“If we don’t show that this life is hard, that military marriage is hard, parenting is hard, we aren’t being honest,” says Corie. “Without vulnerability or honesty, we risk miscommunicating. So many people are putting out their highlight reels on social media. If we do that, people start to measure themselves by what we’re putting out. We’re always doing our best to say we don’t have all the answers, but we can humbly offer what we do know.”

The Weathers know about moves, about kids changing school, leaving friends behind, and they know about deployment. Corie’s book, Sacred Spaces, grew out of the couple’s separate experiences during deployment and Corie’s separate travels to deployment locations. The book offers wisdom for couples navigating deployment, from before departure to after homecoming. First and foremost, says Corie, her book tells the truth about the difficulties of each phase.

“You have to do that, to validate what people are experiencing before you can go on to offer them help or ways to heal,” she says. “If nobody else is going to say out loud what we’re all experiencing, I’m going to say it.”

The response, says Corie, has been overwhelmingly positive, with military spouses and couples recognizing their own emotions in Corie’s story and realizing they’re not alone. She says it’s rewarding to hear from readers that telling her story authentically has made a difference for them.

“That experience of writing Sacred Spaces—taking that risk—and the response I still get from so many people, makes it even easier to keep putting myself out there. We don’t have to be ashamed to say that deployment is as hard as it is.”

–Corie Weathers

“That experience of writing Sacred Spaces—taking that risk—and the response I still get from so many people, makes it even easier to keep putting myself out there,” says Corie. “We don’t have to be ashamed to say that deployment is as hard as it is. Sometimes we reason it away. We think maybe someone else has it harder, or we look around and it looks like other people are handling it better, but it’s hard for all of us. Let’s talk about that.”

And she does. Corie and Matt stepped up to lead a series of virtual deployment workshops for the USO called “You’re Leaving … Again?” The monthly series coincides with Matt’s latest deployment, beginning before his departure. In the videos, which debut live and are made available as recordings, Corie and Matt talk through getting ready for deployment, departure, spending holidays apart, continuing throughout his absence–offering guidance and support for others going through the same experience.

Taking Risks

Sharing the events of deployment in real time is not without pitfalls. When Matt’s departure was delayed, a workshop that was supposed to happen two weeks after his departure ended up falling on the day he left. It was an emotional day, says Corie, but indicative of the way deployment happens. Schedules get changed, and families roll with it, but they still feel the effects of all that is happening to them. Corie led the live workshop on her own, with a surprise call-in from Matt while he was traveling.

The mission of the USO series and other similar events and projects, Corie says, is to validate the experiences of other military couples. For her and Matt, offering their story helps them work through their own experiences, making them accountable to each other and to those they hope to encourage.

“It is a risk, but Matt and I know our boundaries. We talk to each other about what we are ready to share,” says Corie. “When so much of our emotion is still right under the surface, it’s not time to share that. If I’m going to be authentic, and if I’m going to take a risk, I’m only going to share what I’ve learned a lesson from and what I have perspective on that could be helpful to someone. Other things I’m still wrestling with may need to be in the queue for the future.”

Setting Boundaries

Corie also has boundaries to protect her family and her time with them. With so much of her professional life connected to people and relationships, Corie’s goal is to spend weekends focusing only on her own family relationships.

Her personal self-care includes running “to clear the cobwebs” and to get alone to recharge her introvert batteries. In the big picture, she takes a yearly break during the holidays from events and speaking engagements and puts her Lifegiver podcast on hiatus. None of this time away is perfect, and there will always be interruptions, says Corie, but intentionality matters. Slowing down and stepping away offers time to evaluate, personally, spiritually, and relationally as the new year begins.

“I ask myself hard questions: Do I want to keep doing this? Am I in a healthy place?” says Corie. “I give myself permission each year to re-evaluate everything. It helps me recognize the things I actually love and enjoy. If there’s something I’m really dragging through, and don’t know why, I give myself permission to let it go if I need to.”

Knowing Limitations

As it was for many families, the long months of the pandemic were tough for the Weathers family, and Corie says she recognized she was nearing burnout. In addition to the disruptions of school and schedules, the family moved, and Matt began a deployment just as the holidays were beginning.

“I really hit the ceiling as far as maxing out my own capability,” she says. “It was too much, between moving, deployment, COVID, trying to work, both my kids being in a new school, the emotional challenges, working on my marriage. I knew I had to stop and listen to myself.”

