Before my husband's second deployment, I worried about telling my boys that he would be leaving again. The first deployment was a tough one. What I didn't expect was my youngest son to say, "We survived the first time so this one will be much easier!" And he was right, the second deployment seemed easier for them. It was much harder for me.
An article in yesterday's New York Times by James Dao, "Deployment Takes Toll on Military's Children," addresses a recent study that explains why my boys might have had an easier time and why poor mom had it a little rougher.
During my husband's first deployment in support of Operation Freedom, I made an attempt to help the time pass quickly. I filled our calendar with trips and visits to family. In some ways, my plan backfired. Although we did have fun, our enjoyment was colored by their father's absence. Many times, my boys would say, "Oh, this is great! But I wish Dad was here." Visits home to family or good friends often turned into a question and answer session about deployment,
How's your Dad? - Uh, fine, I guess.
How are you holding up? - Uh, fine, I guess.
Isn't the time passing quickly? - silence
For the second deployment, I decided to stick close to our local military base. We were far from family this time but the boys had their own activities to help the time pass in a somewhat normal fashion. They were also older and very firmly stated that they wanted to hang out with friends. It worked for us, somewhat. Honestly, they didn't talk as much about their dad because we weren't seeing people who constantly asked about him. But the emotional toll was quite clear. I spent many an evening comforting my youngest son as he cried in his pillow. And I finally took my oldest son to see a counselor so he could figure out how to control a stress induced tic that became worse whenever his dad deployed or before we moved.
Monday's article in the New York Times just reminded me how normal we really are for a military family:
The study by the RAND Corporation found that children in military families were more likely to report anxiety than children in the general population. The researchers also found that the longer a parent had been deployed in the previous three years, the more likely their children were to have difficulties in school and at home.
Those difficulties included things like missing school activities, feeling that people did not understand their problems, having to take care of siblings and struggling to deal with parents returning from deployment.
As I read the article, I was surprised to read:
Anita Chandra, the primary investigator, said she was surprised by the correlation between the months a parent was deployed and the problems reported by their children. “We thought the challenges of deployment would wane as the deployment went on,” Ms. Chandra said in an interview.
It made perfect sense to me that kids have more difficulty the longer a parent is deployed. Although we find coping mechanisms and strategies for dealing with deployment, children and spouses feel that long term build up of stress. A long time ago, before the word deployment was commonly used, my husband left us for a few months tour of duty in Turkey. He was unavailable - no phones, no computers, no snail mail. My oldest son was 3 years old at the time and we thought he wasn't old enough to experience stress. We were wrong. Every few weeks, he would wake up and need to vomit even when he had nothing in his stomach. After multiple tests, the doctors determined that the symptoms were stress induced. Just as I was ready to take him to a counselor, his dad returned home. The symptoms disappeared. They had been getting progressively worse the longer his dad was gone and then, overnight, he was suddenly better.
In the article, Dao also points out
The study also found that many families encountered difficulties adjusting to the return of a deployed parent, a period known as reintegration.
For instance, Ms. Chandra said, the researchers found that caregivers who worked were more likely to report that their children were having problems during reintegration than caregivers who did not work. The vast majority of those caregivers were women.
We've always taken vacation as soon as my husband returns. We leave the house and go away together. It's a mini-reintegration vacation. But we're lucky. I don't work outside the home so I have the freedom of an open schedule. We homeschool our children, so we can decide our own school schedule. The vast majority of military families cannot make this choice. Working spouses can have a difficult time arranging for vacation. Very often, they've had to use many days while their spouse is deployed. They've essentially been single parents and those extra days are hard to come by. And, although some schools have a lenient absentee program for children of recently returned military, many do not. And for those that do, kids are still expected to keep up with the rest of the class. Many bring home school work. Doesn't make for much of a vacation with mom and dad.
At the end of the article, I was most disturbed by this comment:
Ms. Chandra said the study suggested that the military should consider directing services to families during the later stages of long deployments, when more families report problems.
First of all, the military should provide services during all times of deployment. With a strong support system built at the beginning of separation, it is possible to make the end a little more manageable. However, the military waits far too long to put any support system in place. We depend too much on squadron commanders, first sergeants, and their spouses to provide the necessary support. Most squadrons are all ready overworked. And families aren't very good about making friends when the military member leaves - that community building needs to happen before deployment, not during.
Second of all, the military shouldn't not be doing this by itself. The military budget does not have enough funds to fully support our deployed families. The system relies on a few paid staff members, some active duty, some civilian. But it is primarily built on the service of volunteers. And guess who those volunteers are? They are the very spouses of military members, the ones that have just finished a separation, just getting ready for one, or are smack dab in the middle of it. They may also have just moved or be getting ready to move. Stress is never ending when you are married to a military member.
So, I hope you are asking, what can I do to help? I think it is the responsibility of our civilian community to go out and find the military members living near by. Find out if you have a local military base and call their family support center and ask what you can do to help. No base? Then you likely have families of reserve or guard nearby. It won't be easy to track them down, but it won't happen if you don't start. Hold a neighborhood potluck and start asking around. Look for the yellow ribbons and the blue service stars in windows. Knock on a door and say, "Hi, I'm your neighbor down the street." Please remember that military families are as varied as the rest of the population. We might meet you with a little skepticism at first. But keep trying.
Here are a few things that you can do:
Say "Hello!"
Get to know us! Invite us over for drinks or a cup of coffee.
Deliver some fresh baked cookies or muffins
Mow a lawn or shovel a sidewalk (thank you Bob in Utah!)
Offer to read books to younger kids
Offer to help with homework for older kids
Volunteer at a school where there is a large military population
Once you get to know a family, give mom or dad a break and watch the kids for an afternoon.
Not a hand's on person? Then donate - military families are not known for having a large disposable income. They often need food, diapers, and gas money. Especially the younger families. Contact the family support center or the base chaplain to make donations. They'll know the families most in need.
Our family is still recovering from the last deployment. My husband has been home for a few months and we can sometimes pretend he was never gone. But issues still crop up. We're a family that talks so I think we'll be okay. I'm not so sure about the rest of us.