Chaplain Spouse
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Spilled Milk
By L.G. McCary
As a military spouse, I hear others complain about all the things that go wrong when their spouses are away. ER visits. Plumbing leaks. Car problems. Lost pets. Meteor strikes. But I’m going to complain for a moment about all those other things that happen.
For me, the big things are frustrating, but other people are willing to help as long as I ask. When my husband is TDY or in the field, I find the little stuff that usually wouldn’t bother me is what looms over me like a grinning gargoyle.
For instance, a child knocking over a stack of folded laundry makes me heave a sigh when my husband is home, but when he’s gone, it sends me into a crying jag to rival Alice in Wonderland. There’s something about that carefully folded tower of clean towels destroyed in a second by a backhand from the preschooler that makes me feel like my house is collapsing around my ears.
Then there is spilled Kix cereal. Normally, my kids spilling cereal is an every-morning occurrence, but when my husband is gone, it sends me into a tailspin. A thousand things flash before my eyes. I’m going to have to take four children back to the grocery store for cereal. I’m going to have to listen to three little voices whining for me to buy Chocolate Frosted Sugar Bombs and battle three pairs of hands asking for random candy in the checkout line, all while hoping the baby sleeps through the trip.
Then I pull my hair out because all those tiny balls roll away into corners and lie in wait to be found by a baby’s hand, and they are just the right size to choke my Toothless Wonder. Did I also mention that milk-moistened Kix dries like cement if you don’t clean it up immediately? I’m pretty sure the ancient Romans built their highways with Kix and milk.
And then there’s my purse strap.
I have two purses, one for everyday use, and a smaller one for concerts and special events. My everyday bag is the perfect neutral gray and has lots of pockets for organizing my mess, but it has a design flaw that causes one of the straps to loosen and pop off. Normally this is fine. I know how to use a mini-screwdriver. But shortly after my husband left for his last TDY assignment, I was having a particularly trying morning getting out of the house to church. The baby was fussy, the older kids had trouble finding their coloring books, and the preschooler would only eat two bites of something, then move on to another breakfast item creating a trail of half-eaten foodstuffs in the dining room and kitchen. I herded them out the door, and when I reached for my purse, pop!
I stared at my traitorous handle, rage building to “Hulk Smash” levels and hissed, “Seriously? You’re doing this to me now?”
You know you’re losing it when you start talking to inanimate objects.
All these small things are a different kind of miserable than hospital trips because I can’t reasonably ask for someone else to handle them. But mostly they are reminders of the real reason I’m upset: he isn’t here.
“But mostly they are reminders of the real reason I’m upset: he isn’t here.”
When my husband is home, he carries the laundry upstairs after I’m done folding so it doesn’t get knocked over. He sweeps up the cereal after breakfast while I’m feeding the baby or helping the preschooler use the potty. And if you think I should buy myself a new purse with a handle that doesn’t break, he bought me that purse on date night a few years ago.
I’m a tough army wife. I’m supposed to rival Kris Jenner in having situations under control. In my maladjusted mind, it makes more sense to cry over spilled cereal and talk to my accessories than admit just how much I miss him and really don’t want to do it all without him. The truth is I’m not as tough and independent as I would prefer the world think.
And sometimes it’s okay to cry over a broken purse strap because it’s not just a broken purse strap.
Now excuse me while I power up my jackhammer to clean up the latest breakfast spill.
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White Picket Fences
by L.G. McCary
I don’t know if you’ve checked Instagram or Pinterest recently, but it appears that everyone has got this parenting thing figured out. You can barely scroll without a post about a fancy holiday dinner with extended family or video of Daddy coaching a soccer game.
Blog after blog tells you how to make your family that perfect happy family, complete with halo filter for pictures. Chasing after the idealized family can make anyone panic that they aren’t measuring up, but it’s enough to make a military mama give up in despair.
The painful truth is I cannot give my children most of the things I loved about my childhood. We will never live within thirty minutes of their grandparents and cousins. They will not spend their entire childhood in the same community, putting down deep roots. They will not experience the satisfaction of working hard on a family farm like their father. They won’t have Daddy watching at every awards ceremony, soccer tournament, and choir concert.
Being a military spouse required me to rethink how a family should look because that “should” sent me groping after impossible white picket fences.
I found myself measuring our family by a set of rules that didn’t apply to us. I had to back up, pull out my Bible, and ask God to show me how to give my children what they needed, not what I wished they could have.
I can give them two birthday celebrations: one on their birthday and another when Daddy isn’t deployed or in training. I can send them on Daddy Dates to get donuts or ice cream so they have sweet treats to get them through the long months without him. I can take pictures while they dig into packages of candy, pictures, and books he found while deployed. I can give them memories of visits to historic places and museums, beaches, mountains, deserts, and maybe foreign countries someday.
These are all blessings that other families would envy.
But what they need is for our house to be a safe refuge when everything around them is brand new and intimidating.
They need me to remind them that they have friends all over the world when they are lonely.
They need stories of God’s faithfulness to us going back generations, connecting them to far-flung family.
They need hugs, kisses, and silly jokes.
But most important, they need me to model the resilience and sense of adventure I want to see in them.
My kids bear the weight of being both military kids and pastor’s kids, and I have to show them how to carry it. My joy and obedience will be caught more than taught.
I don’t say this because I’m doing it right. I say it because it is so easy to get it wrong. I can take them on mini-adventures like picking blueberries in Georgia, investigating live tilapia and durian fruit at an Asian market in Maryland, or inhaling “Texas-sized” donuts bigger than your head, but all those things won’t bring joy if they have a grumpy, bored, or bitter Mama who is keeping a mental list of all the things they don’t have.
If I want them to love the life and ministry God has given us, it starts with me loving this life and ministry.
And I do love it. After all, a helicopter practicing drop maneuvers in your backyard is way cooler than a white picket fence.
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Humble Pie
by Andrea M
I love those moments when I turn on my inner Angela Lansbury (I think I just dated myself) and ask my husband if he’s been snacking instead of eating a real lunch because after two days all the granola bars have magically disappeared. Every time, even after all these years together, he’s still amazed I know he’s eaten all the granola bars in two days.
Most women just have a knack for noticing these things, don’t they? We know all, be all, and see all. At least we try to, often to our detriment, because we were never supposed to know all, be all, and see all. That’s just too much weight to carry, like that person (not me) who tries to carry in all the groceries in one trip.
When you’re in ministry though, you feel like you have to keep that weight up–or should I say the appearance of keeping the weight up.
We have this skewed perception that if we are in ministry we will pour out to others, but to stop and need others to pour into us would be weakness or even failure. We’re the ones in ministry after all; it’s our job to help others.
Ministers and their families are still people though, people who experience pain and overwhelming times, times when we need help.
I used to think I was weak for needing the help of others, at least until my life unraveled so much because of sickness that I could not carry it anymore. Let’s just say I was dropping groceries left and right. Yet, I struggled with needing help because I felt guilty, wrong, and embarrassed. Remember, I was the one who was supposed to be caring for others, not the one who needed care.
Apple pie is my favorite pie (my Grandma Blick’s recipe if we’re getting technical), not humble pie. Humble pie goes down a little difficult and doesn’t sit well in the stomach. Apple pie, on the other hand, goes down beautifully with a nice sweet side of vanilla ice cream.
Yum. In fact, why don’t we all take an intermission to get a slice. I’ll see you back in 15 minutes.
Welcome back.
God doesn’t always give us warm apple pie in life though, does He? No, sometimes we get humble pie. You know what I’ve realized though? Humble pie is really good for us and a gift of God’s grace and redemption. It’s like those green veggies your mom always made you eat; the taste wasn’t the best but they sure were good for you. All those vitamins and minerals worked to nourish your body in a way apple pie just couldn’t.
Humbling times from God will grow us in ways the easy times never could and will actually be a springboard for greater ministry.
Don’t be afraid to admit you may need help. To receive help is actually a holy thing, a true expression of the body of Christ just as God intended it to be.
Remember Moses? You know, the guy with the pretty hefty resume who led God’s people out of their 400-year bondage in Egypt. He got help when needed, thanks to his father-in-law Jethro’s advice. Jethro noticed Moses was going to burn himself out if he didn’t get some help while serving as a judge for the people.
Look at what he says to Moses in Exodus 17:17-18:
What you are doing is not good. You and these people who come to you will only wear yourselves out. The work is too heavy for you; you cannot handle it alone.
