11 Things Military Families Want You to Know About Military Life

Military life can be difficult to understand when you look at it from the outside, but if you have a loved one or a friend currently serving, maybe a son or daughter, a niece or nephew, and are unfamiliar with it, here are a few things military families want you to know. 

My family recently PCS’d from Kansas to Georgia. My parents were gracious enough to take off work, hoping they could help us unpack or, at the very least, distract our three children while my husband and I unpacked boxes and got our items in place. 

But, that didn’t happen. 

What we hoped would be a door-to-door move ended up lasting almost three weeks, with difficulty finding a driver to ship our HHG. In the end, my parents took off work to enjoy their grandchildren, play in the park, enjoy some pool time, and sightsee in Savannah (they were not disappointed!).

They also learned a thing or two about our lives. 

We were standing in my empty kitchen, having a few drinks, speaking quietly so our voices echoing off the bare walls wouldn’t wake the kids. My mom looked at me and said: “I never understood just how hard this must be on you. You just don’t realize it until you see it yourself.”

And it’s true. 

For the longest time, we didn’t know when we could move into our current home. 

We didn’t know when our belongings would arrive. 

We didn’t know exactly where they were. 

We had spent a week in hotels, then two weeks in an empty home (save for four air mattresses, one folding table, and four chairs). 

My mom and dad would ask us questions, and the only way we could answer was by shrugging our shoulders. “I don’t know” is not the answer anyone expects to hear. 

It got me thinking about what military families want our extended family and friends to know about our lifestyle. Here are 11 things I came up with (with a little help from my milspouse tribe):

1. Military life and solid plans don’t go together. 

As much as we would love to drop everything to visit you or clear our schedules, unfortunately, we have a serious inability to develop solid plans. The military is known to change its mind quickly and with little notice. PCS orders can change last minute. Approved leave can be revoked. There may be a limit to the distance we can travel. Training occurs often, and the service member may have to be gone. It’s not that we want to do our own thing; it’s that our options are limited. When you can, consider making visits to us if it doesn’t work for us to come to you. We get to live in some pretty cool, unique places and would be happy to show you around or be your B&B for a few days. 

Which leads to number two…

2. Traveling home isn’t a vacation, but we still want to do it.

Again, as much as we love to come home, please understand that it’s a very busy time for us. We are trying to fit in visits with family as well as friends, not knowing when the next visit will be, and we may want to take our children to visit some of our favorite places from our childhoods. Often family members and friends are spread out, making it even more difficult to see everyone. Consider planning a big get together, choosing a meeting place for all the family at one location. It can be a big party with food and drinks (if you’re open to it and your budget allows), or it can be a backyard visit with a picnic lunch that everyone packs for themselves. At the very least, if you can, please meet us halfway.

3. Usually “I don’t know” really is the answer to military life questions. 

It may not be the best answer, but when it comes to military life, it’s the truth. We know you mean well and you’re showing you care and have an interest in our lives, but please know we don’t always have an answer to these questions:

“Will you be home for Christmas?”

“When can you come home next?”

“When will the service member be home?”

“When are you moving?” 

“Where are you going next?”

“How long will you be there?”

“When will your belongings arrive?” 

“What school will the children attend?” 

“When will you start working again?” 

“I don’t know” is the most likely answer to all those questions. And believe us, as hard as it is for you to hear it, it’s equally difficult for us. The difference is that we’ve learned to roll with it out of necessity. Know that despite the uncertainty, we try our best to insulate you from it. That said, when we have an answer other than “I don’t know,” we’ll be sure to share it and would love to celebrate the news.

4. Our lives can be demanding, but we think about you a lot. 

If the service member is working long hours and the milspouse is handling everything at home, it can slip our minds to check in. Don’t hesitate to text us, send a message through social media, or even call. If we don’t immediately respond, know that we will after we pick the kids up from school, make dinner, eat, bathe the kids (and maybe ourselves), chat with our beloved service member, and get everyone to bed (maybe on time). It’s tough being the one wearing all the hats sometimes. If we don’t have the time for a long conversation, we can always do our best to plan one. Please give us grace! 

