Amna Nawaz: After 24 years in the army, Quinton McNair returned home to Chicago and found himself struggling to adjust to civilian life. But an unexpected hobby helped him discover a new sense of mission. He shares his brief but spectacular take on finding purpose after the military.

Quinton McNair: I joined the army for all the wrong reasons. I wasn't joining to be patriotic. I wasn't joining to serve my country. I was joining to run away from my problems.

We all know Chicago gets a bad name, and I lived in some of the areas where that bad name comes from. There was a lot of gang activity going on there. I was one of the few people who were not in the gang. Walking to school every day without protection from either side. I used to get jumped.

That all affected my grades and growing up in the area. And it was a real hard time for me. Basically, I joined the army to get away from the city and probably pretty much to save my life. 24 years in the army, I did just about everything and went everywhere. Between Kosovo and Bosnia and then Iraq and Afghanistan, I think my military career, I deployed between nine and 11 times. I get out of the military in 2019. I retire. I come home to the city that I ran from.

Everywhere I looked, something had changed. I didn't have the close friends support of the people that I built in the military. I felt like a stranger in my home city. Diagnosed with PTSD and depression. Now that I have all this free time, I'm sitting at home. I'm looking for a job. And now all of the intrusive thoughts that I had pushed down while I were in the military were coming up. I found a job as a HR manager. I wanted to do something where I dressed up or I became, you know, something different than I had been for the past 24 years. Not knowing that, you know, that transition was going to be hard for me. Baking became like the therapy that I needed to get through that very hard time in my life.

So, when I first started posting pictures of what I was creating online, I would hashtag at struggle beard bakery because of the struggle with my mental health to making fun of myself with my beard and the products really looked like they were on a struggle bus. But then I got very very good at it. It went from being this therapy to this hobby to something that I wanted to share with other people. So, I decided to turn Struggle Berry Bakery into an actual business. To all my battle buddies who are still in the military, you're kind of anxious about what's going to happen on the other end. Couple of things that is going to help you out immensely. Get that help.

Don't let your PTSD, don't let your trauma just sit. Don't try to mask it. Actively go through the stages of getting some help. Also, you are highly skilled. The time management that you learn in the military highly, highly useful and highly valuable in the civilian world. A soldier will try to figure something out with what little resources that they have. That is invaluable in a workplace. Your people management skills. You've learned how to manage people in some of the hardest situations and some of the craziest places.

An office building should be nothing to you after you manage a squad in Iraq or in Afghanistan. You already have the training. You already have the knowhow. You just have to show it to the world. My name is Quincy McNair and this is my brief but spectacular take on how to find your purpose after the military.