Jethro continues on and gives Moses some sound advice and a plan for how he can safeguard himself (and the people) from a cranky burned out pastor. Let’s be real–that’s just what happens when we don’t take care of ourselves. It not only affects us but, as Jethro reminds us, the people we serve too.
It’s not a weakness to need help, but truly a strength, something God will use to grow you and your witness for Him.
Find someone, or a group of someones, in your community with whom you can be appropriately vulnerable, and when people reach out to help, give yourself the permission to receive it as a gift from God. It’s a true expression of Christ’s body at work.
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Law of Natural Convergences
by Rebekah Cochell
If I ever become famous, it will not be for my art, or my writing, or any other “work” I do.
I am convinced my distinction will be from a scientific law I discovered. And as of right now, I find no evidence anyone has discovered it before. I call it the “Law of Natural Convergences.” I believe it is a universal and fundamental law, like gravity.
What is the “Law of Natural Convergences” you ask?
Let’s say you take your dog for a walk on a narrow country road. There are no cars for miles, and then suddenly there is a car, but not just one, there are two that pass from opposite directions at the same exact moment. Not only that, but a lone bicycler will appear and simultaneously pass you at the same time the cars do, literally leaving no room on the road for you and your pup.
Or when you are driving, and you are about to pull out onto a road. There were no cars at all, and then the second you are about to pull out, several cars appear and there is no chance to move for several minutes.
Or when you are shopping, and the store is empty. By the time you are done, there is a very long line at the checkout counter, yet these people came in at all different times from nowhere.
These are physical examples, but I think you may have noticed how very few things happen singularly. Catastrophes, as well as good things, occur in bundles.
This Law of Natural Convergences comes into full effect during deployments.
But during deployment, it’s always the catastrophes that occur. Everything that can go wrong will, and all at the same time.
The only other explanation of this is what I call the Deployment Goblin. But of course, we can’t really admit to believing in a supernatural beast who wreaks havoc in our lives, breaking everything, and causing every kid to get sick or have broken limbs. Anyway, no one has really seen him, so a scientific law is much more plausible.
Things that have happened to me during my husband’s deployments would only be believed by another military spouse.
During one deployment, the hail storm of the century fell on our town. The hail damage to my new car was devastating. I had barely taken it out of the garage. But that day, I needed to run to the store, and it was going to rain so I took the brand-new car. My other car is a Jeep and had its top down. So, as I was at the store, the storm of the century hit, and the car was no longer nice and new.
This occurred during the same week that my kids all had a stomach virus, there was a lockdown on post, and my coffee maker broke!
The first two months of the last deployment there were few catastrophes, and I was feeling confident I could keep it all together. Big mistake! One day my son, a new driver, missed a street sign and sharply compensated the turn. The car skidded sideways and slid into a stop sign which broke in two, snapped back, and broke off the driver’s side mirror and also left some nice dents.
Then the next week, it began getting very hot. Over 100 degrees Fahrenheit. The air conditioner stopped working. Now, before you think, just call a professional, it was a non-combat deployment which sometimes can cause financial strain. And that was not the only thing that broke! The weed whacker, the lawn mower, my toaster oven, a flat tire, and someone rear ended my car in a construction zone.
And then to top it all off, on a particularly busy day I decided I needed to go to the gym to survive. I was rushing, and slammed the car door into my forehead, resulting in a very attractive gash on my eyebrow. I still have no idea how that was possible, and since I refuse to believe in the Deployment Goblin, the “Law of Natural Convergences” must have been in play.
My first inclination was to go back to bed in an attempt to shut the chaos out. But we all know how well that works.
It’s a good thing I didn’t, because in any of the situations, that would have been bad. Especially in the case of my forehead gash; I needed four stitches. So, I just want to offer some encouragement that we can all get through those times when the Law of Natural Convergences is in full play.
When things go wrong, it gives you a little bit of leverage and control depending on how you react.
I say this because so much in the military life is not in your “circle of control.”
Being married to a soldier means you cannot always decide when you are with your spouse, or where you live, or when you move. However, when something breaks, in a small way you have the power to fix something.
Studying and teaching the 7 habits of Highly Effective People has provided me with a paradigm shift. That circle of control concept is huge for me! If you are unfamiliar, it basically says that there are things outside of your control and if you waste time trying to control things you can’t, you are going to be wasting your time, and be very stressed out. What you do have control over is your attitude and your actions and responses.
So, when important things break, I try to think about my response and what I can do. Perhaps there is some way I can fix it myself. I am frugal, but this seriously goes beyond saving money. It gives me a little control over the havoc. It feels great!
This worked for the car mirror when my son decided to drive into a stop sign. We pulled to the side of the road and I took a deep breath and thought… I need to find the mirror. Maybe I can fix it. I was a little shaky, but I got out of the car and found the mirror on the street. I drove home and luckily there was no law in the state that required a side mirror.
I googled my car and the issue and found that the mirror could be replaced and all it took was a couple of screws. I felt confident that I could do it. I found a replacement mirror on Ebay. The painted part of the original was still in perfect condition and I popped it off and fixed it. I had never, EVER done anything like that before.
The air conditioner broke and it was very hot in our house. Suffocating. If my husband was home, he could have looked at it. He worked on air conditioners during seminary. So, I figured I would call him.
He walked me through the analysis, and he was positive it was a $10 piece that supplied a charge to a bigger piece that was the issue. I was able to order the $10 piece and install it. I was very careful to make sure the circuit breaker was off; there are some jobs requiring respect of already established scientific laws. Among them is anything to do with electric currents.
In a couple of situations, I had to reach out of my comfort zone and ask for help. It is difficult asking for help. But I have found in military communities, there are many people who want to help, because they have been there!
And the door in the face? It didn’t hurt, but I stopped and looked in the mirror. I knew I had to get stitches. I hate hospitals, but I knew I needed to go immediately. I jumped in the car and drove to the ER. If I were to redo that situation, I would have called a friend to drive me. Head injuries are not predictable.
These were some examples of gaining control over the many things that go wrong. Of course, we can’t fix everything. And sometimes we need to call a professional, and that’s okay too. You are still in control of that interaction. Some people are not so great at fixing things but can find alternative solutions or they have skills with bargaining for deals or services.
When the Law of Natural Convergences wreaks havoc in our lives, we often get stressed out and frazzled. But most of the time, the things that happen are not that big. They are little things in the grand scheme of life.
Some of them we can even laugh about later. Yet it is so easy to worry and stress about them when we are experiencing them, even though the worry doesn’t change anything or help anyone.
Of course, some things that happen are huge, truly devastating, or life-changing. And sometimes there are things we can’t fix or control at all.
I have been in some of those situations, and to be honest, I don’t have the strength or wisdom to be in control.
It is comforting to know that God is, though! We can trust that He is in control and loves us. Not everything may turn out the way we want, yet God’s presence, love, and promises can be our comfort.
“When the cares of my heart are many, your consolations cheer my soul.” (Psalm 94:19)
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Left Behind During Deployment
by Rebekah Cochell
Left behind.
That’s how I feel sometimes. And not in a “left behind after the rapture” type of way. This is a left behind out of the action, adventure, and glory.
When my husband goes off to war, my only battle seems to be against my own seeming insignificance. And I become jealous, even though we both made the decision concerning our roles. I am the one who is home in an endless loop of “groundhog days,” driving teenagers to sporting events, cooking, cleaning, and sleeping alone, while he is doing the “important work.”
I know! When I write it down, it sounds horrible! Being a stay-at-home parent is a blessing! And many writers and theologians have said it is THE most important job!
Sometimes, however, no matter how smart or educated we are, it’s difficult to BELIEVE something we KNOW.
I am so thankful I have the option to stay home, and of course I know that my children are much more important than other “adventures.” But to be honest, I don’t feel that way all the time.
You might be thinking that if I really wanted to be part of the adventure and glory, I should have become a soldier or chaplain myself.
But I would make a TERRIBLE soldier.
I have issues with public restrooms, for one. It’s the fodder of my nightmares.
I have issues with schedules and being on time. I’m constantly five minutes late (which is 20 minutes late military time)!
And waking up at 4:30 am does not work for me!
Of course, some of this discontentment has to do with the fact that when you work outside of the house, you have tangible goals that are completed, you have projects with visible finished results, and you have coworkers and clients who praise you if you do a good job.
At home, the laundry piles never seem to get smaller, the dirty dishes never stop, and nothing seems to show for it.
