This episode is brought to you by 4Patriots Survival Food Kits.The kits are compact, sturdy, water-resistant, and stack easily. They have different delicious breakfasts, lunches, dinners. You can make these meals in less than 20 minutes. Just add boiling water, simmer, and serve.
Go to 4Patriots.com and use code COMBAT to get 10% off.

Join our weekly Combat Check-In Newsletter (www.combatstory.com/newsletter) to get a short email from Ryan for people who love and support our veterans, service members, and their families. It has info on a significant event in military and/or intel history, a funny military joke, an update on a current event I'm following, something I'm doing that week in my life, a book I'm reading, a look at an upcoming interview, a reflection on a past episode and more!

========

Today we hear one of our most inspirational Combat Stories from Aaron Hale, an Army Explosive Ordnance Disposal tech who was blinded during an IED blast. Aaron later contracted meningitis and lost his hearing as well. You’ll want to feel sorry for him and, if you’re like me, yourself as well, but he truly has one of the most infectious and inspiring outlooks you’ll ever hear.

Aaron started his military journey doing exactly what he always wanted to by learning to cook as a Navy chef in Italy. After 9/11, however, he felt he wasn’t doing enough to contribute to the combat going on in Iraq and Afghanistan. He made a deliberate choice to become an EOD tech and it quite literally changed the entire course of his life. There was a point in time where his wife had to spell out every single letter of every word she wanted to say to him in the palm of his hand to communicate because he was, as he put it, trapped without the ability to see or hear.

This episode took me through a range of emotions and tears. Aaron’s story about the last time he got to physically see his son and his family before the blast reminded me of just how great so many of us have it in life and not to take it for granted.

I hope this episode takes you through your own range of emotions and helps put some of your own problems - that might not be so significant after all - into perspective the way it did for me.

Find Ryan Online:
- Ryan’s Linktree https://linktr.ee/combatstory
- Merch https://www.bonfire.com/store/combats...
- Instagram @combatstory https://www.instagram.com/combatstory
- Facebook @combatstoryofficial https://fb.me/combatstoryofficial
- Send us messages at https://m.me/combatstoryofficial
- Learn more about Ryan www.combatstory.com/aboutus
- Intro Song: Sport Rock from Audio Jungle
Find Aaron Hale Online:
- LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaron-hale-1861477
- E.O.D. Fudge https://eodfudge.com/
- Facebook https://www.facebook.com/EODconfections
- EOD Fudge Instagram https://www.instagram.com/EODconfections/
- Aaron Instagram @aclayhale https://www.instagram.com/aclayhale/

Show Notes:
00:00 - Intro
00:50 - Guest Introduction (Aaron Hale)
02:14 - Interview begins
02:40 - overcoming disabilities and demotivation
07:00 - Medical logistics
12:16 - Childhood and optimism
19:17 - 4Patriots
20:37 - Recruitment and cooking
31:13 - Culinary being deployed in Italy
33:20 - Soldiers and chefs
37:01 - Best Branches food
41:21 - Army E.O.D. path
52:37 - Jobset of an E.O.D.
59:50 - The tech side of E.O.D.
01:15:07 - First deployment
01:08:06 - Encounters with explosives
01:09:02 - First time facing an I.E.D.
01:11:08 - Complex times as an E.O.D.
01:14:11 - Caught in the explosion
01:24:55 - Thoughts while under fire and aftermath
01:40:35 - E.O.D. expectations
01:42:53 - animosity for the enemy
01:44:45 - Regrets
01:45:42 - Extrodinary Delights and Meningitus
01:56:06 - Favorite dessert on the menu
01:57:44 - Other businesses
02:01:05 - Sentimental item
02:01:51 - Do it all again
02:03:20 - Listener comments and shout outs