Mercenary Mum: My Journey from Young Mother to Baghdad Bodyguard

by Neryl Joyce

  After we’d been released at the end of the day, none of us spoke a word about it to our parents, or anyone else for that matter. If we talked, we risked repercussions. Fear and the threat of violence will always dictate how you respond to a situation. That is when your survival instinct kicks in and logic sometimes goes out the window. As an eight-year-old, it was easier and safer to suffer my teacher’s abuse. I didn’t think anyone would believe my story about her anyway; I wasn’t the most saintly of children back in those days.

  It’s no wonder I despise bullies to this day. There’s nothing that galls me more than seeing people abuse their authority. Even now, I find myself bucking against systems that are blatantly unfair. I guess it’s a consequence of being tormented at such a young age. Feeling powerless as a kid can make you into a victim in your adult life, or it can push you to call out injustice when you see it, even if it gets you into trouble.

  One day, out of the blue, I changed. I don’t know what happened. I just decided that being known as ‘the naughty girl’ wasn’t working for me. Perhaps it was because Mrs Moore was no longer my teacher, or because we were moving to Canberra. Whatever it was, I started to care about what people thought of me and wanted to be the best that I could. I made my bed every day, I did my homework, I cleaned up after myself – I became the perfect daughter. My grades gradually improved, my temperament settled and I became very organised and neat.

  Every action has a knock-on effect. The more I became the ‘good’ daughter, the worse Lil got. The further we moved in opposite directions, the more we fought. We shared a room and this led to many a great battle. My half of the room was immaculate, with my bed made, my clothes folded up neatly in drawers, and my ornaments placed carefully on the dressing table. Lil’s side of the room looked like a bomb had hit it: the bed covers were strewn everywhere, her clothes were dumped in piles on the floor, and she always left dirty plates and cups lying around.

  When I turned ten, we moved into a new house and I finally got my own room. It was heaven. I had privacy and the freedom to do my own thing without my sister hanging around. On my tenth birthday, I was given the greatest gift an ’80s girl could have asked for: a stereo. It was a dinosaur of a machine, with two gigantic ancient-looking speakers, but I loved it. I could listen to the radio, play tapes, and, best of all, put on records. Tapes were so frustrating – you had to keep rewinding or fast-forwarding to get to the song you wanted – but, with a record, you could go straight to your favourite song.

  Having a stereo meant I finally had a release: I had music to listen to! Take 40 and Countdown were my favourite programs. I’d tape songs from the radio and then play them over and over. Madonna became my idol, and my wannabe-pop-star fantasy began. I would come home from school and belt out Madonna tunes. Funny, I still come home from work and belt out Madonna tunes.

  Regardless of how dreadful my voice was, I’d while away hours picturing myself as a pop star. Dad thought I was ridiculous for imagining I could possibly grow up to be a singer. He would always tell me to focus on getting good grades at school. That wasn’t really a problem for me. Every afternoon throughout my teen years, I would come home and, after getting changed and eating something, spend hours doing my homework.

  I’d always have music playing in the background while I did my schoolwork. This was a little harder when I had to write essays, as I found I really had to concentrate. But doing maths was always easy – I could happily study while singing along to my favourite records. It’s no coincidence that I became very good at the subject. In fact, I would have gone on to become a mathematician, except that my enrolment at uni got stuffed up and I let the opportunity slide by.

  When I turned fifteen, Mum broke some major news to us: she was pregnant again! I didn’t think women even could get pregnant at forty. Mum’s announcement came as a shock to everyone. Even the kids at school were surprised. No one in my class had a brother or sister fifteen years younger than them. Mum had not planned on getting pregnant, but termination was not an option. So there we were: a family with four relatively grown-up kids, preparing for the arrival of a new brother or sister.

  Naomi was born late in 1988, the bicentennial year. We all thought she was the cat’s pyjamas. She had blue eyes, which would sometimes change to green, and caramel-blonde curls that fanned out around her face. Shannon was ten by now, and understandably resistant to being coddled by me. Naomi was perfect for filling his shoes. Mum also took advantage of my love for my baby sister, especially after a long night of breastfeeding. She would often bring Naomi into my room at six o’clock in the morning. I was always really tired, but Naomi was so cute that I just had to play with her.