This shouldn’t really matter, but when you are home, you go through days and weeks of not feeling like anything you do is noticed, appreciated, or will amount to anything. Especially during a deployment when not even a husband is around to give a nice nod to your labor.
There is another factor that plays into doing something “meaningful” as a military spouse. Many military spouses sacrifice careers, not always because of kids, but because spouses go where the military tells them to. Many times, these places are towns without many opportunities for one’s chosen field.
Of course, there are tons of avenues in which a spouse can volunteer and at least feel a little more useful. Many spouses plug into the FRG or PWOC and contribute in powerful ways. Some play piano or sing and help with chapel services. Some plug themselves into children’s ministry.
When my husband was a new chaplain, I was a little lost. Initially, I did none of these. I met with the FRG and coffee groups, but I had no desire to take on a leadership role. I was not a big help in the chapel services; I can play a little piano, but I can’t hold a tune, and performing music in public is stressful for me. I had no desire to work with children in Awanas or Sunday School either.
The guilt over the lack of desire, especially concerning children’s ministry, was immense. I have a teaching degree, after all. Perhaps I was burnt out with 25 plus years of constant children’s ministry, since I was 12!
So, when my husband became a chaplain, I felt like I had no purpose; I was just an appendage. My role became one of representing my husband in public. I learned to look presentable for any given occasion, and I could say the right things. But this role left me unfulfilled.
One day, my husband called and asked if I was free. There was a certification class for a Strong Bonds curriculum and spouses were welcome to join. I didn’t know too many people yet, and we were down to one car. This was a chance to spend some time with him and get out of the house! I loved sitting in the training class with him, learning the curriculum. Teaching is not only my background, it’s in my blood.
After that, any opportunity to sit in a class I eagerly jumped on. When he would teach a Strong Bonds event, I taught with him. We would plan events together and co-teach. Our “gifts” worked well together. It was a way that I was useful in this new lifestyle.
It showed me that no matter what your passions or talents are, there are ways to use them within the military life.
But then deployments came and I was, you guessed it, left behind!
I was jealous of him. He was on the battlefront, literally and figuratively. He was fighting spiritual battles in physical wars. He was doing something BIG, supporting and loving the soldiers who were fighting for our freedom.
But, those of us on the home front, who are left behind, have significant battles and struggles too. And often our soldiers have a similar feeling of being left out. They are left out of the important aspects of family life. They miss out on things like birthday parties, baseball games, choir concerts, and graduations. And to top it off, they often feel like they aren’t doing much of importance either. There are times when nothing seems to be happening, times when everyone is frustrated with the futile nature of what they are doing. They often feel they are not being useful because they don’t know the big picture or what is happening outside of their bunker.
It is difficult to gauge the significance of a thing while you are battling through it.
It comes down to acceptance of what you have been given to deal with and being cognizant that everyone around you is going through significant battles as well.
After all, we know that the real battle is not against flesh and blood, but against the “forces of evil in the spiritual realm” and this battle is on both sides of the ocean, both sides of the war.
I know for a fact that many chaplains, and many other deployed Christian soldiers, have stories to tell. Stories of battling the real battle. Battles of depression and oppression. Battles of temptation and battles of loneliness. These are the battles that we as Christians need to be focused on. And they are equally potent whether you are home with the kids or off in the Middle East.
We are so fortunate that our God is infinitely more powerful than the spiritual forces of this world, and we know who will win in the end.
My feelings of being useless and left behind were not accurate. We are all in the trenches of significant and brutal battles, and there are those around us, wherever we are, who are facing battles of their own. This is not exclusive to the military life, yet military spouses have some commonalities in their struggles and we can have compassion for other spouses in an in-depth way.
Possessing peace and the assurance that God is in control and loves us endlessly allows us to share our faith when those around us–whether our children, friends, or neighbors–are struggling. It allows us to share the greatest hope of all.
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Facing the Unexpected
by Andrea M
Never in my life did I imagine that I would become a military spouse. When I was younger, I thought certain people were made for things like this and I was certainly not one of them.
My husband joined the U.S. Army Reserves as a chaplain in January of 2018 after 12 years of marriage. We were in a place I don’t think either of us expected, but God in His graciousness led us to it and I suddenly became something I never planned to be: an Army wife.
Life.
You can’t plan it. As much as you’d like to, you just can’t. You can try, but I sure haven’t had very good luck at it.
We plan because planning makes us feel safe, as the uncertainty can often be frightening.
Let me tell you a story.
I used to do a lot of traveling for an old job of mine. I was just out of college at the time—young and a bit unsure of life on the road.
I always had a fear of walking into a hotel room that was already occupied by someone. So instead of walking right into a room, I would push the door open and take a quick peek to survey the surrounding area before going any further. It sounds more like I was entering a crime scene than a hotel room. Oh, what the imagination can do.
However, my imagination proved to be true one evening as I lugged all my bags with me (I’ve always been a one-trip girl) up to my room a bit weighed down. But I still found the strength to push that door open and the first thing I saw was a bright light. Then I heard a man yelling profanities at me. I looked in the direction of the voice, and there was a man working on his laptop while sitting on the toilet. Doing his job times two.
That door I had pushed opened seemed to move in slow motion as it shut in front of me. I took a deep breath after the door closed. My hotel fear just happened.
I went down to the hotel desk to tell them that someone else was in that room, and he wasn’t very happy to have me as a visitor. The desk staff apologized profusely and gave me a suite for my trouble.
The Reality
Sometimes our fears come true; things in life we never expected can and do happen. The fear of deployment, loss of friendships, an impending move, starting all over again, death of a loved one, our child adjusting, finding purpose, a sick child, etc. What will we do with those times?
This past summer my husband left for three months to complete CHBOLC. I was scared and I can remember the waves of grief that would come over me as I thought about living life without my best friend next to me, becoming a “single” mom to a special needs child, and balancing all of this with full-time employment.
It was, in a word, overwhelming.
I remember the words of Jesus to His disciples in John 16:33:
“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
Jesus gave His closest buddies a pep talk, some encouraging words for their impending grief. Really, it was some very good news in the face of the difficult news that after three years of walking closely with and teaching His disciples He would leave them to go back to His Father.
Life does not always hand us a hotel upgrade for our troubles like it did for me on that fall afternoon in the New Jersey Best Western. However, Jesus says we can have peace because He has overcome the troubles of this life.
Troubles are inevitable. Yet, whatever pain or grief our hearts will experience in this life, Jesus offers us Himself, His power and presence, to overcome them. Beloved, take this joyfully. Fear doesn’t have to control us. You and I will make it because Jesus is enough. We will walk through difficult seasons because Jesus is enough.
We will face our fears because Jesus is enough.
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9 Months into the Adventure
By Mishi Harari
It’s been nine months.
Nine wholesome, challenging, rewarding, frightening, and exhilarating months.
The months that have gone by have proven so much to me. They have provided me with great opportunities to bolster my faith in Gd and to open myself up to those around me who truly care: my fellow chaplain spouses.
Our chaplaincy is unique. It entails commitment and loyalty not only to our battalion and our soldiers and their families, but our role extends outward to the entire Jewish community and anyone at all who feels at home and wants to join us at the Jewish chapel.
Our weekly sabbath services have their ups and downs. There are times when the room is packed with young and old, retirees, active duty service members, and reservists. And then there are weeks when only one young, lone soldier will show up.
Whoever it may be, we are always ready. After the Friday evening service, we have a sabbath meal at our home, feeding the hearts and souls of all those who come to join us.
Our holiday programs and services, caring for service members who are being treated at the military hospital while away from their families, cooking healthful and nourishing meals for them, and bringing women together to learn about sabbath traditions and customs are just some of the things we have been blessed to be a part of so far.
My husband spends his time devoted to his battalion and the Jewish community, as much as he can, any time of day or night, for whoever may need his guidance.
Through it all, my emotions have their ups and downs too.
Our chaplaincy isn’t the only thing that is unique about our military life. Everything about our lives changed drastically and completely when we moved away from the comfort of our insulated community and joined the ranks of fellow chaplains and their families. We knowingly chose to move away from the comfort of our community, far from any Jewish schools, synagogues, and kosher food.
We consciously decided together, as a family, that we could accomplish so much more by being able to support soldiers and their families.
And yet, there are times when my heart cries and wonders why. And I question what I have brought myself and my family into.
