Will Haddon Memorial Fundraiser Project
LINK to Children’s Paperback Book – 100% Proceeds go to Sarah for the next 6 months – until November 2025
Link to find a base near you: https://installations.militaryonesource.mil/view-all
Or send to a Family Support Center: https://installations.militaryonesource.mil/search?program-service=32/view-by=ALL
Children’s paperback book, available on Amazaon:
Told through the eyes of a young girl, her Daddy is gone on deployment and the girl struggles with the common question of “why” he has to be gone. She grapples with her grief, loneliness and anger at his absence. It’s not until her Dad sends a letter telling her about another little girl who was in trouble, that she finally begins to understand the “bigger picture” of deployment.
Told in metered rhyme with real-life photo illustrations.
Originally written for military families dealing with a loved-ones absence, Soldier’s Child reminds ALL of us of the most often over-looked reason why we send our military overseas – to HELP those who are struggling.
Link for Fundraiser merch, 100% proceeds all go to Sarah (lifetime)
bonfire.com/will-haddon-memorial
DONATE DIRECTLY TO SARAH: Paypal SarahLHaddon@gmail.com
Contact Author Suzanne Swift directly: gooseridgefarm@gmail.com
The Will Haddon Memorial Fundraising Project:
Backstory in Sarah’s own words:
Met on Sept 19, 2001. At Fort Rucker in the ATC school (now called Fort Novosel, where he retired).
Heather Sterzick and I were in the Air traffic control school class and it was the first day of class. And when he and the other soldier walked in, I turned around to Heather and I said oh he’s mine lol and our eyes met and we smiled each other only and it was like love at first sight.
We knew each other only a couple weeks and got each other‘s names tattooed on each other as well. lol I got his name tattooed above my heart on my left chest, and he got my name tattooed on his left shoulder close to his heart because he already had his own initials in the area over his chest.
We Married on November.19 2002. For 22 yrs.
(He spent the first majority of the year of our marriage in Korea.)
Kayla and Brianna (our daughters) and he had a biological daughter Milly, and adopted daughter from his first marriage,Mackenzie.
kayla, our oldest has married her high school sweetheart who joined the army as well. He is out of active duty but now in the reserves. He works as a DOD diesel mechanic at Fort Benning, Georgia.
Brianna is graduating May 17. She she plans on attending a local college.
Will joined the Army in 1997 and Retired in 2022. He recently retired after 25 yrs in the Army as a CSM.
With multiple combat deployments. (three Afghanistan tours each year long and one was about 15 months, one year in Iraq, one year in Korea, one year in Bosnia. (And Multiple trainings for weeks and months here and there…)
Three bronze stars and MULTIPLE medals/honors and awards… you can find all his listed awards on the SRB that I attached.
He and I met only eight days after September 11, 2001. I got out of the Army and we decided to start our family.
He lost his best friend in 2011 deployment. That is one of the hardest deployment he had. His ptsd got more severe after he retired a little over two years ago. That we lost him on the battlefield, I truly believe. He volunteered so others didn’t have to go as a helicopter door gunman during the deployments as well. One deployment he was a Blackhawk door gunner and the last employment in 2019 he was a Chinook door gunner all while being the Command Sergeant Major.
My heart hurts and mornings are the hardest…. Having to wake up and thinking for a split second that my life was what I dreamed of…but every morning I get some what of a jump scare when I realize he is actually gone and I have to tell myself it’s true. It’s like a never ending nightmare!!!! We are having his service in the same building and location where he and I originally met and where we graduated air traffic control school together in the Army, and I just hope I can walk into that building without my legs giving out from underneath me. I am asking for prayers and strength for me and my girls and granddaughter Ariel age 2.
Sarah Haddon
www.searcyfuneralhome.com/obituaries/csm-ret-william-haddon
**NOTE FROM SUZANNE (About this Project)**
I went to school with Sarah and only very loosely stayed in touch through Facebook. Mostly I enjoyed seeing photos of the love she and her husband shared, having overcome military life together and built a beautiful family. My husband (ex) got out while hers continued onward in his career. Later when I began penning this book, I reached out to her to preview it with her own girls and give feedback.
I had felt her loss on Facebook, but when she reached out to me for emotional support I was surprised. I don’t know why she did as we had never been very close, but God told me I had to help her. I had no income at the moment (still do not) and nothing I could sell to help with her unplanned expenses.
The I remembered the BOOK. I talked with God a bit on it, and decided to launch it finally and donate 100% of all earnings to Sarah for the next 6 months (up to $200,000). THE DAY I MADE THE DECISION MY LIFE CHANGED.
I woke up the NEXT MORNING with a raging staph infection. I’d had one once in 2020, and it had taken 3 months to spread head to toe. This one took 3 days. Staph infection is worse than Shingles . . . touch can spread it. Clothes can spread it. It’s HIGHLY contagious and exceptionally difficult to eradicate. IT LEAVES SCARS. Think of jumping into a field of poison ivy carrying fireworks . . .
But GOD OPENED DOORS. All the things I struggled with years earlier with trying to publish this book, GOD MADE EASY.
BUT THE DEMONS FOUGHT BACK.
Since the staph infection only made me disheartened and delirious and didn’t stop me, the demons came. NEVER BEFORE IN MY LIFE have a felt SUCH A STRUGGLE. We’ve all had those dreams. The dreams where we are trying to run away from something but our legs are weighed down. Our feet are glued to the ground. We are pulling as HARD AS WE CAN and only succeed in moving SLOWLY.
THIS is how I felt each time sitting down to work on this. SOMETHING was trying to drag me down. I could actually FEEL IT. It was absolutely crazy. I don’t mean dragging my feelings down or emotions. No, but that WAS happening too. This was DIFFERENT. SOMETHING did NOT want me doing this project . .
But God continued surprising me. He kept opening the doors. Even when I FINALLY submitted it to Amazon, and worried about it being rejected (it WAS a children’s book with GUNS AND WAR after all), it went through. It PASSED.
This book started off as a goal of helping other families cope with deployment. And it changed into helping one family who lost it all.
PLEASE. Help me help HER. And other military families if you’d like to send one as a donation . . . or two or three!
I appreciate ANYTHING YOU CAN DO – even just forwarding on this project!
Suzanne