In this season, too, Corie is mining her own experiences for ways to encourage military spouses, reminding them that self-care is not indulgent or selfish but necessary. For deployment, for the pandemic, or any challenge of military life, Corie says spouses aren’t simply looking for advice, they’re looking for someone who understands their experiences.

“They need more than a few practical tips for coping,” she says. “Authentic storytelling from someone who has been there is far more powerful. I wrote Sacred Spaces with that mindset, and when people hear a story that resonates, they’re going to say, ‘Me too,’ and we’re all going to get a little bit better.”

More about Corie Weathers and her book Sacred Spaces:

• Honoring Sacred Spaces in Marriage: Books Make a Difference magazine
• Say it Out Loud: Spouse Calls in Stars and Stripes

The post Corie Weathers: Sacred Spaces and Authentic Stories appeared first on Military Family Life.

Making people laugh comes easy for Lisa, a humor columnist and author of The Meat and Potatoes of Life: My True Lit Com, a funny memoir about motherhood and marriage. The pandemic has shifted the dynamics of the Molinari household, with both Lisa and her husband, Francis, now working from home, and their college-aged daughters also home after their campuses were closed.

“My best coping strategy has always been humor,” says Lisa, who has used humor to overcome insecurities since being voted Class Clown in high school. She adds, “It puts people at ease, and helps me deal with tension during stressful times, like deployments or global pandemics.”

Family foibles are magnified by enforced togetherness, and sometimes the only remedy is a dose of laughter.

Lisa says not taking herself too seriously has helped her handle serious events in her life. As a navy wife, she discovered humor writing as a way to get through her husband’s year-long deployment when their kids were young. After one of her essays was published in the Washington Post, Lisa was inspired to pursue a career as newspaper columnist. Now her weekly humor column appears in Stars and Stripes and dozens of newspapers across the country.

“It’s not always easy to find material,” she admits. “Some days I’m wracking my brain for ways to see how this is funny, but we manage to find a way to laugh anyway. People tell me that I have the best stories, but really, I don’t live an extraordinary life — I just know how to see the humor in everyday things. Carpools, chicken nuggets, clogged toilets, and mortgage payments might sound boring, but any situation has the raw material for a hilarious story if you look for it.”

That doesn’t mean her three kids always think she is funny—especially after weeks of quarantine togetherness—but her husband, Francis, is fond of a good joke and doesn’t mind when the laugh is on him. Still, Lisa says using humor to cope requires balance. She offers a few tips for laughing through challenges without laughing off what’s important:

Lift up, don’t put down. Make sure the humor doesn’t come at someone else’s expense. Busting chops may start in good fun, but when it goes too far, it hurts. It’s far too costly in the long run. Humor should bring you together, and an inside joke isn’t funny if you’re the one on the outside.

Lighten the mood. Especially a minor problem becomes magnified. Use humor to ease tensions and put things back into perspective.

Be sensitive. Isolation may cause more sensitivity and anxiety, so humor may not apply to everyone in every situation. Be sure your family knows you take their feelings and problems seriously.

Look beyond the one-liner. Humor isn’t only about making a joke. Good humor also means kindness and a light-hearted attitude.

Self-deprecatory humor puts others at ease. Better to laugh at yourself than make a joke at someone else’s expense.

Never ridicule and be careful with sarcasm or snark. These tear down rather than build up when directed at a person. Use humor to lift each other up. This is true no matter what is going on in the world.

“Our family sees humor as a virtue, and that’s just as true now as it ever was,” says Lisa. “Humor is such a significant part of our family life. It helps us cope now when we are all stuck together. If we can laugh at ourselves or the situation a little bit, we can lift each other up.”

Lisa Smith Molinari is also a coauthor of Stories Around the Table: Laughter, Wisdom, and Strength in Military Life and has contributed to two editions of Chicken Soup for the Soul. Read more about Lisa’s work on her website The Meat and Potatoes of Life.

More good humor and good advice from Lisa Smith Molinari:

But Seriously: 5 Ways to Handle Family Life With Humor

The post Lisa Smith Molinari: Togetherness with a Dose of Laughter appeared first on Military Family Life.

Seeing her military family on the big screen brought home the power of her own story. Amy, her army husband, Luke, and their young sons, Dave, 10, and Huck, 7, are among several military families featured in the documentary, Sky Blossom—Growing Up a Caregiver. The Bushatz family joined a select audience at the film’s premier at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. The complete film is set to release in spring 2020.

“It was an emotional journey,” Amy says, of both the production process and seeing the film with an audience. The Bushatz family became part of the documentary when the film’s producer, news correspondent, Richard Lui, approached Amy for her expertise, knowing she had been reporting on veterans issues for more than a decade.

