Some people may have read the Nov. 16 Spouse Calls about the effects of military brat-hood and thought I had changed my opinion about how growing up in the military affects one's life. I have not changed my mind about how it affected me, but when I received the question in this week's column (Click here to read) I knew I needed a perspective different from my own.
I am happy that I grew up in the military and have chosen the military lifestyle as an adult. Most of the grown up military brats I know are active duty military themselves, or spouses, so our points of view tend to be similar.
Chris, the reader who sent in the question had a different experience. For a broader perspective and to provide some objectivity, I went to Donna Musil, a documentary filmmaker who has interviewed many grown up military kids and researched widely on the subject.
Her film "Brats: Our Journey Home" is the product of her own life and research into the lives of other military brats, and she did have insight and reassurance to offer.
My view remains the same, that the military life can be a positive or a negative, depending on how parents handle it, and the same life factors that affect every other kid in any other walk of life.
I also think we should spend less time examining the past to find out why we are the way we are and more time in the present deciding what we are doing to do with the days and personality traits we've been given.
However, if a little glimpse into the past and reassurance that one is not alone in these struggles helps move one forward. Then I'm all for that.
Musil had some encouraging words for the questioner. Here are some more of her comments:
"You can work through these problems, not run away from them. And if you try, and it still doesn’t work, you need to trust that you’ll be okay, that you’ll survive and flourish. You don’t have to like everyone and everyone doesn’t have to like you."
"I know this is hard and I know this is scary. I also know that if your parents grew up in one place -- or were brats themselves, but never left the military -- they won’t understand. If they grew up in one place, they learned those skills. If they stayed in the military, they never had to learn them. They’ll think there’s something wrong with you, but there’s not. You’re reacting just like every other person who was raised a brat and then left that environment. You’re normal, Chris. You really are."
To read more about military brats and helpful links, go to this Spouse Calls blog post.
For more about Donna Musil and her work, see www.bratsfilm.com
Adjusting to life after the military
Hi Terri,
I'm glad I saw your column. I grew up as a Brat. I was a Brat for 24 years and had wanted to join the military after college but was unable to due to health reasons. I'll be 40 this summer and I'm still having issues trying to adjust to civilian life. Home was always where my Dad hung is hat. We moved every 2-3 years until my fathers last assignment, where he and my mother finally settled down. I attended 9 different schools. I look back and realize what a great opportunity I had to live in all kinds of cool places. I experienced more by the time I was 10 than most people experience in a lifetime.
When my father received his final assignment I was a freshman in high school. I left allot of good friends and it took me until my junior year to find a group in my new school that I could identify with. After graduation all my friends who had lived there life in the same town were ready to spread their wings and start experiencing life. I on the other hand was to a point that I wanted to make some roots, find a place to call "home". I'm still looking for that place. My friends never moved back after college, they all went their separate ways (as they should have).
Last year I moved back to where we had lived my freshman year in high school (took my wife and kids too). I had kept in touch with a few of my friends there who hadn't left. I don't know who I was trying to fool by doing this. Like normal people they had gone on with their lives. Maybe I thought I could pickup where I left off. But I felt like just a much an outsider as ever.
I long for yesteryear, I feel like there is no place to call home and there is no one I can relate to. Are there others out there like me? How do they deal with this? How do they move on and lead "normal" lives.
Where is home?
There are definitely many grown up brats out there like you! How they move on, lead "normal" lives, as you said, and decide where home is must be as individual as they are.
I suspect when my husband and I retire and leave the military, we will be just the same. Already we are trying to decide where we will hang our hats and call home when the Air Force stops telling us where it is! That process has been delayed for me by the fact that I am still in the military community.
You can get in touch with some of those brats by going online and searching for military brat communities. Here are some links to get you started:
Brats: Our Journey Home
Military Brats
and see this Spouse Calls blog post about brats for more links.
Maybe the skills you learned as a military brat, which helped you make home wherever you landed with your family, will serve you in this circumstance as well. Making yourself at home is rarely instant. It takes time to make friends and feel at home.
If your old friends have moved, then make new friends. Treat it like a new adventure, rather than trying to recreate the old adventures you experienced there.
All the best from a fellow brat,
Terri
Thank you for all the information!
As a (ret.) military wife who hoped she did right by her kids, I am excited to discover all this information and read all the comments. An especially exciting discovery is the physical location of the American Overseas Schools Archives and Museum. It's in Wichita, Kansas and the site is hosted by Wichita State University - the very school my children attend. I look forward to their feedback about the museum. Diana Hartman Stuttgart, Germany
Hi Diana!
Welcome back to Germany. It's good to hear from you again!
If there is a physical museum and your kids get a chance to visit, please pass along their impressions.
Happy Thanksgiving!
Terri
Thanks Terri :)
It's good to be back!
I will definitely update you about the kids' impression of the museum. I so wish I'd known about it when I was in Wichita in August to visit the kids before coming back here.
Brats
I have lived in the same location now almost as long as I was a Brat. It is possible to allow deep friendships to form. It is worth the risk!
I remember clearly the day I had to decide how to handle a friendship that was on the fence. Do I dump it or do I move through the situation and forgive the offending incident? It was quite a moment because I had never had to deal with that decision before. I'm still friends with the person. For me it was a concious decision and turned out to be another valuable life lesson.
I still go through the "three year" cycle. I find that if I continue to add new friends to my circle it easies the urge to create a new routine. I also let my close friends know how valuable they are to me because so many have come and gone over the first half of life.
Brats: Different Journey
I also was a military brat. I'm now 25 a veteran and military wife raising my two year old daughter in the same envirnoment I was raised in. I had a hard time when we left Panama in '98. My dad had retired and I was a sophmore in high school and I felt like I didn't fit in to what I call the real world. I loved being a military brat and having friends that knew what it was like. I watched my older brother join the Air Force straight after graduation and knew some day I would join myself being that it was the only life I knew and loved. So after two years of college and realizing I wasn't happy, I joined the Army. Two and a half years later I met my husband and had my daughter. I felt I had to get out so I could make sure one of would be a more stable parent.
I would never go back and change the environment my parents raised me in. I'm glad I experienced it all. I hate the fact that I had so many great friends that till this day I haven't gotten in touch with all of them. I have seen the military in three different ways and so I'll be able to sit down with my kids and help them get threw it as a military brat. If my daughter ever decides she wants to join I can help her understand what it was like for me to go threw it as a female. And if she ever marries someone who is in the military, I can help her cope with being a military wife.
I'm just now adjusting to being a military wife even though I've been married for 3 years. It hasn't been easy but you learn to deal with it. I thought being a veteran and a military brat would help me but it's a different experience that I don't even know how to explain. It's hard for an child to have to deal with the military life but when they get older they look back and think of how wonderful it was, at least I do.