KILLEEN — With her mother and father both serving 20 years in the U.S. Army, it was pretty much a sure thing that El Paso native Kametra Marzette would one day wear a military uniform herself.
As she made her way through school, her sights were always set on following in their footsteps, but the road took a slight detour and Kametra wound up wearing Air Force blue instead of Army green.
“Military life was the life that I knew, so for me, that was (always) my path,” the 40-year-old retired technical sergeant who lives in Liberty Hill and commutes to work in Killeen said. “My parents were, like, ‘Don’t you want to go to school?’ but I knew I didn’t want to do that. I wasn’t ready to keep studying and be focused on that. I wanted to travel, and I wanted a job that was going to pay me.
“My plan was to join the Army, but my mom took me to the Air Force recruiter. When she joined, she had the opportunity to join the Air Force but never did. So I kind of feel like since she wasn’t able to, she wanted me to go that direction.”
Born in El Paso, where her parents were stationed at Fort Bliss, Kametra moved around quite a bit as a kid, but wound up back in El Paso for high school and graduated in 2001. She did not mind being uprooted from time to time over the years and says her childhood experiences helped prepare her for serving in the military.
“It kind of became something that I got used to,” she said. “Every three to five years, going to a different place. I was always excited to do something different. So in my military career, whenever it was time to PCS, I was always OK with it. It was just one of those things … OK, it’s time to go.”
After graduation, she immediately enlisted and headed in August 2001 to Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio for basic training. Her career as a personnelist (personnel specialist) started at Altus Air Force Base in Oklahoma. From there, she went to Shaw Air Force Base in South Carolina, then to Fort Lewis in Washington, over to Korea for a year, out to Hawaii, back to San Antonio, and then to El Paso, where she retired in January 2022.
After six or seven years in personnel, helping with pay, promotions, PCS moves, she moved to education and training management, tracking training events for different units. In 2009, she was deployed to Qatar in the Middle East to work “as an extension of security forces” in support of Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom.
Two years before that, she married a member of the Army National Guard who is now on active duty and stationed at Fort Cavazos.
Now, Kametra works as outreach director for The Steven A. Cohen Military Family Clinic at Endeavors in Killeen, which is celebrating its fifth anniversary in August. Her role with the company is ‘to communicate the Cohen Clinic mission by introducing and educating the community and community partners about our available mental health and case management services. She also helps with developing effective and trusting relationships and coordinates in-person and virtual events that serve to inform and support Veterans, active-duty service members and their families.’
“When I retired, we had what was called Hiring our Heroes program,” she said. “So, in the program, basically, my last six months in the military, I can do like an internship with a business. I chose The Steven A. Cohen Military Family Clinic at Endeavors in El Paso to do my internship. I was getting my master’s in counseling, and I thought maybe I wanted to go the therapy route after I got out. So, I shadowed there for about three months, and then my husband got assigned to Fort Hood (now Fort Cavazos), and that’s what brought me here.
“When I got here, the outreach director in El Paso called me and said the outreach position is open and you should apply for it. Basically, my job is to put the word out about what we offer, as far as services. We do mental health counseling and therapy for active duty, Veterans and their family members. I do table setups; presentations on Fort Cavazos (and) in the community; I establish relationships with community partners. We want to stop the stigma when it comes to mental health.”
Looking back at her decision to join the military, Kametra, a proud mother of two fur babies who enjoys traveling with her husband, finding new restaurants, visiting her parents in El Paso, her grandparents in North Carolina and watching Dallas Cowboys football, says that was “the only plan” she ever had for her life, and she could not be more pleased with the way things have turned out.
“I’m very proud of my military service,” said. “It’s definitely my biggest accomplishment. I feel like it set me up for the job I have now and lets me know I’m in the right place. I still get to work with my military brothers and sisters, but I also get to offer them help if they need it.
“Honestly, I think the best thing about my Air Force career is the different types of people I got to meet along the way. That became family for me. I was able at each duty station to find those people or that person that I could connect with. So if I was very happy, sad, upset, stressed, I always had someone I was friends with that I could lean on. That was big. I think that helped me make it all the way to 20 (years).
“I think my biggest adjustment was the transition out of the military. I had a lot more on my plate than what I thought. I remember driving to work in El Paso, and I was driving past my mom’s job and I thought I should stop and talk to her, because I felt something coming on. But I had to get to work, and so I just went on.
“I was in school for my master’s degree; my husband was away for training (warrant officer’s school); and I was about to retire and had to plan my retirement ceremony. I had a lot on my plate and I wasn’t handling it very well. I think transitioning is bigger than what people think. People think, ‘Oh, I’m getting out (and) everything is going to be OK.’ It really is a stressful time, but it led me to what I’m doing now, to be honest.”
Her job at the clinic is rewarding “every day,” Kametra says. One example is a visit she made to a local VFW, where she spoke to a Veteran who had lost his wife and was having a hard time.
“They asked us to come out because they were trying to start a grief support group,” she said. “So, I go there monthly and they bring in people who have a loss and are grieving (and) one gentleman came in a couple months ago with his son. He sat down at the table and said, ‘I’m here because I’m ready to start grieving.’
“I was asking him about what happened with his wife, and he was telling me the story. I basically just let him talk, and then I said, ‘You know, you said you’re ready to grieve, but I feel like you’re going through the process right now — you just don’t know it.’ When he got up to leave, he said, ‘I feel so much better today. Thanks for being here.’ Things like that are really what drive me. Being able to help others.
“What I usually tell people is that it’s OK to have a bad day and be stressful, but when those bad days start accumulating and you can’t find your way to a good day, that’s what we’re here for.”
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