“I told him the topic was of particular interest to me, because it was personal,” Amy recalls. “My husband is a disabled veteran, and I wanted to be sure someone with a news background was covering the story.”

Hearing Amy’s firsthand perspective, Lui shifted his request for help with background to a request for her family to appear in front of the camera.

Amy’s husband, Luke is a member of the Alaska Army National Guard. He was deployed several times as an Army Ranger and has mild traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress. Amy says the stories of invisible injuries can be difficult to relate, and the idea of opening up her family’s story gave her pause.

“As a reporter I know what makes a really good story, someone who has a visible problem. Luke does not visibly have a problem.” Amy says. “But if someone is going to tell the veteran story, we’d better have the whole story, and that includes veterans like Luke who have problems that aren’t ready apparent. There are so many like him who have injuries you can’t see.”

“… if someone is going to tell the veteran story, we’d better have the whole story, and that includes veterans like Luke who have problems that aren’t ready apparent. There are so many like him who have injuries you can’t see.”

–Amy Bushatz

The filmmakers traveled to the Bushatz home in Palmer, Alaska, multiple times to interview the family and film them as they went about their daily routines. The crew came in the winter and the summer, spending several days each time. Amy says it was an interesting experience to wear a microphone all day and have someone follow the family around with a camera. The crew filmed the family doing things they would normally do but sometimes on an odd schedule, based on when the weather and the light were good for filming. In addition to the slice-of-life shots, the filming included sit-down interviews with family members, individually and together.

“Huck and Dave thought it was super cool to be in the movie,” says Amy. “They don’t know how not to be honest about stuff. It may not be what you want to hear, but it’s whatever is in their brains.”

For Amy, the interviews were the most difficult and emotional part.

“On camera (the filmmakers) asked me to read a letter Luke sent me from one of his deployments. It was an email he wrote after one of his soldiers died in his arms,” she says. “That is one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. I felt like I was opening up my soul and my husband’s soul to see the rawness of these things we experienced.”

Amy is careful when describing herself as a caregiver but says the role is a universal one.

“Caregiver is a fraught word. It comes with a lot of baggage, because if someone is a caregiver, then it sounds like someone must be broken,” Amy explains. “It’s hard to use that word, especially when you’re talking about care and support for a spouse whom you view as able-bodied and whole. The reality is anyone whole cares for someone is a caregiver, so we’re all caregivers in some way.”

Amy says Luke was open to telling his story for the film, knowing it could be an encouragement to other veterans and their families, even though it was difficult at times for him as well.

Opening Up

“When the rubber hit the road at the documentary screening, that was hard,” Amy says. “We both felt the vulnerability of giving something very personal to someone you don’t know, both the filmmakers and the audience. We were nervous about how it would make us look, how it would make us feel, and what people were going to think about it, but you can’t control that. That’s the risk of telling your story, but we both feel that’s an important thing to do.”

For all that uncertainty and many other reasons, difficult and painful experiences in military life are often not shared, but Amy believes sharing them has a greater purpose.

“If we let people see the rawness wouldn’t that give people a better understanding of the realities of service?” she says. “I think so. Anything we can do to build empathy with our friends and neighbors, whether civilian or military is important because it creates a human connection.”

In the end, Amy and Luke are satisfied the film told their story truthfully, accurately portraying their family and their experience. Amy says entrusting their story to someone else was an exercise in trust for her, a reminder of what it’s like to be on the other side of the news.

Giving Context

“People trust me as a reporter with their stories every day. This time, I was trusting someone else with my story, trusting that the story they’re going to deliver to the world is authentic,” she says.

Personal stories like those in Sky Blossom, add an important human context to the information presented to the public about the military service and military life, and ultimately that’s why the Bushatz family participated in the documentary.

“When I cover the news of military families there’s an information aspect, but there’s the other side of it which is to say, here’s how this military member is dealing with stuff,” says Amy. “What else could be more important than creating connection with other people? Storytelling is the way we do that, maybe the only way. My family is like so many others, and there’s value in stepping out and saying it’s not all great. It’s hard and messy, and then sometimes it’s awesome.”

The post Amy Bushatz: Telling the Whole Story On Screen and Off appeared first on Military Family Life.

During her first five years of life, Kate had multiple surgeries, and spent many hours in therapy and doctor’s appointments. All the while, the family’s military life followed the usual course: deployments, moves, the birth of their son, Jackson. The Hiltons learned a lot—the hard way—and wanted to help others in similar situations.

