‘9/11 changed our lives’: Gold Star spouse and Army veteran reflects on the attacks and the impact on military families
By LINDA F. HERSEY STARS AND STRIPES Published September 10, 2026
Kimberly and Brian Hazelgrove were a dual military couple who served together in the Army, met on active duty at Fort Campbell, Ky., and married in 1999 while on deployment in South Korea. Although the couple soon started a family while stationed stateside, they each had aspirations and planned for long careers in the military. But the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks against the U.S. refocused their duties, upended domestic routines and made life harder for them as a married military couple responding to unpredictable deployments across multiple war zones.
“9/11 changed our whole lives from the moment it happened. Everything we had known prior as a dual military couple didn’t exist,” said Hazelgrove, who was deployed to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and served on an intelligence team in the months after the attacks 25 years ago.
Kimberly was a sergeant who worked as an intelligence analyst, and Brian was a chief warrant officer training as a helicopter pilot. Like many other military couples, the Hazelgroves endured back-to-back deployments.
“There was a lot of time away from each other and from our children,” said Kimberly, referring to the couple’s own two small children, as well as Brian’s two school-age children, who lived in another state.
“Everything was focused on the next steps to defend the country and hunt down those responsible for the tragedy of 9/11,” Hazelgrove said.
Kimberly and Brian Hazelgrove attended a military celebration connected to Brian’s training and graduation in 2002 from Army helicopter pilot school in Fort Rucker, Ala. Brian died in January 2004 in a helicopter crash in Iraq. (Kimberly Hazelgrove) In 2003, the Hazelgroves were stationed at Fort Drum, N.Y., where Brian flew OH-58D Kiowa Warrior helicopters with the 10th Mountain Division. He received orders to deploy to Iraq in November. Three months into that mission, Brian died in an accident while supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom. The helicopter he piloted crashed on Jan. 23, 2004, shortly after takeoff near Mosul, Iraq. Brian was 29 years old. Their youngest daughter, Katelyn, was just 6 months old.
Hazelgrove then made the hard choice to transition out of the military to become a full-time parent. For the next 25 years, she raised their two children as a single mother. “I lost my career, as well as the no-cost health benefits I had before,” she said. The sudden death of her husband — combined with the loss of spousal benefits — reshaped Hazelgrove’s life and became the catalyst for her grassroots advocacy for widowed spouses such as herself.
In 2024, she was a charter founding member of Gold Star Spouses of America.
“The attacks of 9/11 created a generation of Gold Star families. This year’s 25th anniversary lands in the middle of a new war in Iran, and a new generation of Gold Star families is being created right now,” according to the organization."
Between 1.9 million and 3 million U.S. service members deployed to conflicts in the Middle East as part of the U.S.-led global war on terrorism launched after the Sept. 11 attacks, according to the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University. By 2021, U.S. military operations to counter international terrorism had resulted in more than 7,000 U.S. military fatalities and over 53,000 personnel wounded in action, according to the institute. Gold Star Spouses, a nonprofit, supports and advocates for surviving military spouses — men and women — and their children. Hazelgrove serves as vice president.
In the months and years after Brian’s death, Hazelgrove became active in a grassroots movement to reinstate vital military spousal benefits that Congress had stripped away decades earlier. Known as the “widow’s tax,” the 1972 law reduced a widowed spouse’s Survivor Benefit Plan payment, dollar-for-dollar, by the amount received from the Dependency and Indemnity Compensation, run by the Department of Veterans Affairs. SBP is an annuity that service members pay into from their retirement pay Kimberly Hazelgrove is shown in 2003 in her official Army photo.
Hazelgrove served from 1995 to 2004, achieving the rank of sergeant first class, when she left the military. (Kimberly Hazelgrove) Hazelgrove joined other surviving military spouses to lobby and testify before Congress to repeal the measure, sometimes bringing her two children with her. “I was told there was no money. [Lawmakers] said we know it’s wrong, ethically and morally, but there was no money.” But she and other activists kept pushing. In 2017, Hazelgrove traveled to Capitol Hill, met President Donald Trump, who was in his first term, and also spoke with then-Vice President Mike Pence. Congress repealed the offset in the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act.
“It was life changing for me and my family. We were near poverty,” Hazelgrove said. “I’m still digging out of debt.”
Hazelgrove said that her advocacy work with Gold Star Spouses is her life mission. She said that the work enables her to provide for other widowed spouses the support that was often lacking after her husband died.
“When you’re a survivor, there is no infrastructure in local communities, which is what Gold Star Spouses is growing,”Hazelgrove said.
“We as Americans pledge to honor the fallen soldiers. But the sacrifices and losses that their families experience are often unseen and not recognized.”
Gold Star Spouses is now focused on increasing the base rate for military dependency and indemnity compensation, which has not had a real-value increase since 1993. The tax-free monthly payments are provided by the Department of Veterans Affairs to eligible survivors of military members and veterans who died from service-connected injuries and illnesses. Several bills pending in Congress would provide for higher compensation and bring the benefit level closer to other federal programs that support survivors, she said.
“I am challenging my brothers and sisters who’ve worn the uniform to please don’t just honor my husband. Honoring him means remembering us, too,” Hazelgrove said.
Read more at: https://www.stripes.com/history/2026-09-10/gold-star-spouse-army-veteran-9-11-22809847.html
Source - Stars and Stripes