  AT AGE EIGHTEEN it was time for me to leave home and start life on my own. So, with a crappy old black suitcase in my hand, I was dropped off at the train station by my dad. I was off to join the army. I caught a train to Sydney and checked into a hotel. I was so excited about my enlistment ceremony the next day I could barely sleep. I would be a soldier – a fully-fledged soldier!

  There were a lot of families present for the ceremony. I was a little embarrassed that no one had come to see me sign my life away, but I soon got over it. As I stood up and swore my allegiance to Queen and country, I felt proud and honoured to have been accepted into the army. As I watched the other enlistees pledge their allegiance, I noticed one particular guy who did not blend in. He had bright-red hair reaching halfway down his back. The officer in charge of the ceremony made a point of rolling his eyes and focusing on this guy’s long hair. We all knew what was going to happen: that guy was going to lose his long locks the moment he arrived at the recruit training centre. I chuckled to myself, not realising that the exact same fate awaited me.

  At the completion of the ceremony, we all piled onto the coach heading to Kapooka, in the Riverina district in New South Wales. All us girls sat together at the back of the bus. Over the next eight hours we got to know one another. We talked about how tough we thought the next three months were going to be. We placed bets on who would be the first to get in trouble and what the reason would be. We compared fitness levels and general military knowledge as we tried to suss out who was prepared for training and who would struggle.

  I honestly didn’t have a clue what I was in for. You hear how intense an experience it can be, but it doesn’t really register until you go through it firsthand. I started to understand exactly how hard recruit training was going to be the moment I got off the bus, though. It was nine o’clock at night when we pulled into the recruit training barracks. The bus stopped, the doors squeaked open and what looked like a bulldog that had taken female human form stormed on board. Now, I am not that easily intimidated, but when Bulldog started barking orders for us to get off the bus quickly, there was no way I was going to dawdle.

  In a mad panic, everyone dashed off the bus and lined up in two rows. Bulldog told all the men to “get lost” and to “keep away from the women”. She then told us to grab our bags and follow her. All the girls, including me, rushed towards the bus and scrambled around trying to get our bags. It wasn’t hard for me to identify my bag: it was the only one that looked as though it had started life in the ’70s and then been on a world tour. I grabbed it and tried to keep pace with Bulldog.

  I couldn’t catch her. I hadn’t done much fitness training before joining the army. In fact, I hadn’t done much of anything to prepare for recruit training. I thought I’d learn about that stuff once I joined. My bag was heavy and was too antique to have wheels. I was wearing a skirt and high heels and kept stumbling around in the dark. It’s a miracle I didn’t sprain my ankle. Eventually, I arrived at the building, only to be greeted by two flights of stairs. I dragged my bag up the stairs, then stood at the top, drenched in sweat.

  I’d made it, sort of. Then Bulldog’s minions swarmed around, screaming at us to get into our rooms. I was placed in a room with three other girls and told to follow their lead. They glanced at me with the same stunned look I was giving
them. They didn’t have a clue what was going on either. The room was divided in two, with two single beds located in each section. The girl sleeping opposite me was known as Rush Var. In the army, everyone tends to be called by their surname. Maybe it was a ploy by the army to dismantle our identity prior to reshaping it with a new mould? Or perhaps it was just easier to remember one another’s surnames because they were displayed on all our clothing and equipment? Either way, my roommate’s surname was Rush, and she had three first names. All her equipment was subsequently labelled with Rush VAR, so we started calling her Rash Var instead of her real name. Rush Var was a tall, athletic country girl. She had lived on a farm all her life, and was planning on studying agriculture at uni.