“We learned where the gaps and weak spots are in our system for families with special needs,” Jeremy says. “These are broken things. If I don’t try to fix them, who’s going to?”

While the Hiltons were stationed in the Washington D.C. area, Jeremy added a new component to his mission: advocating for military children like Kate. He put his hard-won knowledge to work, testifying for multiple congressional committees and writing for major publications.

Jeremy was named Armed Forces Insurance Military Spouse of the Year in 2012, the first male to receive the title, and used the platform as a megaphone to advocate for medical care and better support for military families with special needs.

He wrote about being an effective advocate as a coauthor of Stories Around the Table: Laughter, Wisdom, and Strength in Military Life.

Though military moves have taken the family to a new home, Jeremy still keeps a finger on the pulse of Department of Defense policy issues affecting his daughter and other military kids.

As part of the Tricare for Kids Coalition, he continues to advocate for improvements and reform in military pediatric healthcare to better serve the needs of military families. Jeremy says changes are needed to close gaps in medical coverage for children with special needs and to improve accessibility to state programs for mobile military families. Often, those families are not in one place long enough to reach the top of state waiting lists for services.

“Practically every year since (the coalition’s) inception, we’ve had some luck getting legislation introduced to the National Defense Authorization Act,” says Jeremy. He maintains a legislative history of those changes, which he makes available to anyone, and says it’s important to build awareness and keep this topic in front of policy-makers and legislators.

Continuing Advocacy

Jeremy has returned to the civilian work force and also continues his work as an advocate. He offers his expertise individually, when someone reaches out to him for help, particularly military families impacted by disabilities, and he continues to push for policy and program changes.

One avenue for military families reach out to policy-makers, says Jeremy, is through the Military Family Readiness Council. The council, created by Congress, is a federal advisory committee whose sole purpose is to hear from military families, on any issue. The meetings and records of the council are open to the public. Military family members can submit information and attend the meetings, which are held at the Pentagon.

Jeremy created the DoD Military Family Readiness Council Information Page, an unofficial page to keep military families informed about the council meetings before and the issues they cover.

“I know and have worked with many of the council members over the years, all in unofficial capacities, sending them information when I think it will help,” says Jeremy.

Sources of Strength

Though Jeremy has seen improvements over the years, he’s also seen some government policies and pronouncements that look good, but don’t bring real change. He emphasizes there is still much the military should do—not just say—to support families with special needs.

“We are still five to ten years from getting this right,” he says. “An entire generation of military kids has grown up—literally since the start of the Afghanistan war to today—and things are marginally better.”

The road to creating change in a bureaucracy is a difficult one, but Jeremy says he finds strength in his family and his faith.

“When thinking about the roadblocks life puts in front of us, whatever the source,” he says, “I remember Philippians 4:6-7, ‘Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.’”

The post Jeremy Hilton: Advocating for Military Children appeared first on Military Family Life.

Jessie Barnes and Christina Rodriguez, adult artists who grew up in different military families, each drew on childhood memories to create a coloring book especially for military families. Christina designed Coloring My Military Life–Book 1, for young artists. Jessie designed Coloring My Military Life–Book 2, for teens and adults.

Christina credits her artistic development to her mobile military life as a child. “The variety of ecosystems—both natural and cultural—I was exposed to at a young age were critical to my development as an artist and citizen of the world,” she says.

Jessie agrees. “I’m thankful that life was kind of challenging on the front end, the constant change and what that means and how to look forward,” she says. “All of that has shaped me into the person I am and am continuing to grow into. I felt empowered and encouraged and I think that has made me very confident in who I am.”

Having friends all over the world and living in many places also means saying goodbye to friends with each move. Jessie acknowledges that one of the challenges of her military life was learning to deal with those losses.

Military parents are sometimes concerned about the long-term effects of those goodbyes, the goodbyes of frequent deployments, and other demands placed on their children. Both Jessie and Christina say having a strong sense of support at home guided them. From their grown-up vantage point, they suggest these ways parents can support their military children:

• Do what any parent should do: “Try to be steady and loving and have healthy relationships with their kids,” says Jessie. “That ultimately is what makes military life something that’s a growing experience.” Healthy, confident parents inspire healthy, confident kids.
• Maintain structure: Christina says the routine and structure around her young military life, particularly while living on base, gave her comfort and stability.
• Look forward: “Take a positive outlook and look at military life as an opportunity for new adventure and new friends,” Jessie says, echoing advice that her parents gave her as a child.
• Don’t feel sorry for your military kids: Parents do sometimes feel a sense of responsibility for the pain military life brings into the lives of their children, whether through moves or deployment. “In every life there’s some kind of pain,” says Jessie. “Military life is no different.” If you feel sorry for your kids, they’ll feel sorry for themselves.
• Show your kids you are confident in their abilities and resilience: “My parents trusted us to be resilient, to rely on and look out for each other,” Christina says. “My siblings and I are close in age, so as long as we had each other, our parents, our dog, and our carefully-curated favorite possessions—for me, art supplies and books—we were gonna be okay.”

