Friends!!! We all need them and it has been such a great thing to have been able to make friends with so many other Military wives over the years. They have helped me to see that I am not alone and that other wives have gone through similar situations over the years. They can be a huge support on a bad deployment day or a great way to get out and have some fun together without the kids. Thanks to Facebook I have been able to stay in touch with so many of them over the years.
Having other Military spouse friends are a huge benefit to Military life. This is why…
1) They understand what it is like to have a husband away for long periods of time. They get it. One to two days away is nothing. They understand what it is like to be the only adult in the house for a period of time.
2) They understand what it is like to be both mom and dad for long periods of time. They get the solo parenting and how hard it can be. It isn’t easy and it is nice to be able to vent to others about it that truly understand.
3) They get how the military is. That sometimes what we think might happen will change at the last-minute and we have to be ok with that. That we can’t plan. That we have to wait and wait and wait.
4) When we are having bad days, they might be having good ones but can remember what the bad days are like and can encourage us. When it is reversed, we can step in and be the shoulder for them to cry on instead.
5) We can spend the holidays together if we are both going to be without our husbands. We can make fun plans with our kids on the weekends when the rest of the world is having family time. This is great because it can be hard to be the only one without a spouse on the weekend or over the holidays. Knowing you can spend it with someone else can really make life a little bit easier.
6) We can vent about all the ways the army is annoying us and they get it and probably vented about those things as well. We can get annoyed that our husband is going to miss another birthday and they get it. We can get mad about housing and they have been there.
7) Because we move around a lot, there is always the chance of running into an old friend or a friend of a friend at any new place we might go to. The Army world is small and the infantry world is even smaller. I love seeing new friends again and knowing that because we live by an Army post, there is always a chance that an old friend might move here someday too.
The Military spouse community truly is a sisterhood. From those you meet locally to the Military Spouse blogger community. We support each other and help each other make it through.
What would you add to this list?
I like the lack of questions they ask when they know we can't share. I also like that they understand the same acronyms and we don't have to explain what ranks or the promotion system. Trying to educate civilians can be time consuming 🙂
Love it! and very true.
I also agree, explaining to non-military friends gets to be exhausting.
It is a good community, but I find it is much harder for non-active duty life. We don’t live near a base or other military families since hubby is in the national guard.
Yes! The only reason I am still able to find other spouses is because we still live by a Military post. I don’t know any of the other Guard wives though.
So true and the community is amazing. My husband has been active duty and is now National Guard. I truly miss the friendships through active army which just doesn’t happen in the NG (at least the group we are with).
Yes, we had a Christmas dinner and that was the only time I had ever met any of the other spouses and didn’t really connect with anyone.