By: Suzanne Lawler

Althea Wooden is not part of the Marine Corps, Army, Airforce or Navy. Yet, in early 2025, the 61-year-old woman from central Georgia will deploy to Kuwait with the American Red Cross.

Over six months, she will work seven days a week to deliver critical and emotional messages to the command of service members and provide Morale, Welfare, and Recreation (MWR) services.

“We’re their respite,” Wooden said. “They come to us for solace and the rigors of what they do. We provide programming for them like cooking, yoga, playing cards or learning to do a skill.”  Wooden says she’s ready to teach some classes with a brush and canvas. “I like to paint and I like to draw,” she said.

The MWR side of things will only be a fraction of her work. The crux of her time will concentrate on emergency communications. Red Cross volunteers and staff help military families communicate with their loved ones and facilitate their return home to deal with emergencies on the home front through our Hero Care Network. Every day, the Red Cross provides about 1,300 emergency communications and critical community services to members of the military, veterans and their families. A communication may include when a family member is sick or a death has occurred. But it could also be the joyous birth of a child. “Some messages are cheerful, but the majority are because of death and life-threatening illness,” Wooden said.

It's emotional work, but Wooden who was working as a paraprofessional at an elementary school, joined the Red Cross because one word stood out on the application. “When I opened the ad, I saw servitude in capital letters and I was like bingo,” she said with a smile. She has a big heart, and that’s practically a requirement to talk to folks going through a life-changing shift in their lives. “My mom was a very giving person,” she described. “She was always helping others, and I guess she rubbed off on me. Though no longer here, she’ll definitely be on this journey with me, and this will be my way of carrying on her legacy.”

After training at Camp Atterbury-Muscatatuck in Indiana, Wooden will work at a base in Kuwait. She will become part of a four-person team. “We’ll actually be delivering the emergency communication messages to command,” she explained. “Sometimes there is a little bit of investigation work involved trying to locate the service member or find someone who is able to take the message and get it delivered. We make sure the commander has all of the pertinent verified information so he can make an informed decision as to whether or not the service member is allowed to come home.”  

After hearing the devastating news, many military members find their way to the Red Cross office. “A lot of times they just want someone to talk to,” Wooden said thoughtfully.

The Red Cross does not authorize emergency leave for members of the United States military. The Red Cross helps independently verify the emergency, enabling the service member’s commander to make an educated decision regarding emergency leave and then to provide transportation assistance and/or financial assistance if needed.

“What may be an emergency in the eyes of the service member or his family, may not actually constitute an ECM (Emergency Communication Message). Not all messages are deemed emergent by the Red Cross and we’re not able to create an ECM,” Wooden explained. “It’s hard to say no to someone during those moments. Sometimes they understand and sometimes they don’t, but more often than not they just need to be heard or just want someone to talk to.”

So, she will pack up her caring and nurturing spirit. Luckily that won’t take much room because it is not the mission that keeps Wooden awake at night before she leaves, it’s the logistics and packing to go to Kuwait. “That gives me the most anxiety,” she admitted. She will get four 50-pound bags. “I made sure I got a duffle bag with wheels,” she chuckled. Anyone who has had to pay extra money at the airport for a bag may understand that 200 pounds of stuff isn’t much when you’re talking about an extended stay in a foreign country. “You don’t know if they’ll have the same supplies you use,” Wooden surmised. “People say oh you’ll have shops there, but I don’t know that they’ll have what I need.”

She will also carry military gear like a gas mask, combat boots and a Kevlar vest. Wooden had to train for this assignment and pass a strenuous medical exam.

And whereas packing gives her anxiety, leaving her family and her beloved elderly dog Bailey for half a year can bring her to tears. “My father, he’s 84 and he really doesn’t want me to go,” she said somberly. “He was like, ‘You’re going to leave me, what if something happens to me while you are gone?’ I had to reassure him that he was going to be okay, nothing was going to happen. But I also had to let him know that just like the service members, we too get emergency communications.”

Wooden has a special place in her heart for the military. She was in the Reserve Officers’ Training Corp (ROTC) in college, she spent a chunk of her life as a military wife and her son is an Air Force veteran. She knows the sacrifices she and her family are making now will touch the lives of men and women wearing the uniform in a vulnerable part of their lives. “And it will make a difference,” she said confidently. “It may not make a difference while you’re talking to them and it may not make a difference in that first month when they're going through their grief and trauma but at some point, they’re going to know that the Red Cross was there providing comfort or a listening ear.”

A true act of servitude backed by a humanitarian organization committed to supporting the heroes and their families serving overseas.

The American Red Cross Hero Care Center is available 7 days a week, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, with three options for requesting assistance.

To speak to a Red Cross Emergency Communications Specialist call 1-877-272-7337.

Visit redcross.org

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