A Look at the Stresses Within the Military Family

Faces of Sacrifice-Beyond the Soldier.


A loud roaring sound is finally making it’s way down the street in front of the house. We’ve been up for a few hours preparing for their arrival. Our backs are a little stiff from sleeping on the air mattresses for the past two days, so we are a bit cranky. As we sit on the couch and wait for the monestrous truck to be maneuvered in a more suitable position, tears start to well up in my 14 years old eyes. As I reach to pat him on the back he suddenly hides the fact that he is emotional and then retreats into his room which is full of packed boxes of his only belongings. You say to him, "It will be alright." However, deep inside you are tortured with his pain of having to face another military transfer, attend another school, make new social relationships, and leave the friends that he has worked so hard to develop.


Though society often hears of the sacrifices associated with military service members, are the sacrifice of the military family truly understood? Generally, when one hears our President thanking our Nation’s military for their sacrifices, we think of the obvious and deemed most important, time spent in war or the ultimate sacrifice of giving one’s life. We must always validate those service members with respect and provide empathy to their families


As the first paragraph gives a true life account of the morning a military family is faced with the reality of the moving van arriving, the face of a broken hearted teenager gives new meaning to the word sacrifice. Not only are the service members dealing with the stresses of a new duty station and Command, but within the family unit lies a deeper internal struggle-the guilt of uprooting their family’s life and resentment that may build from all the changes.