A nice editorial from the Washington Post…. I lost many of my civilian friends when Paul left for Afghanistan because they didn’t support the war and couldn’t make the leap to support him as a soldier and us as a military family. It baffles me that people can’t see that the reason they have the […]

By Seth Robson / Stars and Stripes While the Army has been working to gauge the mental health toll of multiple deployments on soldiers, some Army leaders and spouses say the service is moving too slowly to address similar effects on military family members. Spouses face day-to-day pressure while soldiers are away and very little is […]

The 4th is the celebration of America declaring its independence from the British, and bringing the Revolutionary War to a close. This day marks what we celebrate as “America’s Birthday” and the beginning of a nation that has one of the longest standing constitutions in the world. In 1870 the US Congress declared the 4th […]

Here’s a post by Sarah Gilbert, who’s husband is an Army reservist deployed to Afghanistan. She writes honestly about how the financial windfall associated with a deployment helped her family. You can read the original story here. I don’t know whether it was minutes or hours or even a day: the time it took me […]

Aside from being away from loved ones, deployments share a key common feature: their varied pace. Know throughout the military as operational tempo or simply “op tempo,” and defined as how busy any given person or unit is during their time deployed. While everyone’s deployed jobs and experiences are different, the fact is that no […]

My husband recently came back from Iraq after a seven month deployment. Even though this was our fourth deployment, I think this home coming was the most nerve racking of them all. It was the first time we had our own home while he was gone. So I felt a lot of pressure to have […]

I’m re-posting a wonderful entry from a woman living through deployment and musing about marrying her soldier. You can see her blog here. I don’t know any military spouses who haven’t had moments of ‘I can’t do this,’ or worse still, ‘I don’t want to do this.’ Certaintly I felt that way plenty during Paul’s […]

Deployments aren’t easy, whether it is to a combat zone or to another country, but with the information age in full swing communications with your deployed service member is easier than ever.  The Internet has brought us communication tools such as e-mail, instant messaging, Skype, and Facebook, and with these tools the amount, type, and […]

  Last month I was chatting with a few other families while waiting oh so patiently to see my husband’s unit get home.  Two sets of parents, both whose sons were returning from their first deployments, asked me if deployments ever get easier.  I smiled a bit and responded “unfortunately no”.      It never gets easier […]

Attention Oregon National Guard Spouses & Friends: Lane Community College offers new Deployment classes!   Holding Down the Homefront: A Guide for Spouses   Based on the Army’s Battlemind training for spouses and her own work with military families as a Certified Professional Life Coach, Katie Dyer – National Guard wife and Founder of Heroes […]