Essay On Military Deployment

The Impact of Deployments on Military families

We can all imagine the stress and hardship that military families go through while their loved one is deployed. The daily fear of the unknown can leave a lot of spouses and children with enormous feelings of stress and anxiety. Two million children under the age of 18 have an active duty parent, and 500,000 of those are under the age of 6. Young children can feel the same anxiety, depression, stress and aggression that older children and adults experience after living with multiple deployments, long separations, and often tense and awkward reunions with parents returning from war. A Lot of research has been done on the effects of deployments on children and spouses and the affects on the younger children are alarming. The concern is that when children are exposed to stressful events, particularly traumatic stressful events will have difficulty dealing with emotions as well as socially and academically (Schulte, 2013).
One in five service members returning from war is experiencing acute stress, depression and anxiety including a high numbers diagnosed with

The military has a lot of support groups that meet a couple of times a month to get together and support each other. It’s important to stay connected and share fears and worries with other spouses who know exactly what they are going through. Spouses’ supporting each other is the most important key in surviving a deployment, babysitting for each other, helping when one gets sick or just long talks when one hasn’t heard from her husband because he has been on a mission. Counseling is another very important help for military spouses. They should never be afraid to ask for help when they just can’t take it anymore. More military health providers make it a priority to inform the spouse of the options they have when they feel overwhelmed ( National Military Family Association,