5. Moving is a real chore.

Many of us look forward to a change of pace at a new duty station, but it’s a lot of work. While we often make it look easy, it’s hard to watch our furniture come off the truck in pieces or nervously unwrap fragile items we hope survived. We are often displaced for a few days or up to two weeks (or longer in the case of moves outside the lower 48), trapped in small hotel rooms or camping in empty homes.

And that’s just the actual move. 

We spend months prepping as best we can. We need to find health care providers (at least dental if not everything), check local schools to find the best location, research activities for our kids, find jobs for ourselves, determine our budgets for the area of choice, and prep our homes before the movers even arrive. 

Please give us time to settle in and enjoy the moment when we can finally sit on furniture in a place that feels like home. And you can always offer your assistance and support, or try to plan a visit when things settle down. 

6. While we chose to live this military life, please give us room to share our complaints. 

When we complain or gripe, it doesn’t mean we want to live the civilian life. It doesn’t mean we regret our choices. It doesn’t mean we want to do it differently. Military life unfolds in seasons, with pros and cons. Sometimes the cons weigh on us, and sometimes we can’t see anything but the pros. We often need your support more than ever during the tougher times, and that is usually a listening ear. We don’t need you to solve it for us or propose suggestions—just listen. We’ll do the same for you during your seasons of life (believe us, we have lots of practice). 

Which leads to the next thing we want you to know…

7. We may not ask for help, but we need it. 

Or at least we often have difficulty asking for help outside of our military community. We know it can be hard to understand our lives, but support and help is the bedrock of our community.

Our best friend may have just moved away, or our service member may have recently deployed, and our usual support network just isn’t there.

8. Our service member works hard, but military family members have a tough gig, too. 

We know better than many just how hard service members work. Long hours, time away from the family, and tours in less than desirable places is surely a sacrifice. 

But the family members sacrifice, too. 

Our lives have to reset with every move. Our kids leave teams and groups they loved to restart with people they’ve never met in the new location. All of the family must say “see you later” to cherished friends and a familiar community. Milspouses give up their jobs and their own community involvement. We don’t necessarily need your thanks or massive appreciation, but know that we have it tough, too, especially when our service member is gone. 

9. You may not know how we do it, but neither do we. 

Truthfully, this is something you have to experience to understand. We do it because what other choice is there? Like the “I don’t know” response, we learn to roll with it and ensure we find what we need when we need it: friends, a gab fest, a babysitter, a quiet place, a vacation, whatever. Support from our loved ones also helps.   

10. No matter the branch of service, type of duty, or deployment location, military life is still hard. 

Sure, the branches rag on each other, but in the end, they will support each other in battle, one way or another. Keep that in mind. While certain branches may not be “boots on the ground,” people still fly planes and man ships, and those families worry about their service member and miss them just as much. A deployment may not be to Afghanistan or Iraq, but it’s still 6-12 months the families have to wait for their service members to return. National Guard and Reserve components may not live the same military life as active duty, but they have their own sets of hardship without a solid military community and people going through the same thing.

11. While we’re all military families, we aren’t all the same. 

While the majority of the force may look a certain way, military families come from a variety of backgrounds with various makeups, are born in different countries, speak multiple languages, worship in different places, vote different ways, work different jobs, and carry a variety of opinions on the same issues. Our differences don’t make us any less patriotic or maintain less dedication to service. And one service member’s or military spouse’s opinion of a political issue should not be considered the majority opinion. If you wonder our opinions about military budget, current actions overseas, or political opinions, ask us. If we know it won’t get us in hot water, we’ll likely give our perspective. 

 

I, like many military spouses, believe that supporting service members and their families is important. But, it’s also important to take a closer look at the experience, to give us the chance to share those experiences, to recognize the various details that make up each individual family, so you can gain a fuller understanding of just how we do it and what it’s like.