According to this article, Army Sends Infant to Protective Services, Mom to Afghanistan (found via @JessicaGottlieb on Twitter), a single mom is being ordered to deploy even though she has no one to care for her child…

My husband (a Veteran), pointed me to an interesting column from the New York Times: Back From Home, But Not Really Home. The article discusses some of the ambiguity of this day that honors the service of our Veterans and draws parallels to Odysseus’ homecoming.

In a time of war, our veterans may find they have difficulty re-entering the society they fought to protect…

Whether you are moving to a new country, an isolated posting, or your servicemember is deploying, I advise you to “grow where you are planted”.

Get involved, get busy. Or, as Tim Gunn says, “make it work”.

Reach out to other military spouses. Find deployment support groups, try the FRG, volunteer on post. Most posts have a community center where you will find postings for groups, classes, seminars and events.

A Reader Asks:
Happy Veterans’ Day! I just found your blog and I was wondering if there are directions to making a military family binder, something that would include military records, important numbers, deployments, LES, or anything you can think of. My husband is an Army Reservist and I think this could be very helpful.
First of all, Happy Veterans’ Day to you, too! Thank you and your husband for serving!
You did not mention if your husband has been activated in anticipation of a deployment. Regardless, there are …

For the military wife bloggers out there, or anyone whose husband is frequently gone on business trips, do you blog when the soldier is away from home? Do you feel you have enough anonymity or are you not concerned about any safety issues? Does it matter if he is away for a shorter or longer time? (I’m assuming male spouses don’t worry about this…but maybe I’m wrong.)
When DH was active duty, I always felt uncomfortable blogging about his absence while he was on field exercises…yet, I blogged …

iVillage is one of the first “woman-oriented” sites I became aware of online. I’ve used a lot of their resources, throughout the years, especially once I became pregnant.
I never knew, though, that they had built a thriving military wives’ community! And you can also connect with other long distance wives, some of whom are military and others who are geographically separated for different reasons–because sometimes a fresh perspective is just what you need to sort things out in your head.
I got a great e-mail tipping my off to …

A reader posted this comment:
Does anyone have any advice? My brother is due to deploy overseas within a year and it is causing problems in his marriage. His family (young wife and 2 year old daughter) and my family moved half way across the country two years ago to forge a better life away from the West coast. Our father also lives here. We are all within minutes of each other. Now that he is due to deploy, his wife wants to move back in with her mother out west. …

Wow! I added the contest late in the giveaway and I did not think there would be so many military families and friends of military families playing!
I wish I had forty-four copies to give away–there were so many touching stories about military children who need some support and encouragement while their soldier is away! I would strongly encourage you to ask your local or post library to pick up a copy. If you are near or on an Army Base, Army Community Services and the unit Chaplains …

I’ll never forget Halloween, October 31, 2006…because that is the day that my husband called to say he would be arriving in Killeen, TX, in hours, from Iraq.
A Halloween Homecoming, that was a real treat. However, there was a trick, or a catch, if you will.
He was home a couple of weeks early because my dear little baby was due in surgery on November 6…the day after my husband’s 30th birthday.
My husband never got to journey home with his men, all of whom survived the deployment, thank the Lord. …

Sammy’s Soldier is sweet picture book, written to help young children feel more comfortable with the deployment process. You can have a chance to win a signed copy at the end of this post.
As both a trained family counselor and the wife of a former Marine, Ms. White understands how confusing and trying deployments can be for our littlest patriots.
Her book follows Sammy through the preparations leading up to his father’s deployment, some of the activities Sammy and his mother do during the deployment, and then finally the homecoming. …