During the hard times and the difficulties, facing challenges and days of loneliness, I wonder. There are days when I feel so present and comfortable. Like I truly belong here.
And there are days when my world is more lonely and isolating than I ever thought possible.
We have had quite a few hurdles to get through. There have been difficult and hurtful people who have challenged my faith in Gd and in myself. Homeschooling and raising a large family, pregnancy, and miscarriage have slowly and steadily pushed me down this untrodden path. Yet they have given me the chance to dig deeply into myself and find my strength. My intuition. My wisdom.
The experiences I have faced so far, large and small, beautiful and dark, have paved the first few steps of this new journey we have set forth on.
Through it all, there is one thing that protects me and also propels me. It encourages me and keeps me focused on my goals. It reminds me daily of why I am here, living on an Army post, far away from anything I have ever known and related with.
Faith.
My faith in the One above, the One who directs the steps of man, the One who puts each one of us exactly where we need to be at the precise moment we are there.
My faith in Gd has been strengthened by all of my adventures thus far. He has given me the courage to look past the haters, to open myself up to those around me who truly do love and care, and most importantly, He has taught me to look into myself, to see who I truly am.
Without the ups and downs, without the challenges that come along with the precious work of being a chaplain spouse, without all the beauty it brings, I would never, not in a million years, have known who I truly am and what I could accomplish.
And this is only the beginning.
We must take adventures in order to know where we truly belong.
I may never understand why we have been challenged and blessed in the ways we have, but I know that for whatever reason, we truly do belong here.
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On Loneliness, Grit, and the Hard Work of Building Community
By Sarah Sandifer
I shouldn’t have been surprised, really, when we got all of our boxes unpacked, and instead of putting them out on the curb with a “free” sign on them as we had said we were going to do, Lane hauled them up to our attic with a mischievous grin on his face.
“I just thought this would give us the option to do it again if we wanted to.”
In the previous three weeks we had seemingly agreed on how hard DITYs are and how he owes me a trip to a beach somewhere as I was not excited to be New Girl again. So when he mentioned the option of even considering another DITY move, I threw a roll of tape at him.
We didn’t know a soul in our new city and we moved into our new neighborhood mostly without any fanfare besides some kind souls who waved as they passed our driveway. Not a family to be discouraged too easily, we explored and created adventures of our own as we finished out Lane’s PCS leave.
When I stilled myself and let myself acknowledge it though, the loneliness and accompanying sadness of beginning again were so palpable I ached.
Our move was especially tender because as soon as Lane signed into his new unit he practically simultaneously boarded a plane to meet up with his unit overseas.
“Daddy, I love you and I don’t want you to go.” She was wearing pink glasses and was five and this phrase just about broke me.
We said goodbye and the girls and I went to get ice cream; we got through Day 1.
On Day 2, I realized there was not a single person in this city whose number I had saved in my phone and felt more vulnerable than I wanted to admit. What if I needed help in the middle of the night? What if I needed to send an SOS and take a kid to urgent care? I knew no one and battled the urge to become a self-reliant fortress: I can’t crumble, there’s no one around to help pick up my pieces.
I sat for a few days in this vulnerability and loneliness, then a thought streaked through my heart: “It doesn’t have to be this way.” I decided that I actually do need people in my life, and if it wasn’t happening on its own, I needed to create it.
I repeated a phrase that became a bit like my battle cry: Stronger together, Sarah–remember, you are stronger together.
I decided that if I needed community then there were other girls who needed community too, so I organized a weekly Bible study for our unit wives. There were some moments of insecurity and doubt. Can the new girl really be the one to rally others together? They don’t know me, will anyone show up?
I did it anyway.
On the day we were to have the first Bible study, each of our phones rang with the same terrible news: One of our soldiers was killed. Our collective breath was taken out of our very lungs.
Should I still have the Bible study, I wondered? Would the girls still want to get together?
I decided to still meet, with the same mindset I had in starting it in the first place. If I needed to have others in my life, no matter the circumstances, surely others did too. So on Night 1, the night we lost one of our own, I was shocked as the room was packed. It was true after all–we needed to be together, we are stronger together.
We talked about how we were doing and how good guacamole is and we cried a little, too, about how we were sad and how we needed to feel normal in a life that is decidedly not normal.
What am I trying to say with all this?
We needed to make space for each other and in doing so, we made space for love too. We needed a space that would push out the fear and the loneliness and the big doubts and would allow for love to fill in those gaps.
And it happened.
Each week we got together, we left a little less alone, a little more hopeful, with a little more grit and a little more love.
As for me, I continued to refuse to go it alone and started inviting girls from the unit over for Sunday night dinners. One night, they walked into laundry all over my dining room table and another night I ruined the spaghetti, a seemingly un-ruinable meal.
Deep down though, we all knew they didn’t come for the spaghetti. They came to be together, to not have to worry about one night’s dinner while their husband was deployed.
They came because there’s that low-grade simmer of fear that walks with us everywhere we go, every time the phone rings. And when we’re packed into a living room laughing about the chaplain’s wife’s mushy pasta, we kind of forget about that for a little bit.
Honestly? I’m glad there’s never a point where it just becomes easy. It keeps me awake to the pain and I think that’s a good thing.
It’s a continual reminder for me that I can’t do this alone and I mean that both in how I need God and how I need others.
I’ve been making it a practice to notice the goodness of God no matter what difficult circumstance is going on, and I can’t deny it: I see it in the people we do actual life with, the ones who say the same goodbyes we do, because the goodness of God is alive to me in the context of others–those who walk through the same suffering that I do and keep loving, keep giving, keep going.
In this military life, I find that loneliness, fear, bitterness and exhaustion will take up as much space as I let them. But if we make space for others, we’re also making space for love. And every single time, we’re getting more resilient as well because it’s just true:
We’re stronger together, we’re stronger together, don’t ever forget it, we’re always stronger together.
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Connecting the Dots
By Cindy S.
(previously published)
Sometimes I have a hard time connecting my daily ministry tasks to what God is doing in the lives of the people I serve and work with. Sometimes it feels like a lot of squeezing for a little bit of juice!
But this summer, God allowed me to serve in a ministry that helped me draw a very short line between my efforts and God’s results.
In June, I had the opportunity to volunteer for four weeks with Operation Heal Our Patriots (OHOP), a ministry of Samaritan’s Purse, reaching wounded warriors and their spouses with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
For 16 weeks each summer, Samaritan’s Purse flies ten couples to their remote Samaritan Lodge in Port Alsworth, Alaska, for a five-day retreat focused on marriage enrichment and spiritual renewal. The staff that serves these couples consists of seasonal employees and short-term volunteers, working in maintenance, housekeeping, cooking, and food service. I was assigned to serve in the staff kitchen.
Because I had met several of the people connected with OHOP before I flew to Alaska, I had some idea of what to expect as a volunteer: long hours, physical labor, no stores—so bring everything you might need—and no transportation beyond my own two feet.
But what surprised me during my month there was the single-minded focus on sharing Jesus that characterized the staff, from the chaplains who work directly with the wounded warrior couples, to the volunteers and staff who provide support.
Daily we exhorted each other to stay strong because our work would bear tangible spiritual fruit. And every Friday, as staff and guests gathered around the fire, our work was rewarded as guests gave testimony of their new faith in Christ and their desire to be baptized. What a celebration as we walked down to the lake to witness the new believers enter the water with the chaplains!
Then, we happily returned to our tasks because we knew our efforts had grown fruit. We had connected the dots between our jobs and God’s moving in the lives of the wounded warriors and their spouses.
I had the opportunity to sit down with Karen Webber, one of the season-long OHOP staff members and wife of GARBC-endorsed Navy chaplain Tom Webber, and talk about the unique focus and teamwork I experienced at OHOP this summer.
Karen has served at OHOP during the last four seasons as a cook in the staff kitchen. Her job is not an easy one. As one of four staff cooks, Karen not only prepares meals six days a week, but also plans menus and orders food which is flown in once a week on Samaritan’s Purse planes.
Long hours and hard work don’t discourage Karen. She sticks to her motto: “Be kind and gracious and cook good food.”
And good food it is! While I was there, the staff ate shrimp, salmon, steak, fresh watermelon, scratch-made yogurt, apple pies, and gourmet pizza. I had to ask Karen why the food was so good; it requires substantial effort and expense. Her answer was, “It’s my goal to serve tasty, nutritious food to allow the staff to serve with strength and joy.”
