a five-paragraph order, which support and preparation weighs heavily on the decisions that are made.

And I think that helped all of us with just now meeting these men here today, and I can hear it in their various stories that they share with us today.

- Absolutely, I'm hearing that connection as well.

And also, from what I know, military service often requires long deployments away from home and from family.

Right, so what are some of the toughest sacrifices that you all endured during those periods that kind of made you both, in terms of being a soldier and a father, how tough was that, being away from home for so long?

What are some things that you held onto to keep your sanity?

- I think it's like taking things for granted.

So like when I was in, a cell phone really wasn't out, definitely wasn't a smartphone out.

So you sending off mail, mail takes a long time to get to you when you're on deployment.

And so just being patient, but then also appreciating the memories and making sure that you make memories, right?

So each and every day you're trying to make sure that everything that you're doing is the right way because there may be times where you're away from your children, and now that my children are grown, I'm an empty nester, one lives here, one lives there.

And you still have that sense of the memories that were made as kids.

And you can sit back and laugh and joke, but when you're away and you're focused on your assignment, that's all you got at that point is the memories.

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

- Absolutely.

FaceTime was a big thing with me.

I got my first iPhone after I enlisted in the Army.

So just being able to use that device, just seeing my daughter's face, that was my motivation to do my job for those nine months I was deployed in Afghanistan.

We went in Operation Enduring Freedom.

And it was boots on the ground as soon as we got there.

But my first opportunity, I FaceTimed my kid, I was like, "Hey, daddy coming home.

That's all you need to know."

And like I said, for nine months, FaceTime, FaceTime, FaceTime, reassuring her that this too shall pass.

I kept on telling myself that too.

I was heavy in the Bible.

- Yep.

- And after a while I started incorporating what I read in the Bible to help me maintain that discipline with myself that this is what I signed up to do for the betterment of my child, for the betterment of my family.

You know what I'm saying?

And shoot, that's what got me through, you know?

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

- How do experiences like that shape the way you show up for your family?

- It shapes it a lot.

Yeah, the deployments are long, but they're also equally as hard going into a foreign land, foreign location.

You may not, for the first 72 hours, know where you are, where north and south may be.

But it's just being able to discern about safety, and maintaining a sense of awareness that you gotta stay alive.

But in doing so, you need to stay alert, need to take care of your body, take care of the machinery and equipment that you have that's going to enable you to return safely to your family.

- Absolutely.

- I didn't have an iPhone.

There wasn't no videos, mail was spotty.

- Yep, yep.

- But when rest and relaxation occurred, we were able to make VHS tapes and send them off.

And however, God knows how long it took to return home, but that was our way of communicating.

- I think two things I had for me during my time was every opportunity that I had opportunity to have with my family, kid, make it big, make it special.

It was never just a normal moment.

I don't ever want them to think that.

Like it's always special.

So always keeping that energy in the air.

And then the other thing was that I learned through mentors, just don't try to do this alone.

Like it is easy for us to, we been taught to compartmentalize what we're dealing with, what we're going through.

And we only gonna give you the Yellow Page version of what we're dealing with.

We're not telling you the root deal.

So it's like, don't try to hold that front by myself.

So it's like I've had somebody to be there as a support system, whether it's my first sergeant, or a battle buddy, or whoever it is, 'cause we're not meant to carry that burden by ourself.

But we had been, naturally through survival, taught how to carry that burden by ourself.

- Right.

- Right.

- But with that moment, it's like, I don't want to carry that by myself because it comes with so much weight because of what I'm willing to sacrifice for it.

So that's why it's like I can't carry that weight of my kids knowing I just, I might have just did some things you might not be proud of.

But at the same time it's like, it's all in so that way for the greater good of not just you, it's bigger than you.

So it's like just reminding myself of what it is, sharing that with that.

And every moment gonna have, it's a big time.

It's a celebration, dog.

- I love it, go ahead.

- To add on what he said though, so it is a big time and a big moment, but as young men, right, and I'm sure we all were fairly young when we enlisted or went into the military, we didn't know what the future was going to hold.

- Absolutely not.

- Yeah.

- We didn't know.

We only had the fate in which your father, grandfather, or your mother, and your family supported you to have.

