Why the Military Life Isn’t Like Any Other Life
The military life is a unique life. It just is. Saying it is “just like any other life” doesn’t make any sense.
I wish serving in the military was just like any other job, but it isn’t.
I wish my husband hadn’t missed my son’s birth and pretty much his entire first year. Most parents don’t have to do that, and the thought of doing so would be unbelievable. But missing a whole year of a child’s life is not uncommon in the military world.
I wish that none of my friends ever had to PCS. Saying goodbye to your good friends is the worst. While everyone does experience friends moving away, or even moving themselves, the military does so on a regular basis. This is one of the many things we experience as a military spouse.
I wish serving in the military was just like any other job, but it isn’t.
I wish my husband had been able to have been there during the difficult years of adapting to an autism diagnosis. That was such a difficult time for us. My son really did need two parents in the house but he only had one. I did the best that I could, but there was a big loss there, one that was felt by all of us.
I wish so many spouses were not hurting because of a military-related loss. I have friends whose husbands never came home from deployments. I have friends whose husbands came home, only to be completely different people. There are so many military families out there struggling, trying to heal from the wounds of war, whatever they might be.
I wish serving in the military was just like any other job, but it isn’t.
I wish that when war was being talked about I could just ignore it because it didn’t affect me at all. But it does. What the US does overseas affects us, military families, greatly. There is no way to turn that off. We can’t do that like others can. We can’t just ignore it. We worry about war, new wars, and wars we have been in for years.
I am not sure where the idea came from that military life is simply a job, just like any other job. While there are plenty of other difficult jobs out there, each with their own struggles, the military life is a unique life, not like any other. And that is why we have the support systems we do.
As military spouses, we simply can’t go through this life alone. We need our people. Whether our people is a group of friends, a best friend that we can always talk to, or online friends we met through a support group. We reach out because we need to find people who understand what being a military spouse is all about, or at least listen to us as we make our way through this life.
The military affects the whole family. In one way or another.
As a National Guard spouse, I can go for periods of time without thinking about the military. But then, I hear about summer AT dates, or possible deployments. I wash his uniform and I remember every time I had to say goodbye to him while he was wearing it. The military is always there.
When my husband was active duty, deploying over and over, the military was even more so in our lives. When they told us my husband might have to deploy, days before my due date. When he was overseas and the deployment got extended, so he would be gone for over a year.
When duty calls, they must go, and we as spouses support them as they do.
The military is very much a part of our lives, there is no way to deny that. This is a completely different experience than a spouse who works a more typical 9-5 job. The military life is its own beast, for good and for bad.
I wish serving in the military was just like any other job, but it isn’t.
How has your spouse joining the military changed your life?