  The two girls on the other side of the room were called Putt Putt and Alicia. Putt Putt was a princess: petite and beautiful, with fine blonde hair. She was from the Gold Coast and enjoyed your typical surf-by-day, club-by-night lifestyle. She was planning to study business after her full-time year here. Alicia and I were the same height, but I was about 10 kilograms heavier. She was very outgoing, loved to talk, and refused to be called by her surname. Right from the start Alicia admitted that she wasn’t sure she wanted to be in the army. I told her that we were all scared, that no one knew what to expect, and that we’d work it out together. I just wanted her to hang in there and not give up straightaway. The girls all called me “Joycee”, and the nickname stuck throughout my time in the army.

  “Everyone, get out here now!” The high, piercing yell brought me back to my senses quickly. All the girls came running out of their rooms to line up along the hallway. We weren’t allowed to talk or move in any way. We were given detailed instructions about what we were to put in our lockers and how they were to be arranged. We were not permitted to keep any big personal items with us – they had to be left in our suitcases, which would then be locked up in a storage room. We were allowed to keep some small valuables and mementoes in a desk locker, but they had to be left in inspection order. To me, it wasn’t worth the extra effort: I packed everything into my bag and that was that.

  At ten o’clock it was lights out – regardless of whether we had finished unpacking. I took great pleasure in pulling back the crisp, perfectly white sheets and then lying in my new bed. I was exhausted but couldn’t sleep: I was anxious about how I would cope the next day. Eventually I drifted off, but it was a fitful night. I awoke before reveille, not knowing what was going to happen. I didn’t even know what reveille was, apart from that it was the time I’d have to get up – 6 a.m. I could hear movement nearby, but no one was getting out of bed yet. Two minutes before six. I was counting down. One minute to go. Nothing. Six o’clock. I held my breath.

  “On parade, thirty-two!” screamed the section commanders. Finally! I jumped out of bed and lined up in the hallway. ‘Thirty-two’ was the name of our platoon as well as the shorthand to get everyone to line up ‘at attention’ in the hallway to await further orders. Forty-five young women stood in various states of dress and disarray, only to be told that we hadn’t been quick enough. We were all sent back to our rooms and into our beds.

  “On parade, thirty-two!” they screamed again. Out we jumped again to line up in the hallway. We were better that time; we were more coordinated and a little more awake. But still it was not good enough. The section commanders, or ‘seccos’ as we called them, explained that recruits often tried to get out of making their beds each morning, so they didn’t sleep beneath the sheets. It was the seccos’ duty to ensure that everyone slept under their bedclothes. Each morning we were to run into the hallway with both sheets on our shoulders. So we grabbed our sheets and ran into the hallway. Again, we were not fast enough. This game continued for about twenty minutes. We were then given precisely fifteen minutes to make our beds, get dressed, brush our teeth and hair, go to the toilet and then be standing at attention in the hallway again. It was miraculous how fast I eventually became at achieving all this. Even to this day I can still be dressed and ready to go in an instant, so long as you don’t judge me on my fashion sense and hairstyle!

  My platoon was divided into four sections, and each section was allocated a commander. I was assigned to ‘one section’, which had Corporal Harty as my secco. Harty was a lean, mean Maori machine; she was also incredibly beautiful. I loved that she could be so tough yet so feminine at the same time. I wanted to be like that too. Harty had recently returned from her honeymoon, after marrying the man of her dreams. I was pretty happy having her as my secco because I thought she might be a little softer on us, given her loved-up experiences over the past couple of weeks. I was wrong: she was a hellcat. I can still hear her penetrating voice echoing through my brain, screaming at me to “HURRY UP!”

  *

  The next few days were a blur of being issued equipment and clothing. The army gave us everything we could possibly need for the following months: we were issued shoes, uniforms, field equipment and even undies and sports bras. Harty instructed our section on how everything was to be presented in our rooms, including the measurements our clothes had to be ironed and folded into. I couldn’t believe I had to get out a ruler to measure my undies, ensuring that I ironed them into the correct dimensions. I then had to place them in a certain position on my shelf, so that they were ready for inspection at any time.