Even though Karen’s position as a staff cook doesn’t directly impact the wounded warrior couples with the gospel, she knows that great meals renew the spirits of those who are interacting with the guests at OHOP. It is hard to minister to hurting people when you are feeling empty yourself, and Karen’s food fills the stomach and the heart. It certainly kept me going strong!
If you are like me, it is tempting to discount the small contributions you make to a ministry.
It is easier to see a personal impact when you are serving in a leadership position, or when you are directly sharing Christ’s love, but this is a misleading viewpoint.
Karen and her fellow cooks are solely responsible for the nutritional needs of 40 people who serve over a 16-week period in a location where they cannot purchase food for themselves. The volunteer kitchen helpers make sure the dishes are clean and sanitary for the next meal. The volunteer housekeepers keep guest and staff areas tidy and hygenic. Fail at these missions, and the staff members who counsel with the couples are too sick or tired to be effective.
So, we all work together, and even the smallest or simplest contributions are connected to the greater mission of sharing the Gospel.
Of course, this only works if we know and understand the mission.
If the mission ends at good food, clean dishes, germ-free bathrooms, and personal satisfaction in a job well done, our motivation won’t last for long. My experience this summer helped me reevaluate the impact of my ministry tasks on the cause of Christ, and to take the long view.
At OHOP, there were just a few dots to connect between my tasks and God’s results. At home, there are countless dots, sometimes stretching years into the future, requiring faith in the working of the Holy Spirit.
As a senior spouse in the Army chaplaincy, my role is often like Karen Webber’s at OHOP—demanding, yet far from the action—but I too can help other chaplain spouses on the frontlines of ministry “serve with strength and joy.”
What a lesson to learn! And what a gift to know that God will use all our efforts, large or small.
When we faithfully fulfill our roles “as unto the Lord,” we can trust God to connect those dots for us and use our efforts for His glory.
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Deciding to Leave Active Duty
By Kristin T
In February of 2012 I welcomed my husband home from his second tour in Afghanistan. I couldn’t have told you anything about Super Bowl that Sunday, but the energy inside that Fort Campbell hanger was tangible with a certain mix of nervous energy, sheer exhaustion, and impatient longing.
We still have the double-sided sign in our attic: “CH T Belongs to Me” on the front and “Merry Anniversibirthday” in big thin lettering across the back.
My favorite guy was home.
We knew the drill. After the mandatory hold time, we decided to take a few days to ourselves before coming “home” to my parents’ house where he’d be reintroduced to our then two-and-a-half-year-old daughter and the son he met the first time via Skype only eight months prior.
It was a wonderful plan. We rendezvoused at a sweet B&B in Serenbe, GA and discussed our past, present, and future plans, uninterrupted, face-to-face.
We had filled out our “PCS (Permanent Change of Station) Wishlist” in the eleventh month of deployment and soon learned that we were headed to another deploying unit (out the door in twelve months) not on our list at all.
We believe the wisdom of Proverbs 16:9, “The mind of the man plans his ways, but the LORD directs his steps.” Location was no big deal…as long as we were together.
But this next assignment did not seem to be lining up with our desires nor our expectations.
Uncle Sam had given my husband some invaluable training and a wealth of experience in a relatively short amount of time. But another deployment? Again? Already? Emotions were high and feelings were mixed. Can we do this again? What if the next twenty years is like this? Will our children know their father? Will this break him? Will this break me? We didn’t know.
It had been a long year. He was tired; I was lonely.
A Bit of Background
Our initial introduction to active duty had been a whirlwind. My husband graduated seminary and welcomed our first child within ten days of his reporting to Fort Campbell to fall in on an already-deployed unit. He would be replacing a chaplain who had burned out, as we understood it.
I took our newborn and settled back into my parents’ home in SC and off he went to ready himself for his first adventure halfway around the world. Not unlike anyone else’s story, ours was exciting. And it was shocking. It was like nothing we could have prepared for.
On his very first day, before he was able to get upstairs to meet his rear detachment commander, he was caught off guard with a somber, “Oh, good, Chappy, you’re here.” He was led to a grieving father, set to retire in the next few months, who had just lost his son in a boating accident. He had missed so much over his career and was desperately looking forward to making up lost time.
This encounter was the first of many etched on my husband’s heart.
Time in garrison post-deployment was non-stop reaction to crisis. Many counselings, many losses, many divorces, many suicides. We didn’t realize until much later that his aviation support battalion was larger than most by at least double.
I know my husband can thrive under pressure, and I believe he does only through the power of Jesus Christ.
God Met Us At Our Crossroads
We knew something had to give. He had been gone nearly 35 of our first 72 months active. He had trained aggressively and cared tirelessly for every family, it seemed, except his.
Certainly families can and do thrive in an active duty environment. This was a very personal decision. It was time to release, to leave and cleave. We began to pray for God to open doors as we began to emotionally separate ourselves from active duty.
Like only He does, God flung the doors open. A pastoral position opened up at his father’s church where we had completed his seminary internship, a house not yet on the market became available (it was less than two miles from the church!), a National Guard position was offered, and, as a special surprise, we discovered we were pregnant with our third child without the help of fertility treatments.
We crunched numbers, set calendars, filled out a gazillion pages of paperwork, and packed our bags for our new adventure together.
A Few Thoughts and a Healthy Dose of Hindsight
- Timing is (not) everything.
We know better than to discuss important issues when we’re tired (or hungry); but we’re not always granted that luxury, especially pre/post deployment or PCS season. To say we were exhausted is an understatement. We took what energy we had at the time and threw it into re-evaluating our situation.
With the prompting of a senior chaplain,we ran our decision through five filters (in no particular order): Family, Finances, Future, Faith, Fun.
What was the best possible scenario within these five areas? Facts and assumptions? We knew the short dwell times of AD were not what we wanted for our family. We knew our finances would take a big hit leaving AD for a small-town pastorate. We knew that we still wanted and needed the military as part of our future. We knew we wanted to minister our faith together rather than independently as we’d been experiencing. We assumed anything could be fun as long as we were sensitive to the Lord’s leading. We knew it was time for a break.
We had peace, we had purpose, we had a place to go, and we had a plan.
- You can take a soldier out of active duty, but you can’t take the active duty out of a soldier.
So, what about all those glowing plans of quality time together? Well, I’m still not sure whether to blame genetics for his high-octane energy level or the military for this ingrained op tempo, but our first year with that DD214 was nearly as lonely and independent as the years prior.
I recall moving into our new home and my husband spending many of his evenings working on the house. Everything was time-to-task, whatever it took to get the job done. He even put up a ten-foot fence by himself…in winter…in Pennsylvania.
Perhaps it was partly his bewilderment at my preoccupation with our three children under age three, but we were certainly in a stage of independent taskings. Again, timing isn’t everything. We were together and I wouldn’t trade that bumpy year for anything.
In addition to the unexpected restlessness, there was the actual marked lack of sleep, the continued speaking in acronyms, the higher-than-normal personal expectations, the detailed evaluation of systems, and (perhaps more so for a pastor/chaplain) the constant analyzing of people.
These aren’t bad things, just things that tended to carry over for us.
Of course, there are also things we miss. First, the simple wardrobe. I love the uniform; it’s practically a wearable duffle bag that looks so good on my mister. I doubt he’d admit it, but I think he enjoys lacing the combat boots for his Mdays. Then there is the unity, organization, efficiency of personnel that is just not the same in the private sector.
You still might catch my good-natured eye roll at the church potluck. Why won’t folks just walk down both sides of the table?! It became a joke pretty quickly, “Just sigh and say ‘civilians.’”
Until we got our medical coverage straightened out, I even missed Tricare Prime. I know!
We laugh about it now, but active duty has a rusty on/off switch.
- The grass is greener…where you water it.
One benefit of being married to an amazing chaplain/pastor is that he knows the delicate art of communicating to need. I can always count on him to diffuse my mood, break my cynicism, and encourage my heart.
The fact was, we were just in desperate need of pausing to patch up and refill the watering cans. It seemed clear that another move with another deployment would have likely left us high and dry, at least for a season.
It wasn’t a lack of faith that the Lord would care for us. We knew He had our best interest for His glory through struggle.
It wasn’t discontentment; we refused to dwell on “the luck of the draw” when it came to assignment.
It wasn’t an unwillingness to be “spent” for the work of the Lord. For the believer, life is ministry.
We were just ready to enjoy the gift of marriage a bit closer positionally (insert smiley emoji).
