Boulder Crest Foundation

After Conley separated from the Navy, she felt the intense gaze of others who didn’t understand what their curiosity cost her. It was like being under a microscope. At this point she was still having surgeries. People would see her in a wheelchair and ask a cascade of questions that left her feeling very uncomfortable. Eventually she stopped talking about being a Veteran, and if people made assumptions, she let them go. “I wouldn’t do anything to correct them because it was just easier. And people don’t always need to know everything. I definitely downplayed and was almost secretive about what I did. Because [I got] everything from disbelief to that awful question: did you kill anybody?”