Welcome Home - A Podcast for Veterans, About Veterans, By Veterans
Welcome Home is a Willing Warriors and the Warrior Retreat at Bull Run project. The program highlights activities at the Warrior Retreat and issues impacting all Veterans. For questions or feedback, please email us at podcast@willingwarriors.org.
Episodes
158 episodes
Military Spouse Survival Kit
Your spouse raises a right hand, and suddenly, your whole life has a new rulebook. Larry Zilliox, Director of Culinary Services at the Warrior Retreat at Bull Run, sits down with Kayla LaFond, military spouse liaison for the
A Community Car Show That Funds Healing at the Warrior Retreat
A great car can stop you in your tracks, but a great car show can do more than that. We’re joined by Chuck Berge, board member at Willing Warriors and the team lead behind Vettes For Willi...
From Service to Survival: The Fight for Veteran Healing
The fastest way to lose your footing after the military is to lose your people and then pretend you’re fine. Host Larry Zilliox sits down with Navy Veteran Jordyn Jureczki, CEO of Frontline Heal...
How A Combat Injury Led To A Fitness Mission For Veterans
A locked Marine recruiter door turned into an Army career, and an IED in Afghanistan turned that career into a fight to rebuild a life. I’m joined by Jason Smith, a retired Army infantryman, double amputee, and ambassador for
What If Belonging Is The Best Medicine For Veterans
A lot of veteran suicide prevention talk gets complicated fast. This conversation stays refreshingly direct: isolation kills, connection protects, and a well-run event can be the difference between shutting down and showing up. I’m Larry Zillio...
Transition Out Of The Military Is Harder Than People Admit
Stop Loss. That single policy changed thousands of military timelines overnight, and it changed Jonathan Tennis, too. Jonathan is a prior-service Army intelligence specialist who served through the post-9/11 shift, and he joins us at the Warrio...
Priorities Shaping Veterans’ Benefits and Care
What does it take to turn a veteran’s story into law that actually changes lives? We sit down with Jess Finucan, a retired Air Force Senior Master Sergeant and now the Director of Policy and advocacy at Iraq an...
Women Veterans And Toxic Exposures
Burn pits and jet fuel aren’t just headlines; they’re lived experiences that can follow veterans for years. We sit down with Dr. Maheen Adamson (Research Director) and Dr. Jennifer Jennings (Clinical Director), two VA physicians leading the
Inside The Stories Bringing Veterans’ Service To Young Readers
A single word on a headstone—Unknown—sent author Jeff Gottesfeld on a path to write children’s books that carry the weight of service with grace. Today, we sit down with Jeff to trace that path from 21 Steps: G...
Inside The Coast Guard Foundation’s Lifelines For Families
When a cutter launches into a storm or a helicopter hovers over a capsized hull, the story we don’t see is the family at home watching the radar, praying for their service member going into harm's way, or the kid who just switched schools again...
Brain Injury Is A Journey
What if recovery felt less like appointments and more like belonging? We sit down with Donna Meltzer, CEO of Brain Injury Services in Fairfax, to unpack why “brain injury is a journey” and how a purpos...
How One Combat Medic Built A Lifeline For Women Veterans
The most powerful sentence in today’s conversation is also the simplest: “Actually, she’s the veteran.” We sit down with Brooke Jackson Kahn—Army combat medic, neurosurgery PA, and founder of She’s the Vete...
Inside The Marine Raider Foundation: Care, Community, Continuity
The quiet work after the mission often decides whether a family bends or breaks. We sit down with Marine Raider Foundation CEO Jessica McAndrews to open the door on a community that rarely seeks...
From Underserved To Seen: Holistic Support For Women Veterans
Too many women who served are still asked to fight for basic recognition before they can access care. We sit down with Virginia Giordano, CEO and founder of the Barbara Giordano Foundation, to e...
Building On A Decade Of Healing At The Warrior Retreat
Ten years in, the Warrior Retreat at Bull Run stands on stories that still move us—volunteers who swung the first hammers, families who found rest here, and a community that showed up in sunshine and storms. We take that history and turn it int...
Green Berets, Still On Mission
The question we ask is simple: Who watches the warriors when their war is over? Larry sits down with Denny Caballero, a former Green Beret and media entrepreneur, to explore how the Special Forces ...
From Combat To Community: How "The Battle Within" Supports Veterans And First Responders
A Purple Heart veteran turned advocate, Justin Hoover knows what it takes to look tough at work and feel lost at home. We sat down with the CEO of The Battle Within to unpack practical ways veteran...
Chest Candy, A Veteran’s Quiet Battle to Come Home
A 17-minute film shouldn’t feel this big, but Chest Candy lingers like a conversation you’ve needed for years. We sit down with writer-director-actor Robert Golphin to unpack the st...
How A Navy Admiral Turned Hard-Won Lessons Into A Playbook For Ethical Leadership
A two-star admiral sits down with us and lays out a clear, unvarnished blueprint for leadership, mission success, and the China challenge—no buzzwords, no hedging. Mike Studeman hoped to fly after reading Flight of the Intruder, landed in intel...
A Year In Service: The Warrior Retreat at Bull Run 2025 Recap
Ten years can bring about significant healing. We open the doors to the Warrior Retreat at Bull Run and walk through a year where a 37-acre sanctuary, a pair of five-bedroom homes, ...
How A Veteran Hockey Team Builds Tribe, Health, And Hope
Some stories hit like a clean snap pass: direct, fast, and aimed at the open ice ahead. That is the energy we bring to our conversation with Pete Perzel, president of the Capitol Beltway Warriors
How Team Rubicon Mobilizes Veterans And Civilians For Disaster Relief
The call comes after a storm, a flood, or a wildfire—and before the dust settles, the gray shirts are already moving. We sit down with Evan Farley, Northern Virginia Metro Field Operations Coordinator for T...
From Isolation To Impact: Building Support Beyond the VA with CJ3 Foundation
A quiet question—why choose the Army?—opens into a candid story of injury, recovery, and purpose with Eric Thomas, founder of CJ3 Foundation. We dig into how a veteran and first responder-led nonprofit t...
Inside Fisher House: How Free Lodging Keeps Veterans’ Families Close
What if a warm, welcoming home sat steps away from the hospital where your loved one is fighting to heal—and it cost your family nothing? We open the door to Fisher House, the nationwide network of free lo...
Supporting Servicewomen Through Moral Injury Care
Moral injury isn’t a buzzword or a rebrand of Post Traumatic Stress. It’s what happens when military service members face actions and events that violate their core values, or when the institutions and leaders they trusted fail them. We sit dow...