And now, always ready for our next adventure.
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ALONE: A Chaplain Spouse Perspective
By Anonymous
When my husband came home to tell me he had received orders for a year-long unaccompanied tour to Korea, I remember thinking how different life would be.
I didn’t expect just how different.
He had only been an active duty chaplain for three years and we were still at our first duty station. We had established a good routine and had a great supportive community. I had grown up as a military kid, so not having a “home town,” we decided that I should stay at our current location with our two children. Our oldest was five and our youngest turned two, three days before my husband left.
The day came for him to leave, and although extremely sad, I was determined that things would go back to “normal.” We got up early the next day and made it to chapel (on time). I remember looking around that day and things just felt different
My husband had been the chaplain over the contemporary service for the three years he was there and it grew to be a very tight community. The people attending were consistent and willing to serve. However, it didn’t take long for that to go away. The transition to a new chaplain was hard for people, and for me.
Slowly, people started finding churches off-base and I finally made the decision to go elsewhere as well. So not only did I lose my husband, and my children their father, we lost our pastor and our church community. It was a very lonely place to be.
Our new church was wonderful and welcoming and understanding of our situation, but it was small and a bit of a distance away. And for me, who was getting used to being a single parent, it was hard to get plugged in.
We lived on base, and our community was great. It was surprisingly filled with fellow believers. We had different denominations we associated with, but our foundations were similar. In the beginning, people were very kind and thoughtful. But, after about three months, they kind of forgot about us.
So while my community was always supportive and willing to help in any way possible, it wasn’t always inviting. Not to say they were rude, it was quite the opposite, but I found myself being more of an outcast.
I do not think this was new. I probably always was kind of an outcast. I was surrounded by pilot wives. I was not in their “group.” I did not always understand the language they spoke in terms of their husbands’ jobs. But I always had my husband to talk with at the end of the night. We went out on dates and I could “get away” if I needed a break.
Well, that was no more. I found myself, on most nights, tired and overwhelmed, looking on Facebook at all the things the people around me were doing with each other–but not with me.
Our houses were very close together, making our lives pretty transparent. Sharing fences, and windows and doors often being open, we heard and saw real life. My neighbors on most Friday nights would have people over. I remember one particular night seeing four other families being invited over, their children having a blast together and the parents enjoying conversations while my kids and I sat in silence eating our frozen pizza.
I didn’t understand. Why was I left out so often?
I started seeing this pattern more and more. People would say encouraging words, would invite the kids and me over for dinner (usually no one else would be invited), and would say we need to do it again. But then they would have a birthday party for their kid and invite everyone else in the neighborhood except us.
I remember talking to my husband on FaceTime in tears, just asking him, “What’s wrong with me? Why don’t people like me?” He, of course, was encouraging, but at the end of the night, I was alone with my thoughts.
So I started thinking, maybe God is trying to teach me something. Maybe there is something wrong with me. Maybe I’m too vocal with opinions, or joke around too much.
I decided I would start being less like myself and try to work on things. But when I started doing this, people would ask me, “What’s wrong? I’ve noticed you’ve been different.” All this just brought confusion for me. I didn’t want to tell them what was going on, so I always simply said it was personal.
After a few months, I started noticing something.
When I was invited to a Chick-fil-A playdate or I randomly ran into a few people on the street and we started talking, there was something that always seemed to happen. One of them would use bad language, immediately look at me and say, “I’m sorry,” and keep going.
I always found this a little odd. I never directly said, “Please don’t use that language around me.” They just assumed I wouldn’t appreciate it. They were right, but I never said anything.
I noticed it more and more. Even around different groups, I could tell they were more cautious with their words–start to say one word, pause, and use a different word.
It finally hit me. Maybe there was nothing wrong with me. I was simply a chaplain’s wife.
Now, I know not all chaplains’ wives are the same. We each have our own convictions and struggles. I know that not everyone’s personalities mesh well together, and some of these people may have had a problem with just me. But the simple fact was, when I was around, they weren’t acting the way they usually did. I never told them my convictions, they simply assumed what they were because of my husband’s job.
After this “ah ha” moment came, I then had to start asking myself if I was ok with being an outcast. Was I ok not being part of a “tribe”?
The answer was yes. I still had support and knew these people would be there for me because they genuinely loved me and my family. I just may not be “their people.”
I wasn’t going to change the values I had because I might be invited to more birthday parties. And I didn’t want them to feel they couldn’t be themselves with me being around. I just had to be ok with being alone sometimes. Ok with seeing others go out together having fun while I sat binge watching Netflix.
In the end, it should never have been about me. It should have been about God. Once I finally came to that realization, and I took the focus off of me, I no longer felt alone.
I felt free.
Free to go out and be who I was, and to show others who I really was. I decided that even if I was ok with being an outcast, I was going to try and not be one. At least on my end.
I started inviting families over for dinner more and letting them see my real life. Making more of an effort to go out and let others in. I think people started seeing that even if we had different convictions, we had more in common than not.
Towards the end of the tour, I felt more a part of things. Looking back now, however, I don’t think much changed around me. Instead, I had changed. I had a different outlook on life. My convictions and values were a part of me, but that didn’t mean I needed to sit and be lonely because others didn’t share them.
I needed to go out and make myself available. I needed to invite instead of waiting for an invitation.
The Lord definitely sanctified me in ways I never thought possible during that year. The fact remains that my husband loves being a chaplain, and I love being his wife. I will proudly wear the title “chaplain’s wife” no matter what assumptions come with it.
Because, let’s face it, assumptions will be made about us no matter what our husbands do.
Let’s get out there and invite people in before too many of those assumptions can be made.
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The Hello-Goodbye Continuum
By L.G. McCary
Making friends isn’t the simplest thing for me. I have a quirky sense of humor influenced by British sitcoms, Shakespeare, Calvin and Hobbes, and my dad’s affinity for puppets. I contemplate the zombie apocalypse on a regular basis. I repeat the phrase, “I read an article the other day…” so often that it’s become a joke.
Needless to say, finding my “people” can be a bit of a process.
But making friends within the military sphere is hard for a different reason: friendships have parting dates from day one.
One of the first questions I ask upon meeting someone new is, “How long have you been here?” From their answer, I calculate how much time I have to get to know them and whether it is worth it.
It may sound terrible, but I know the person I’m speaking to is making that same calculation. Is it worth exchanging numbers? Should I friend her on Facebook? Is this someone I will never see again because new orders are in the pipeline?
I met several fun people as we prepared to leave our first post, and they all gave me the same look: “I like you, but I’m not going to talk to you again, sorry.” I’m sure my face said the same.
The truth is, friendships rarely last a lifetime with job changes, changing schools, having children, and a hundred other things small and large that shift your social circle. It may not feel like it, but every friendship is always somewhere between hello and goodbye.
For military spouses, the continuum is compressed into a few short years or months, and it changes the way you approach relationships in some comical ways. For example:
- Asking someone you met an hour ago to be your emergency contact isn’t weird for a military spouse.
- If you’ve been at a post for six months, you’re officially the expert. Be prepared to tell the newbies the best restaurants and kids’ activities in the area because they will ask.
- You could be asked to teach a Bible study at PWOC (Protestant Women of the Chapel) when you’ve never been to PWOC before and have only the vaguest idea of what it is.
- Having a ten-minute conversation with a stranger in the produce section of the commissary or the bathroom at chapel may net you a new hairstylist, dentist, chiropractor, and best friend.
- Someone you barely knew at a previous post is now your instant best friend at a new one because she’s the only person you know.
For someone who takes a long time to trust people, it’s been an education. A very wise senior chaplain’s wife told me at our first post, “What you used to do to make friends won’t work anymore. You have to think differently.” She was right. I don’t have the luxury of taking my time.
Instead, I have to take the approach of my lovely friend Tayler who grabbed my arm after chapel one day and said, “I’ve heard we should be friends, so let me give you my number, and we’ll hang out this week.” And we did.
Non-military friends get to stick around somewhere long enough to grow deep roots and enjoy a wider space between hello and goodbye. I admit I envy the breathing room, but I also see how easy it is to waste time.
If there’s anything I have learned in four short but intense years, it is to cherish my friends because time is short.
While social media allows us to communicate news and enjoy pictures of friends who have moved on or stayed behind when we have moved, it isn’t the same as chatting while your kids play at the park or laughing over coffee together at the Starbucks on post.
