Pull Up a Sandbag — Veteran Retreats, Phuket, Thailand
Real Veterans. Real conversations.
Pull Up a Sandbag exists because leaving the military doesn't just mean losing a job. For many veterans, it means losing routine, identity and the people who understood them without explanation.
We create small retreats in Phuket, Thailand, where veterans can slow down, spend time together and have the conversations that rarely happen once the uniform comes off.
"Pull up a sandbag" is what you'd say when someone needed to sit down and talk. That's still the idea.
There are no lectures. No clinical setting. No pressure to open up. Just veterans spending time with veterans.
Everything we do is built around genuine connection. Sometimes that happens over coffee. Sometimes during a boat trip, around a fire, or while walking through an elephant sanctuary. The activity isn't the point. It simply creates the space for conversations that might never happen otherwise.
Pull Up a Sandbag was founded by someone who served in Afghanistan and understands that transition isn't something you finish when you hand your kit back. It can take years to work out who you are once the military no longer tells you.
We're not here to fix people. We're here to create the kind of environment where veterans can reconnect — with themselves, with each other, and with the version of themselves they've been trying to find since leaving service.
Built by a veteran, for veterans.
Pull Up a Sandbag is run by Jody, a veteran with deployment experience in Afghanistan, who brings that lived perspective into every part of the programme — not as a credential, but as the reason this exists at all.
The retreats are governed by three trustees handling oversight, registration, and safeguarding, while Jody runs delivery on the ground in Phuket. The aim is a fully funded, peer-supported retreat model — and eventually, support for the families bereaved by veteran loss too.
Three frameworks. One Lego table. A week to put it together.
Every retreat weaves together three respected psychometric tools — not as a tick-box exercise, but as a structured way to help veterans see their own strengths clearly, often for the first time since service.
Gallup CliftonStrengths
Sent ahead of the retreat so each veteran arrives already knowing their top strengths — ready to build on rather than discover from scratch.
MBTI, Facilitated
Worked through together on-site, in conversation rather than alone with a results page — the real value is in talking it through.
VIA Character Strengths
Completed during the retreat itself, adding a third lens on character — separate from skill or personality type.
Lego Serious Play
All three profiles come together in a hands-on Lego Serious Play session — veterans build a physical model of where they stand, which tends to surface things a worksheet never would.
Wheel of Life
Run during the camping segment, connecting the lowest-scoring areas of life to the strengths already identified — a practical bridge between insight and the next step.
Service doesn't end with the conversation — retreats include community outreach in the local area.
Sunshine Village, Phuket
Every retreat includes a visit to Sunshine Village, a local home for vulnerable children in Phuket. Veterans spend the day interacting and playing sport with the children, then serve the funded dinner alongside the staff who care for them year-round.
Each visit, Pull Up a Sandbag donates ฿9,000 to help feed 93 children and the 10 nannies and mothers who look after them.
Training, talking, and everything in between.
No two days look the same — Muay Thai, yoga, and camping under the night sky in the hills of Phang Nga. The schedule changes; the conversations don't stop.
The full cohort, hillside lookout
Muay Thai training
Morning yoga session
Retreat Reflections
Every cohort sits down at the end of the week and talks honestly about what the retreat gave them — no script, no editing the hard parts out. Those conversations, alongside the Lego Serious Play reflections and the everyday moments of each retreat, live on the Pull Up a Sandbag YouTube channel.
It exists for two reasons: so veterans thinking about coming on a retreat can see exactly what it's really like before they sign up, and so the wider community can hear these stories told straight, by the people who lived them.
Watch the Reflections on YouTube →Fund the Next
Retreat
Every retreat is currently funded through Ko-fi support, YouTube revenue, and community donations — 100% of profit goes straight back into running the next one. No funds are paid to the founder personally.
Donate via Ko-fi →
Set up at Campsite #1, Athi Camping