  I was only a few days into the training and, so far, it was going well. I wasn’t a ‘heat seeker’ – those poor sorts who were always in the firing line because they had trouble organising themselves. Harty and the other seccos would home in on those girls and grill them until they felt two inches tall. I had managed to avoid that kind of heat – thank God – but I did cry on the fourth day.

  Bulldog was working on bringing up our dress standards. She was particularly disgusted by the state of our hair. She announced that there was going to be a ‘bun test’ and those who failed would have their hair cut off. I was horrified. I didn’t think they could make us do that kind of stuff. But they could and did. First, the girls with short hair were inspected and forced to get a haircut if they had ‘step cuts’ or any other breaches of army dress standards.

  The long-haired girls, including me, were then given four minutes to each put up our hair in a neat bun. It only took me a minute. Bulldog inspected my bun and then pointed at my elastic band. I had used a thick pale-green elastic. That particular green was not ‘legal’. I was only allowed to use black or brown elastics. Bulldog couldn’t have cared less that I did not have any of the right coloured elastics: she told me to borrow one from another girl in the section. Most of the girls didn’t have any spare, but eventually I was given a thin black elastic band by a mate. Now, I have some of the thickest hair known to womankind. A weak little elastic like the one I had been given wouldn’t hold up half my hair let alone all of it.

  Bulldog wasn’t interested in excuses. She just wanted results. I struggled with the elastic band and had to use about twenty bobby pins to hold my bun together. After four minutes, I ended up with what looked like a fragile bird’s nest at the base of my neck. Bulldog asked me to jump up and down. Within seconds, the bun had fallen out. “Fail!” she yelled. I was devastated. The army works so hard to make you tough and strong and able to cope in an environment dominated by men. You’re expected to shoot, run and fight like a man (or get as close as you can to those standards). When my hair was cut off, it was like that last piece of femininity had been taken away from me. I wanted to live and work in a man’s world, but not at the expense of my feminine side. So I cried like a girl. I swore it’d be the last time they made me cry, though.

  As the weeks went by, I learnt about weapons, first aid, navigation, drill (marching) and section attacks. I was quite good at handling a weapon and one of the best shots in the platoon. Navigating in the bush with a map and compass was a new experience for me, but, once I got out there a couple of times, it was easy. I was often the first to finish navigation exercises and felt proud that I could excel in something. Although I was
above average in my other subjects, my poor fitness was starting to detract from my overall performance.

  I was hopeless at running. My fitness level was the worst in the platoon. Fitness was the most important aspect of training or, at least, the seccos placed a greater emphasis on it than on anything else. Harty labelled my performance “spasmodic”. One day I would be doing really well, then we’d do a fitness session and my standard would plummet again. I didn’t know what to do. Even though I would slog my guts out during physical training (PT), I just couldn’t keep up with the other girls. I was scraping by in the progressive fitness tests, but then I developed stress fractures in my left foot, which made running extremely painful.

  My foot would swell and ache after training hard. So I would rest my ankle overnight, enough for it to settle down so that I could train on it, but afterwards it would blow up again. It was a vicious circle. It was worrying because the fitness tests were gradually getting harder and more sustained. I wouldn’t be able to put up with the pain for too much longer. I was edging towards the final stage of my training. I was so close to graduating that I kept pushing myself. There was one more test to complete: the dreaded 4-kilometre run.

  THE 4-KILOMETRE RUN test was the bane of my existence. I had attempted it several times before, but was unable to pass. I failed the first test by one minute, the second test by twenty seconds, and the third by two minutes. I was heartbroken. Failing that test meant that I could not complete the training alongside my mates, and that I would be sent to Digger James platoon for remedial training. I would then be back-classed to another, more junior platoon once my foot healed, and I would not graduate with my friends.

  My foot and ankle were killing me so I was sent to the medical centre for treatment. There was not much they could do about the stress fractures. The only thing for it was to rest and let them heal naturally. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the time to let them heal. I had to keep going. I didn’t want to be back-classed to another platoon. But I had no say in the matter. The doctors gave me a chit (a medical advice form) to rest my foot for the next three days, which meant I wouldn’t be allowed to do any drill or fitness training.