You won’t get this moment to laugh, cry, pray, and encourage each other again. That goodbye is looming on the horizon, and new hellos will come. You can’t walk alone for long.
“Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil.” Ephesians 5:15-16
P.S. If you’re still lonely, lure new friends with homemade baked goods. Brownies are especially effective.
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Calling for Chaplain Spouse Contributors!
Are you a chaplain spouse? Do you love to write or is it something you’ve been interested in? Read on, my friend…
A few years ago, I came across a dissertation paper that was studying officers’ spouses. The study found that as the service member was promoted in rank (and the spouse became a more senior spouse), there was an increase in isolation which led to increased depression and anxiety.
That part may not surprise you. But then I came across one sentence that said that the increased isolation these spouses experienced was very similar to what was commonly seen in a pastor’s wife.
Because I, too, am a chaplain’s spouse, I realized that it is quite possible that our community struggles with a double whammy. This was what fueled my passion to do the Anonymous Chaplain Spouse Survey in 2015 and 2016. My research, along with many conversations with senior spouses, has confirmed what many of us know to be true. That being a chaplain spouse (although quite fulfilling) also brings difficulty that we must be willing to talk about. Whether it is real or perceived, chaplain spouses tend to struggle some of the following:
- Isolation from family, friends, and sometimes military spouses we are assigned around
- No consistent church home/community (especially active duty)
- An internal struggle to be involved out of calling vs obligation
- Difficulty with being authentic/vulnerable for fear of feeling weak or jeopardizing a spouse’s career
- Watching or experiencing your chaplain’s experience of burnout and stress
- and so much more.
The Chaplain Spouse Blog is an authentic and safe blog .
I am inviting chaplain spouses who are interested in writing to join me in creating authentic meaningful content for our community. If you are interested, here is what you can expect.
Content contributors can/will:
- Remain publicly anonymous if desired, but must be confirmed as a chaplain spouse
- Touch on authentic topics for our community
- Write content that breathes life into others rather than be divisive
- Have the option to write content that is faith-based
- Find community in an ad/political free platform
FAQs
The Lifegiver mission statement is purely to “provide a place for honest conversation and breathe life into our community.” Although that sounds pretty vague, it hopefully sets the tone for positive content while remaining authentic.
1. Is there a commitment?
Not at all. For those who wish to write regularly, I will definitely consider it and welcome having new and fresh content. I personally work better when I have deadlines each month, but you may be in a place where you want to write as you feel prompted by a topic. If you are working on a piece, I wouldn’t mind getting a heads up though!
2. Is there any payment involved?
At this time, no. In order to keep Lifegiver a free resource, as well as a nice platform where people want to come, I do not take sponsorships and therefore do not have incoming funds to pay out. I have hesitated reaching out for contributors or team work for a long time because I have not wanted to “ask” for more than what I know you already give to the community- especially as a volunteer. However, I also want to be obedient to the prompting I feel to give you a place to both give and receive positive, encouraging content.
3. How will you decide who will be a contributor?
I am not currently turning people away from this opportunity as of yet. I would definitely encourage you to turn in any brief writing samples you may have. If you are just beginning, that is ok, too! We all have to start somewhere. Just like a family, I expect to have various writing styles and experience. The great thing about a blog like this is that I can create categories like devotionals, educational, PTSD, support, etc.
However… Any articles, or behavior, that is divisive, destructive, or does not have healthy movement forward will not be included as it does not align with the mission statement.
4. Will you be including faiths other than Christian?
As of right now, yes but with some limits. This may change, but it would not be helpful to our community and in line with the calling of a chaplain family to not be inclusive. There will be limits to faiths that are attempting to proselytize through the blog. This is a place of support. I will also have the ability to create categories on this if necessary. Limits on this also go back to being filtered through the mission statement.
5. What topics can I write on?
What is most important to me (and I believe to the community), is that it is authentic, relatable, and has movement forward. In other words, I would love for content to deal with tough topics that are rarely talked about openly, even if they feel negative. I only ask that the article ends in encouragement and movement forward.
Consider writing on topics that other chaplain families are wrestling with and experiencing! Please try to steer away from personal blog style writing where you are documenting your own journey. Feel free to share parts of your story, but use your story make a point or make it more relatable to what someone else is experiencing. For more on this, consider watching my video on “Telling Your Story“
6. What is the process of being accepted and submitting an article?
- Apply and turn in a brief writing sample if you have one (see below)
- After you receive an email acceptance from me, consider asking for feedback from me or other chaplain spouses on your topic.
- Send me an email on a topic you would like to write on and start writing! Aim for 800-1000 words.
- Enjoy a FB group just for chaplain spouse writers
- Send in your article and wait for editing.
- Receive your article with edits; approve or appeal any changes until an agreement is made.
- Article is submitted and waits in the Lifegiver queue for publishing. You will be notified of the dates of your publishing
A note on editing:
Please know that all articles will be screened and possibly go through some editing before they are made public. I know first hand that it is quite vulnerable to have someone edit your work. If this is new for you, I understand completely! I promise you will value it as it may even sharpen your skills as a writer! Your article will not be published without your final approval
7. Do I have to make images for my article?
Not if you don’t want to. If you feel especially talented in this area, I am open to it. More on this to come…
If you are interested in this exciting opportunity to serve, fill out the form below!
I’m so excited to do this with you! Corie Weathers, LPC
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A Glimpse into the Life of a Chaplain Spouse
by Dinah D.
Our family recently PCSed. This, of course, brings a lot of changes and stress. Honestly, it is incredibly overwhelming physically, mentally, and emotionally. Especially the emotional part.
I am an advocate for military families and I had spent the past five years of my life fighting and advocating for one community. It was emotionally very difficult to leave those families and that community behind. Then there is the part of having to start all over again, as a chaplain’s wife.
Starting over as a military spouse is stressful; starting over as a chaplain’s wife is super stressful.
The emotional weight chaplain spouses carry is heavy for many reasons. First, we not only deal with our own personal emotional reactions, we deal with our spouse’s reactions, our children’s reactions, and we understand people are watching our reactions. There is pressure that we feel, especially walking into a community we do not know. We do not know how this community views the chaplain. We do not know what their experience has been with the church.
This is what we walk into with each PCS.
I was surprised to be invited to a senior leadership spouse tea upon my arrival to our new base. This is a result of my passion to be very involved in my community; volunteer opportunities present themselves. Walking into that tea, I was nervous. I knew one person, only because I connected with her via email, joining the spouses’ club upon our arrival in Oklahoma and we later met at a Hearts Apart event. I worried about how these spouses would receive me.
This is the hidden part of being a chaplain’s wife people don’t know or see.
As the chaplain’s wife, I feel, based on my experience, there are automatic assumptions. Assumptions people develop based on their own experiences with the church community. Some assume I will judge them for what they say and do. Others may judge what I do and say because of what my husband does. Some hold people in positions of leadership and ministry to higher standards just because of the position they hold.
The reality is, I am a real person living a real military life. I am human and feel things deeply, especially for those I love and care for.
I remember when my husband was deployed. Although I had worked directly with the Key Spouse for the wing in coordinating service projects for the community, she never called to check on me during that deployment. I think she assumed I was equipped and had what I needed. My friends, which included our Wing and Vice Command Spouses, watched after me. I was very blessed in that assignment.
Additionally, I am a very resourceful woman. I helped with coordinating Hearts Apart events and connected with other deployed spouses and families, something I am passionate about. This helped me pass the time and provided support for me as well.
In talking with other Air Force spouse friends, I found they had similar experiences during separations. We are often left to handle everything by ourselves and ask for help if we need it.
This is complicated for those of us who are chaplain spouses. To start, chaplain spouses are usually at an installation or wing level which means we do not belong to any group or squadron. We really do not have a shirt or any clearly identified person we can call if something goes wrong during separation. We call those we are in relationship with. We really have to work hard to build our own support networks.
This makes for a lonely life in many cases. I also think being a minister’s wife in addition to being a spouse of a service member complicates the experience of military life for chaplain spouses. We carry the responsibility of being spiritual leaders for the community.
I also feel as a chaplain spouse I cannot share burdens with just anyone. I would not feel comfortable sharing my personal burdens with those I am responsible for looking after spiritually. It is an ethical conflict for me.
Those we find for our support networks are people we can trust, often located outside our local communities. These are armor bearers, people we ask to pray for us and our ministry and people who are objective enough to give us wisdom when we need it.