Working toward having a healthy military family does more than get kids through the next deployment, or the next move.

“You’re not just preparing kids for military life but for life in general,” Jessie says. “You’re learning from the hard stuff, too. You’re able to see the excitement of what’s to come.”

The two volumes of Coloring My Military Life work together to reflect military experiences, with each artist approaching her designs from a different perspective, based on military childhood and beyond.

Inspired by a childhood pet, Christina used a canine character to convey important events of military life in the book she created. When she was growing up, her family’s dog, Lucinda, was particularly fond of her father and missed him when he was away on temporary duty, Christina says.

“When my dad would call home, we’d make sure to pass the phone to Lucinda as well, so they could ‘talk.’ She would be visibly happier after hearing his voice. One time she went to grab her favorite ball afterwards and played quietly by herself, tail wagging.” she remembers.

“I tried to imbue a sense of curiosity and wonder in certain illustrations in Coloring My Military Life, through the playfulness, expressions, and antics of the dog,” says Christina.

Jessie says every page of the coloring book she illustrated reflects her military childhood and the way it shaped her. She wants readers and colorists to see the value of processing the hard parts of military life while looking forward to new experiences.

“It’s not ignoring that the little boy misses his friends from his last school, or he’s looking forward to having friends at this this new school. It’s not … taking off all the friendship bracelets,” she says, referring to specific illustrations. “It’s remembering those things, but then it’s looking out the plane window at all the grandeur of the new city underneath you and being like, ‘Okay, what’s going to happen here?’ says Jessie.

“Military life has definitely enriched me in every way shape and form; because that’s been my life.”

Christina Rodriguez is the illustrator of Coloring My Military Life–Book 1 and The Wishing Tree by Mary Redman, and the activities in My Dad’s Deployment and My Mom’s Deployment. Jessie Barnes is the illustrator of Coloring My Military Life–Book 2.

Listen to an excerpt from the interview with Jessie, including her responses to the question: Did you put pieces of your military life into Coloring My Military Life?

The post Coloring My Military Life: Illustrators Offer Wisdom, Creativity appeared first on Military Family Life.

Eleven days after the birth of her second child in 2011, Jacqueline woke up to a phone call with life-changing news: Her husband, Michael, had been severely injured in an enemy attack in Afghanistan.

Through the years of Michael’s recovery and extensive treatment for his injuries, Jacqueline became her husband’s caregiver and strongest ally, ensuring he received the medical care and services he required.

“She has been my advocate,” says Michael. “She has changed military medical policy and brought attention to many things that are still lacking … My wife is someone who will not relent until she has affected that change.”

Jacqueline’s advocacy extends to her children as well. The Goodrich children, Lucy and Tag, have grown up around hospitals and wounded service members. The family lived for almost a year in a Fisher House while Michael was receiving care.

Jacqueline shared her children’s struggles and triumphs in a story titled “Strength of a Little Warrior” in Stories Around the Table: Laughter, Wisdom, and Strength in Military Life.

Knowing the challenges her children faced, Jacqueline created the General’s Kids, a nonprofit organization to offer financial assistance for wounded warrior families and provide care packages for children living in military hospitals while a parent recovers from service-connected injury or illness.

Jacqueline says organizations like the Fisher House Foundation, Operation Ward 57, and the Yellow Ribbon Fund supported her family at critical times. The Goodrich family was also provided a new home through Operation Finally Home, which builds houses for wounded veterans.

Caregivers are constantly fighting for those they love, says Jacqueline, and she is willing to be a fighter, an advocate for her family.

Jacqueline was chosen by the Elizabeth Dole Foundation to be a Dole Caregiver Fellow, to advise the foundation, its coalition partners, and government leaders on important issues for military caregivers. Telling her story, as an author and as an advocate, is an important part of what she does.

“Always be willing to share your story,” says Jacqueline. “Even if it’s painful, you could be the reason why some other service members get the help they need.”

The post Jacqueline Goodrich: Warrior as a Caregiver appeared first on Military Family Life.