Chief Navy Counselor Desiree Rivers left her hometown of Everett to join the U.S. Navy in March 1997.
On her first assignment, she was one of just 13 women aboard a ship of 300 sailors. Rivers recalled a chief rolling his eyes and making a comment about not needing another woman on the ship.
“It was the pride that I wasn’t going to quit,” Rivers said. “I could not let someone say that I couldn’t do it, because I knew I could.”
The U.S. Navy Office of Community Outreach shared Rivers’ story to mark Women’s History Month in March.
She told the Navy reporter that she used those negative moments to fuel her movement up the ranks. At one point, she was one of very few women to serve at a submarine support command in Pearl Harbor, at a time when women were not authorized to serve on submarines.
Rivers now serves aboard the Bremerton-based USS Nimitz. She said she has stayed in the service because she is proud to be an example to her children, to inspire other women, and because it is what makes her happy.
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