Many of us hold volunteer advocate positions in addition to our role as chaplain spouses due to our passion to serve our families and communities. It weighs heavy when you are managing an entire household and children alone. This is added to the expectation that because you have all the answers to the “Sunday School” questions, you are prepared to handle anything life throws at you. It is never that simple, not even for chaplains and their families.
All the wisdom and knowledge of the world will not keep us from suffering. Sometimes it is the suffering that makes us strong; it defines us and shapes us into better leaders.
Another challenge of the chaplain family is the fact that even when the chaplain is home, he is not always available. Even though my husband is home every night, he is still very busy with work. He may be home from the office but he has sermons to prepare and invocations to draft. He has many evening and weekend events he is required to attend. I am unfortunately not able to attend every event with him.
We have young children and some of those events are for single airmen and are not family-friendly. So, even though Saturdays are the only family day we have, they are often taken by mandatory all-day events for single airmen. This is, of course, in addition to his work schedule during the week. Chaplains don’t just work on Sunday; they work all throughout the week too.
At least in this assignment he actually has the opportunity to come home at night. When we were stationed at SAMMC there were weeks he lived at the hospital. I do not joke when I say this. He literally had a room he lived in, due to the work load. I had to come to the hospital at night to have dinner with him and go home by myself. Yes, that was all kinds of fun, in the midst of my fertility treatments and surgeries. Thank goodness we got through it.
Chaplain families are passionate about serving military families but this often requires incredible sacrifice and hard work. We sacrifice quality time together as a couple and as a family. We carry the burdens of our communities, which distract us from our own and that of our family.
I love and have devoted my life’s work to helping and caring for military families because I know and understand personally what sacrifices the service life requires. I will give until there is nothing left to give because I am a very passionate advocate for my families.
Yes, I call them my military families because I treasure them as much as I do my own family.
We carry a heavy load. We will never truly share with you how heavy, but please pray for us. We live this military life too.
Dinah Dziolek, LMHC, LPC
Licensed Professional Counselor
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The Worst Chaplain Spouse Ever?
By Rebekah C
I have considered writing a blunt and honest blog for quite a while. I thought about calling it, “The Worst Chaplain Spouse Ever.” (Hey, there is a “Very Worst Missionary” blog out there and people seem to respond to her candidness.) But I’m not sure just how honest I can be.
Perhaps people would enjoy reading our stories, but would they judge? Would it harm my husband’s career as a chaplain? Would it harm our ministry with soldiers? Or would it encourage them?
During the last deployment, I became weary of Facebook. It made me depressed because what was happening in my home was nothing like what I was reading in my friends’ posts. I couldn’t post things such as, “How many scholarships my senior received,” or “How many touchdowns my son made.” If I posted, it would read, “How many bizarre places my son spent the night this year,” or “How many times the police come to my door at 3 am,” or “30 ways to fight with your husband over Facebook messenger with no chance of kissing and making up.”
I never thought my family would have to deal with these issues. Thirteen years ago, my husband was a successful businessman and I was a stay-at-home mom. I homeschooled, and we went on business trips as a family. We went to church religiously. I read Bible stories to the kids. We prayed. I read all the right parenting books on how to raise your children for Christ.
Then, one day, my husband came home and told me that he needed to go to seminary. I laughed because I thought he was joking. He is a funny guy.
He wasn’t joking.
He had been sitting outside of a conference room waiting to speak with some very important people–CEO’s and what not. And suddenly, an overwhelming feeling rushed over him and he knew he wasn’t doing what he was supposed to be doing. He had to go into full-time ministry.
Fast-forward to eight years later and he was a military chaplain in the United States Army. During those eight years, we dealt with trials, seminary, church internship, and unemployment. We both taught at classical Christian schools for a few years, which provided the kids an excellent Christian education. We had a wonderful church family and an incredible neighborhood community.
The transition into the military lifestyle for my two teenaged sons was traumatic. They froze up emotionally. My husband had quite a welcome to the Army, as well. Within a couple of weeks, his battalion had two suicides in one weekend. That was just the beginning. He was the chaplain for a support battalion and it was the largest in the Army, with over 3000 soldiers.
By the end of the year, he was depleted. I was depleted and I felt alone. He was carrying so much on his shoulders, and I had no idea how to help him.
His second assignment was a Signal unit with an immediate deployment to Afghanistan. Let me just say, nothing that anyone writes or tells you will ever prepare you for the heart wrenching experience of deployment. Not just the deployment, but the reintegration. It is not all love and romance when they come home. “It’s a cold and it’s a broken hallelujah” to quote Leonard Cohen.
Deployment made me feel like I was missing a limb. My heart was missing half of itself. Reintegration didn’t sew my limb back on, nor did it mend my heart. At least not immediately.
And then a year passed, and we were told we were PCSing. We were even told where we were “penciled in.” I love to move. I love the experience. House hunting, meeting new people, finding new treasures. I was on Realtor.com every day. When the orders came, they were for the current duty station, but a new battalion. We weren’t moving.
I was disappointed, because emotionally I had already detached and pulled away. A week later, he got a call. The unit was deploying a couple of weeks after his new assignment started. I was devastated. Our relationship had not fully mended from the first deployment and now he was leaving again. My husband tried to be optimistic. He tried to find “the good” in the situation.
I was not so holy. I threw a huge pity party.
I was a single mother, for all intents and purposes, with three teenagers. During the first deployment, I had discovered my oldest was an atheist. He was and always has been respectful towards me and a pleasure to be around. But I knew he was making choices which would lead him into a downward spiral. And my heart ached for his pain. I wondered what I did wrong. I won’t go into details, but he was reckless, and I was terrified.
I prayed for his heart to turn towards God once more. I couldn’t understand why he didn’t believe in Jesus anymore. It had to be my fault, even though I thought that I read the right books and did the right things. He knew Christian theology. He had memorized God’s Word. He knew his Bible. How could he not believe?
In another vein, I found out my second son, the one who never cared about school or received an academic award, was dyslexic. He had managed to hide it from every teacher, including me, his whole life. Which explained everything, but his story is for another post. He learned differently than other students and now there were accommodations that would help him succeed. I thought everything would be great, but he instead just gave up academically.
My daughter, the youngest, suddenly started dealing with stomach issues. The amount of doctor visits during the deployment was ridiculous. They found nothing “wrong” and I still think it was caused by anxiety due to the separation from her father.
Those nine months were the most difficult of my life. But you know what? I survived. No, my family did not “thrive,” but we all survived.
An important aspect of enduring difficult times is how one grows. I not only found out I could fix anything that broke, including air conditioners, car mirrors, and coffee makers, but I found that when I dug in deep, I was stronger emotionally than I thought.
Yes, I pleaded for God to turn my son’s heart from stone to flesh. I had nightmares that my son overdosed on drugs. I accompanied him to court and watched him stand before a judge as he pleaded for mercy, due to his reckless behavior. Unrelated to the court issue, I answered the door at 3 am and talked to police officers twice. I had to let him go and set him up in a college dorm by myself. After my husband came home, we got a call that he had been taken to a mental hospital because he tried to commit suicide.
But there was Hope. And Grace. And Mercy.
My son is doing better and he had no serious consequences for his behavior. He is a different kid now. He is now agnostic, which has given me hope since he can’t discredit the possibility that God exists. I trust that the Holy Spirit will work on his heart and he will come back to Christ.
The military life is not an easy lifestyle. But the issues we dealt with during deployment were not caused by the Army. They were caused by the human condition, and the depravity of our sinful nature.
What the deployment did was expose our sin, wounds, and imperfections. It allowed things to come forward and allowed us to be in a place where Christ could work in us.
Why did I write all this?
Many assume chaplain families have it all together. Maybe they all do. Maybe I am the only chaplain spouse who doesn’t have all my ducks in a line. Maybe I really am “The Worse Chaplain Spouse” ever. But maybe there are those out there who relate. Maybe I’m not the only one who smiles and pretends I have it all together.
The other reason I wrote so candidly is because I believe there are always reasons why we go through hardships, and many of these reasons we will never understand until we see Christ face to face. I think that the trials we endure help us empathize with soldiers and their families in a truly authentic way.
These trials make us “real.” These hardships give us compassion and wisdom. They also humble us and cause us to cling to Christ.
Christians are human, just like everyone else, and we have issues. The difference is where we go for consolation. We have this beautiful hope, that no matter what happens in this life, God is in control. And one day we will be in eternity in His Presence.
And there will be no more tears.