The Moms of Military Service Members

“I want to be like Daddy! I want to be in the Army.”

If you have military kids you have probably heard this come out of their mouth at some point. Some military kids will join the Army or another branch of the military when they get older. Some men and women join the military even if they are not from a military family.

As military spouses, we are the #1 person in our service members life. We head the support team. We drop them off and we pick them up. We wait for their calls and we are the ones that will be notified if something goes wrong. We are their spouse and we stand beside them. But there is another person in their life that loves them and misses them, just as much although in a different way. She is there for them and wants them to be safe just like we do.

This person is their mom.

Moms of Military Service Members stand by as they watch their son or daughter serve their country.

This mother’s day we should be remembering these moms. The ones who raised the men and women in the military. The ones who might take a back seat to the spouse but still want to be there for their child.

I have a hard time thinking about my little boys joining the military. Thinking about them joining and eventually going off to war tears at a mother’s heart but that is exactly what the moms of military service members go through every day. As a mom, you need to let your child find their own path, you need to let them go and sometimes that means watching them go into military service.

These moms are so proud, how could they not be? They raised someone who is willing to put their life on the line for their country. That is something to be very proud about. These women support their sons and daughters and they support each other. I have seen them come together in different places and in different organizations. They support the mom whose son has just left for another deployment to Afghanistan and they support the mom of the daughter who just left for a year in Korea. They support the mom whose son has PTSD and just doesn’t seem like the same boy who left her house a few months before.

For some, their son or daughter goes from a senior in high school to a Private in the military in just a few months time. What a change and what a difficult transition to make. Most parents have a hard time dropping a child off for college, boot camp is another story.

Sometimes the moms of military service members get left behind.

It’s a difficult thing for the military spouse. She doesn’t want to leave her mother-in-law out but this is her husband and he is coming home from 6 months in Iraq and she doesn’t want to share him. This is understandable and most moms know this. They know that as much as they miss their child, the spouse is going to come first.

As a military spouse, we want to do our best to not leave our mother-in-law out. This can be more difficult if you don’t get along with yours. It’s much easier if you do. Keep her in mind during your spouse’s deployment, when you PCS and any other part of your military journey. She will be so glad that you did.

If you are the mom of someone in the military, know that we spouses support you too. Even though we look at everything a little differently than you do, we understand that things can be difficult for you as well. We know that you don’t get to talk to your child as much as we do and you may have to wait to have some time with them after they get home from a deployment. We know that it was hard to let them go and have them move so far away from you. We know that you cry at night just like we do and you pray hard for their safe return.

If you are the mom of a military service member, check in your local area to see if there is a Mothers of Military type of group for you to join.

Are you a mom of a military service member? How do you find support?