50 years on, Karen Sutcliffe still remembers the day she enlisted in the Canadian military

It's been 50 years but Karen Sutcliffe still remembers the day she enlisted in the Canadian military like it was yesterday.

Sutcliffe, 67, enlisted on Oct. 5, 1971, serving in a reserve unit after training in the Canadian military as an infantryman.

"My father took me to the Armoury in Montreal with the Black Watch.. walked me in and signed me up," said Sutcliffe. "I was 16 years old. It was the proudest day of my life." 

She said she was only weeks away from turning 17 when she signed up. The minimum age to join the Canadian military is 17 years old, with parental consent.

Sutcliffe, who is from Montreal, now lives at a retirement home in Windsor.

"I'm a long way from home. Home was Montreal. I came here to retire," she said.

Sutcliffe said while she did not serve on the front line, there were some tough days.

"I was trained by the Black Watch to be an infantry soldier, so I was trained to go on the front line. I didn't actively serve in any wars except the Cold War, which sometimes wasn't too cold," she said.

The bad times were scary. There were times when I would rather have been anywhere  else, but the good times were the times you remember with friends, co-workers  sitting at a bar having a drink. Those are the good times.- Karen Sutcliffe

Sutcliffe said her "toughest day" involved a riot in Montreal. She was a part of team dealing with the aftermath of the FLQ (Front de libération du Québec) October Crisis.

"I had to be on the line with a rifle, potentially to kill some of my fellow citizens," she said.

"Luckily, I didn't have to but it was a potential." 

Noting that it was "a hard day," Sutcliffe said she and many other soldiers ended up with post-traumatic stress disorder. 

"The bad times were scary. There were times when I would rather have been anywhere  else, but the good times were the times you remember with friends, co-workers, sitting at a bar having a drink. Those are the good times" she said.

Sutcliffe also said the men she served with "were generally pretty good about it." 

"They gave me the chance and I took it that I had a chance to do something no woman in Montreal had done at the time, which was serving with an infantry unit." 

Sutcliffe said she lost her husband in December but now has her service dog Bailey "to care" for her. Bailey is specially trained to help Sutcliffe battle PTSD.

"She has saved my life. She's a post-traumatic stress disorder disorder dog, which means when she senses stress, she'll get up and protect me, care for me," Sutcliffe. "Not that she would bite anybody, but just that she will help protect me."

For Remembrance Day, Sutcliffe wants people to know that service dogs work, and they should consider supporting organizations that support service dogs.

"They are out there and they make a difference," she said.