- Yeah, yeah.

I wanna spend a little bit of time on mental health.

Mental health is an increasingly highlighted topic these days, but particularly in the military space.

A lot of veterans, they talk about their transition from military life back into civilian life and the challenges they face there.

Have y'all dealt with that?

And if so, at what level?

And what have you seen from your peers?

- Yeah, I think that there needs to be more investment, more resources placed upon mental health issues.

Because, if you've been in a situation where you've been on the go 1000% for 4 years, six years, some people do it for twenty years, and then you just come home and there's none of that, right.

So you become what they call a soldier without a war.

So you're looking for action, or you're looking for something, but there's nothing really there, 'cause it's a different domicile in the civilian world than it is in the military.

And so I think that there needs to be more transition to take place to allow people to get adjusted back to the natural order of society.

And that doesn't happen.

But it doesn't happen in our communities either.

So we gotta make sure that we've got more mental health resources within our community as well.

And you'll find that a lot of veterans could benefit from that.

But a lot of people in our community could use it as well.

- Yeah, absolutely.

Mental health is a big thing that I see working on the fire side of the city.

I work Memphis Fire Department, and come into contact with a lot of veterans, homeless veterans, who basically just called 911 because they looking for shelter, looking for resources, looking for a bite to eat or whatever.

And the thing with that is, a lot of those guys going in the military at the time that they did, they didn't know they had those resources.

You know what I'm saying?

They didn't know that therapy was free.

So not understanding, once you get out of that environment of, okay, I gotta be on alert, 'cause I'm at war, to, I'm back home, but you know, I still have that feeling of alertness.

You know what I'm saying?

That's a condition.

That's a condition.

That's how you've been programmed in the military.

And then when you get out, you're not looking for answers, because hey, I'm gonna just get back to regular life.

I'm gonna get me a regular job.

But you still dealing with that, whether it be PTSD, or anything of that nature.

Me personally, I was recently diagnosed with ADHD, and back in February, my son, he was diagnosed with ADHD, you know what I'm saying?

So that's something that I carried into my adulthood that my son doesn't have to go on wondering what's going on with him now because he knows at five years old, and now we have the resources to work on, okay, you're not different because you have this condition.

You know what I'm saying?

You just have a different way of thinking.

So the thing is knowing, the thing is knowing.

Utilizing the resources and shoot, I'm still working on that 100% myself.

You know what I'm saying?

- And I think like too, like killing the stigma of it being a bad thing to get help.

- Absolutely, absolutely.

- Because everybody talks about like, if you do that you must be crazy.

And it's not, that's not, no, I'm getting some help.

I'm going to the doctor.

I'm getting-- - No shame in that.

- Yeah, no shame in that, right?

- Yeah.

- And I think that we need to do that more too.

- I would like to say that, and it's a sad story, that everybody's not gonna make it.

Everyone's not gonna make it.

We're all different.

We're all come from different walks of life, right.

There's different circumstances between the five of us that occur every day.

But having the outlet for resources, having the outlet for support is a big factor.

And I think if we pour into those families that receive these veterans back home, right, it will help.

But when those kids, or those children that may be involved, we look at the demographics in the Black family, right.

When that father may be absent, or mother may be, it just compounds on the things that we naturally see.

But as veterans, we do have support, access to those various services, and I encourage anyone to reach out if you need help.

If you see something, help someone.

- No, absolutely.

I'm a huge advocate of mental health support, finding different programs in the system, because I'm a living witness of it.

I'm a person, I can say this with conviction.

Like I attempted suicide.

I've tried to kill myself before, and I'm not ashamed to share that with anybody, 'cause I've done the work to overcome from it.

That's the biggest thing.

I think the biggest thing is that people just have to be in a place to be willing to be vulnerable.

- Right.

- Willing to, 'cause we created a stigma amongst men in particular, regardless of race, of being tough, being strong, compartmentalized, holding things off, where there's a time and place for everything.

- Right.

- And there's also a time where you need to go, 'cause if, we've all been deployed, right?

So we also know when you go to deployment, you gotta leave your car somewhere potentially.

If no one's checking up on your car for a year, the car's probably not gonna start.

