Terilyn Tamayo

Share your military spouse story:
My husband and I were together 2 years before he joined the Marine Corps. At just 17 years old with a 3 year old and newborn in tow, we moved to California for his first duty station. This first experience of moving away from home when I had previously never even left the state showed me the resiliency that would be required of me to endure this lifestyle. Little did I know that I wouldn’t just “endure” this lifestyle but I would love it. 18 years, Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea, Philippines, 3 children, 6 duty stations, 3 OCONUS moves later and although it wasn’t always easy, I loved every minute of it and sharing it with my best friend. I have been blessed to have met many amazing people through my military spouse journey over the last 18 years who have become like family to me, each one imparting something that has made me the strong, resilient person I am today. As a military spouse, my husband’s career has taken me to many states and military bases and I have truly found a love for volunteering with the military and civilian communities. Getting to meet new people and learn about new cultures that I get to carry with me and share everywhere I go brings joy to my heart. Being from Hawai’i and Okinawan I love sharing my culture with other people. I have learned through the years that by spreading your roots throughout the local host community that you live in at each duty station helps give you a sense of belonging and it fosters a great relationship between military families and the local community.

Share an example of your leadership experience within the military community:
Throughout my time as a military spouse, I have had amazing opportunities in leadership roles throughout the community. I started off with my children’s school being the Vice-President of the PTO helping to coordinate family events for the students as well as support the staff and faculty of the school. A big portion of this volunteer work was organizing fundraisers to fund these endeavors. I was later afforded the opportunity to be the President of the school board for two consecutive years. In this role, I was able to be a voice for the community to raise concerns. I was also a FRA during my husband’s second tour as a Drill Instructor. In this leadership role, I was able to support spouses through their husbands’ tour and develop a sense of community within the company. I was Parliamentarian and Community Outreach for the Parris Island Spouses Club where my main role besides a parliamentary was to foster a good relationship with the community.

Describe your involvement in the military community:
I love the feeling I get when I am able to contribute in a way that is meaningful to me. I often seek out volunteer opportunities on and off base. I attend school improvement council meetings for my children’s school in order to be a more actively involved parent and contribute to the improvement of their school in any way that I can. I stay actively involved in the spouses clubs/association for both bases. I enjoy getting to attend Command sponsored events to get to know the Marines and their families to ensure they feel supported and foster a relationship that makes them feel comfortable enough to reach out if they need support.

Describe how you support your community:
I enjoy supporting my community through my volunteer work. I enjoy being involved with both of the local spouses club in order to best help in supporting my community. It gives me the opportunity to support other spouses as well as the local community through spouse club events and volunteer events hosted by the spouses club. I frequently volunteer at MCCS events on both bases. I also volunteer with the marching band that my children are a part of at Battery Creek High School by chaperoning the many events that they perform at throughout the community to include parades and festivals.

What do you advocate for? Why?
One thing I feel the most passionate about at each duty station is learning the history and the culture of the area. I encourage everyone that I meet to immerse themselves in the community as we are so blessed to be sent to places by the Marine Corps and the Marine Corps is blessed to have many beautiful duty stations. In these duty stations, there are rich cultures. As military families we come from a diverse melting pot of cultures, being able to share our cultures is such a unique and enlightening experience. We can give back to our host communities in such a meaningful way with our time and love through education and volunteering. As military families, we are often far from our biological families and it’s easy to find families in our military community but I advocate for spreading our roots into our host community to be able to grow a love for it that we can share with all the families to come and take it with us to spread to all the places that the Marine Corps sends us next.

How have you spread the message of your platform/advocacy?
By being actively involved in my military community, I am able to share my experiences as well as opportunities for other spouses to join me in volunteer events to support the community. I enjoy connecting spouses with volunteer opportunities within the local community that they would enjoy. I love attending community events in order to network and create relationships that would help me be able to provide other spouses with opportunities to be involved with the community. In previous years, I would volunteer to be a part of a spouse‘s panel in order to share these insights and opportunities with spouses that were new to the area. Recently, the air station here in Beaufort has started a new meet and greet that I sometimes get the opportunity to attend with the Military Spouse Association Beaufort and I enjoy getting to advocate my cause there.

What do you hope to accomplish with the AFI Military Spouse of the Year^® title?
With the AFI military spouse of the year title, I would hope to continue spreading my message of advocacy for fostering, a strong relationship between military spouses and families and the communities that host us. Often times as military families we can feel lonely when moving to a new duty station. I am all too familiar with that feeling of loneliness and it is my hope that through advocating for more community involvement I can share a joy and love for the community that prevents other military spouses and families from feeling that same feeling of loneliness. Spreading our roots through helping our host communities can help it feel a little bit more like home.