Jennifer Higginbotham becomes 100th Veteran at Huntington VA to join VA’s largest health research program

When the first plane struck the World Trade Center, seventeen-year-old Jennifer Higginbotham was standing by the vending machines in her high school break room, her eyes glued to the television. Like everyone else in her hometown of Kenosha, Wisconsin, she couldn’t believe what she was seeing. And as the towers began to crumble in Lower Manhattan, the world as she knew it had collapsed with them. “Right then, it was a feeling in my gut, I knew I was doing this,” Higginbotham remembered. The following spring, when the snow began to thaw, she walked across the high school graduation stage and into the recruiter’s office for the U.S. Marine Corps. “It's going to be hard. It's going to be tough, especially being a female,” the recruiter told Higginbotham. “Awesome,” she said. “Sign me up.” AN ULTIMATUM TO ENLIST Higginbotham had always been a daddy’s girl, and even though her father was an Army Veteran, he was reluctant to sign for his daughter, allowing Higginbotham to enlist prior to her eighteenth birthday. American troops were already deployed in Afghanistan, and soon the U.S. military would have boots on the ground in Iraq. Her parents were worried. But Higginbotham was resolute. “Sign the papers and allow me to enlist now,” Higginbotham remembers telling her parents, “Or I’ll sign them myself when I turn eighteen in two months.” With that, her mother and father took turns signing their names, and Higginbotham’s four-year career with the Marine Corps began. TWO WAR-TIME DEPLOYMENTS The first deployment to Iraq was loud, Higginbotham remembers. “You wake up to big booms. You go to sleep to big booms,” she said, describing the constant sound of incoming mortars and return fire near her airbase west of Baghdad. Higginbotham worked in logistics, running convoys to Fallujah, Blue Diamond, Ramadi, and Al Asad. Sometimes they’d drive through the desert at night, in pitch black darkness, to avoid detection by the enemy. Each time, she wasn’t sure if she’d make it alive. To her relief, each time she did. Five months after arriving home, Higginbotham volunteered to go again. “My parents weren’t too happy,” she chuckled, but they knew their daughter’s decision could not be changed. This, she said, is why she joined. COMING HOME TO THE VA By the time Higginbotham left the military, she’d fallen in love with another Marine. She moved to his hometown in Barboursville, West Virginia, where they planted roots and have grown their family over the last 16 years. But in those early years, the memories from two combat deployments were still all-too vivid for Higginbotham, now busy as mother to three boys. The thundering explosions, the mortar fire, the dark nights riding in armored vehicles to Fallujah, the fear of not knowing whether she’d make it back to the airbase alive – all of this haunted the young mother. Higginbotham finally reached out for help and found it at the Hershel “Woody” Williams VA Medical Center, where 15 years later she still receives her care. With the help of trained mental health professionals, and the camaraderie of fellow Veterans, Higginbotham broke down the stigma she had felt around her post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). “There’s a sense of connection here I wouldn’t get anywhere else,” Higginbotham said. “At the VA, you’re with your fellow brothers and sisters.” Now she works in Peer Support at the VA in Huntington. Every day, Higginbotham meets with Veterans who have reached out for help, just as she once had. She shares her story, and in the process, offers the most treasured gift of all—hope. A CHANCE TO KEEP GIVING Recently, Higginbotham received a letter in the mail from a VA research program she didn’t recognize. “What in the world is this?” she thought, as she read about a biobank with more than 900,000 Veterans who had already signed up to share their health information with VA researchers. Then she saw the words “genes” and stopped reading. She had too many questions and pushed the letter aside. Not long after, the Women’s Health Program Manager mentioned the same program to Higginbotham at work. “It’s basically data collection,” her colleague explained, “Data that could help find new treatments and preventive care in the future or discover links between diseases that matter to Veterans.” Higginbotham thought about it. She trusted her colleague. “If there is anything that would improve care in the future, then I would be happy to be part of it.” JOINING VA'S MILLION VETERAN PROGRAM Higginbotham made an appointment for the following week to enroll in the Million Veteran Program (MVP). She took the elevator down to the 1st floor and walked into her local MVP office, which opened at the Huntington VA in August 2022. Higginbotham read the consent documents and had a chance to ask questions of the MVP staff. She understood that researchers wouldn’t know her information belongs to her. Anything that directly identified Higginbotham—like name or social security number—is removed from genetic information and health data before it’s shared with researchers to protect her privacy. Already, data from Veterans in MVP have supported some of the largest genetic studies to date on PTSD, major depression, heart disease, as well as groundbreaking research in suicide prevention. This is just the beginning of what their research has to offer. With that, Higginbotham rolled up her sleeve and became the 100th Veteran at the Huntington VAMC to enroll in VA’s Million Veteran Program, joining more than 900,000 Veterans nationwide in the program. “Serving is in our blood,” Higginbotham said. “That desire never goes away. I’m proud to be a part of this.” Make a difference for Veterans like you by joining VA’s Million Veteran Program. You can sign up online at www.mvp.va.gov/pwa/ or by calling 866-441-6075 to make an appointment at the Hershel “Woody” Williams VA Medical Center. You don’t have to receive your care at VA to participate. **Marine Corps Veteran Jennifer Higginbotham survived two war-time deployments and a battle with PTSD. Now she finds strength in sharing her story, offering hope to fellow Vets and giving back, this time through research.