The tires are probably gonna be dry rotted.

The point that I'm getting to, whatever you just leave, we like the saying of with time, you know time, things get better with time, but with effort and work you put into it.

So if you just leaving these emotions, these traumas, and PTSD, whatever you dealt with there, it is just deteriorating, getting worse until it comes out.

So you gotta be willing to do the work.

I was willing to do the work.

Just like he shared everybody's son having ADHD, that's a superpower now because of the fact that you now, you figuring out yourself helped him learn himself.

- Right.

- Absolutely.

- But you had to be willing to be vulnerable with yourself.

'cause during that journey, you also are witnessing things you don't like, you don't want to admit, and you don't like the fact that other people might see that of you.

But that's the whole point of that, you still overcome that, because once you get through that dark barrier, you stop caring about all these stigmas and everything.

In reality, man, you beautiful, you gifted.

It's not that I'm better than, it's I'm different from.

- Exactly that.

- It's changing the notion of it.

So I'm huge on mental health.

If anything I champion it, I support it.

Go get the support.

You're not weak.

It's so much strength in vulnerability.

- Yeah, absolutely.

- And so it's encouraging that.

- And I appreciate you being vulnerable to share that piece of your story as well, man.

- Absolutely.

- Thank you so much.

- Yes, sir.

- Last question.

I would love to get a sound bite from one of y'all, from each of y'all rather, on what legacy means to you.

- Man, legacy means that I left something behind that was greater than it was when I started.

I want my children to know that they're loved, and they're appreciated, and that they're gifted, and they can do whatever they put their minds to.

And I think that you do that by doing it yourself.

Shooting for those goals that seem unattainable, but making sure that you reach 'em, and you leave that behind for them to be able to use as a guide, as a map to make life better for themselves.

- For me, legacy is just carrying on what those before you have instilled into you, you know what I'm saying?

My grandfather was every bit of my father growing up in a single parent household, and he taught us hard work, working landscaping in the summer, construction business, all that.

Those businesses are still going on in the family.

You know what I'm saying?

At any point in time, one of us could've just went the other way, but it's about seeing, as children, like what our grandparents, what our parents, what our aunties and uncles did, and saying, man, I want to keep that going.

So with my kids, whether they want to go fire, police, military, whatever, just know that you got options.

But know that once you start your own family, you basically carrying on what I put into you to put into your children, and the next generation.

I want Moodys to be remembered.

You know what I'm saying?

That's the whole thing I keep saying, man, Moodys, that name carry weight to me.

So if you carry my name, then you gotta keep it going in a positive light.

You know what I'm saying?

- So what legacy means to me, power.

- Okay.

- Consistency and love.

The work that's put forward shall prevail.

There's power in the name of Jesus.

There's power in the blood of Jesus.

- Mm.

- Love your family for the time that you have.

- I love it, I love it.

- Absolutely.

- I like everything that everybody said, so I'm taking that for sure.

[group laughs] Right.

But then I add too is, I think the biggest thing for me is not necessarily what I'm leaving behind, but what I'm leaving within them.

- Okay.

- Really just focusing on the character, the principles, just like you said, the power, and just really instilling that.

If I'm showing the blueprint of the principles of what you can be, that's legacy in itself.

Because now that can be, reach one, teach one, and it's repeatable.

- Absolutely.

- Throughout.

So it's ensuring that what I'm instilling within you is the legacy that continues on, 'cause if you do that right, it'll create the abundance, the multitude, the material, whatever it needs to be.

Let that blueprint be what's forever remembered.

The Reid name.

- Absolutely.

- Absolutely.

- Yes sir.

- Well, gentlemen, this was fun.

- Yeah, for sure.

- Thank you, thank you so much for shedding light on your lives, right, pouring into the watchers and the next generation of fathers.

We appreciate your service for this country.

Today's conversation reminded us that service doesn't end when the uniform comes off.

For many veterans, the mission continues at home, leading their families with courage, discipline and love.

To our guests and our veterans everywhere, thank you for your service and thank you for the example that you set as fathers and as leaders.

I'm Nate Ollie, this has been Fatherhood, where we uplift voices and redefine legacy.

We'll see you next time.

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