Cedar Rapids mom worried while awaiting word from Ft. Hood son

Sheryl Dunshee, 42, of southwest Cedar Rapids, was watching TV when the programming cut to reporters saying there was a shooting at Fort Hood in Texas.

Her son, Specialist Mathew Carlson, 24, his wife Abby, and their three children lived on base with 40,000 other soldiers and family members at the Texan military base. Like any mother, she began to worry.

“I saw it and I immediately jumped to my feet and started pacing,” Dunshee said. “I was wondering and worrying the worst, terrible.”

She spent the next hours on Facebook, communicating with her sister and her niece in the area. It was hours before she got a hold of her daughter-in-law and was told everyone was OK. To say she was relieved would be an understatement.

“My first reaction was disbelief that this could happen,” she said. “I've been there, I've seen how the soldiers down there… they're all family down there. They're brothers.”

Luckily, Carlson, who works on base as a military police officer, was nowhere near the shooting. He was at work with his company when they were told they were on lockdown.

“I've been there for a year-and-a-half and I've never seen a lockdown,” Carlson said. “We didn't know what was happening, maybe it was a drill.”

A half hour later they turned on the TV and saw the news. Carlson was as shocked as his mother back in Iowa.

“This is the last thing I thought would ever happen,” Carlson said. “I had heard things throughout the war… but never in our own minds did we actually think something like this could have happened.”

Carlson said he and the other 40,000 soldiers and employees on base have tomorrow off. He said it's a day for reflection, for comforting and for prayer.

Carlson added: “We are all handling it really well.”