Self-Care and Support While Your Partner Is Deployed

Deployments and separations are part of military life and often bring changes and added responsibilities at home. Managing things on your own — especially tasks you once shared with your partner — can seem overwhelming. You are not alone. Support is available, and there are steps you can take to help navigate this time. Explore these tips and resources.

Before deployment

As departure day nears, some spouses begin to feel:

• Confused, stressed, resentful or depressed
• Detached or withdrawn as their service member invests more time and commitment in the mission
• Hopeless and impatient
• Emotionally and physically distant

To better support one another during the predeployment period, remember that it’s important to:

• Keep the lines of communication open. Talk about your feelings and discuss what you expect from each other during deployment, including how you’ll communicate.
• Create opportunities for lasting memories during separation. Spend time together in a relaxed atmosphere to create memories that will sustain you during deployment.
• Get to know other military spouses and service members who are going through the same experience. Get involved with family readiness activities and other unit or installation events.

One way to reduce uncertainty and stress would be to use the Plan My Deployment Checklists tool, which can help you organize all phases of deployment — before, during and after. Setting up these practical, logistical checklists may ease your worry and allow you to better take care of yourself and each other.

During deployment

Stay grounded.

Don’t try to hide your feelings. It’s normal to feel sad, lonely or angry when you’ve been separated from your spouse. Some days may feel harder than others. Maintaining a positive attitude can be difficult, but positivity doesn’t mean ignoring difficulties or hiding your feelings — it means you accept the situation and trust you have the power and resources to get through it.

• Try to get comfortable with change. Change can be difficult and uncomfortable, but it can also help you build skills, self-confidence and connections and to grow — as a person, as a couple and as a family.
• Focus on things you CAN control. A key part of resilience is learning to pay attention to what’s going well. When you have negative thoughts, stop and remind yourself of — five things you’re grateful for. These can be simple — the sun is shining, you’re breathing, your children are healthy, you’ve slept well and your morning coffee is delicious. Practicing gratitude helps reduce stress.

If you have children, remember they learn as much from what their parents do as from what their parents say. When parents learn how to adjust, how to be patient, they show children how to do that too.

Practice healthy living.

Take care of yourself. Healthy living practices are other things you can control and model. Deployment can be a great time to focus on good sleep, good eating, regular exercise, stress management and staying connected to loved ones. Think about it as adding new tools to your wellness toolkit.

Pick a healthy living practice that appeals to you and add it to your daily life. Even small steps can make a big difference — like eating one healthy meal a week, giving up your favorite snack until the weekend or exercising for 10 minutes a day.

If you want to try a new wellness practice and aren’t sure where or how to begin, it can help to have a little support. Use these resources from Military OneSource to jump-start your healthy living practices:

Reunion and reintegration

This period can last from a few weeks to several months. Along with your relief and joy, there may be an adjustment period for you, your service member and your family. This may be especially difficult if your service member is having difficulty disengaging from combat or is suffering from combat stress.

There are several things you can focus on to reduce stress for you and your family:

• Talk openly and honestly about your experiences during the deployment and how you’ve changed. It can help you re-establish a foundation of healthy communication and encourage your service member to trust you with his or her deployment experiences.
• Try to be patient. It may be some time before you and your spouse feel relaxed and comfortable together. Recognize deployment reintegration may not go exactly the way you expected.
• Make plans. Making plans together, whether it’s for a weekend outing or planning for the future, can help you focus on your life together and help you feel closer.