It took years for former Army Staff Sgt. Choi Woo-ri to return to uniform. Leaving the military was never about giving up her dream. It was a decision she made for her family after she and her husband, both career soldiers, struggled to balance military service with raising their three young children. “My discharge wasn’t giving up on my dream. It was simply putting it on hold,” Choi said in an interview with The Korea Times. Choi, who now serves as a long-term standing reservist with the Army’s 60th Infantry Division, said she had wanted to be a soldier since childhood. Her father, a former reconnaissance battalion soldier, was her biggest role model, while lessons from an elementary school teacher about serving the nation left a lasting impression. Learning about the 2010 sinking of ROKS Cheonan while working as a security officer in her early 20s cemented her decision to enlist. Becoming an Army noncommissioned officer in 2011, Choi spent years doing what she had always dreamed of before stepping away from military service to focus on her family. Even after leaving the Army, howe