Real Friendship Transcends Military eCards

Sometimes, as a community we just want to be heard.

Every community does. We all look to be understood, right?

So then we see things like

and this

and this

and at first I thought it was funny and cute and I had a giggle until I realized that people were serious.

Now don’t get me wrong, years ago when I first saw those ‘things not to ask a military wife’ I thought they were funny, tongue in cheek, cute ideas.  I even posted one on here once a few years ago.

But friends, they’ve gotten out of hand.

They were meant as a JOKE.

And while I still think that asking my husband ‘have you ever killed someone?’ deserves whatever smart ass response he gives you about not yet today, we’ve really got to cut it out handing out a list of rules for people to follow if they want to talk to us.

And I agree that obnoxious is someone telling you “I know exactly how you feel”, especially when they are talking about a deployment because of a business trip to Kansas.

But we’re not talking about that.  We’re talking about real friends, acquaintances, and family members sharing their honest struggles about their spouses absence.

Because we are constantly like ‘my civilian friends don’t help/understand/support me‘ with one breath, while we are busy telling them we don’t want to hear anything they have to say, or any struggles they may have, with the other.

Friendships are a two way street.  

Military spouses do not have the monopoly on missing their spouses.

And here’s the absolute truth

I miss my husband when he is gone

for 
one 
night.

True Story.

He’s done 4 overseas deployments, several domestic deployments, countless courses that were months long.  There have been years he has been nothing but a passing presence in a house, away far, far more than he is home.

I have been married-but-alone a lot.

But let me tell you something, while it may be more of a routine, while I may have developed more coping skills, while I may be able to handle it better than someone doing it for the first time, while I may even enjoy my time alone and the starfish on the bed and the late nights writing, truth is I miss my husband every single time he leaves.

For however long he leaves.

I read an article in a military magazine that said (paraphrase) ‘the difference between military and civilian friends is when you find out your husband will be away when you have a hair appointment scheduled, the military friends will offer to take your kids, the civilian friends will offer to take your appointment.’

That has NOTHING to do with whether or not someone is a military spouse.
That has to do with whether or not they are a decent friend.

And suggesting that people whose spouses are not military are incapable of supporting military families is completely absurd and insulting to those many, many friends out there who are doing just that.

The very best friends I have had have been both from military families and civilian ones.

I have had ‘civilian’ friends hold my hand in the hospital in lieu of a spouse.

I have had ‘civilian’ friends watch my children, watch my house, wipe my tears and bring chocolate for no reason other than to brighten my day.

*Disclaimer – all my friends who are not actually members of the Canadian Armed Forces are civilians.  I am a civilian, Dh is not.  For the ease of this blog, when I say ‘civilian’ I mean a friend who is not part of a military family.  I am well aware of the difference.

To say that they are just ‘not capable’ of being my friend because they don’t share my experience would be the same as saying it is impossible to support a cancer patient without having the same type of cancer they do, or saying you can’t be a friend to a widow unless you too have lost your spouse.

And along that vein, telling my friend they can’t complain a little when their spouse is gone for a short time just because mine has been gone for longer would be the same as telling someone they can never complain about their hair because some people are bald.

Which is ridiculous.

There is a time and place when it is wonderful to be around people who share very close to (but never exactly) the same struggles as you, because you can share a common bond and that can be a good thing.

I absolutely enjoy a bond that cannot be replicated with some of the spouses of members who have served with Dh, because of shared moves, shared loss, shared joy, shared fear, shared grief.

But sharing the same experiences is not a pre-requisite to being a great friend.

And we are a military community are not doing a very good job being ‘great friends’ to civilian families when we tell them what they can and can’t share with us.

In fact, I  have been to over a dozen military bases. I can say with certainty that I don’t know what it would be like to be married to a military pilot. Or a person who does things in the Navy (sorry guys, I clearly wouldn’t know because I couldn’t think of the actual name of a hard Navy trade…) or a special forces operator. I could never, ever truly understand the grief of someone who has lost a child or spouse either during military service or outside of it. I have no personal frame of reference to say I know what it would be like to live with someone with PTSD. All those things fall outside my experiences, and yet I have dear friends who live those realities.
Absolutely, we connect and bond over the things we do have in common (I mean, that’s kind of what I do here, right?) and there’s so much value in that. But it serves a point to remember that I don’t know their reality, even if we are all ‘military families.’ Our diversity, that’s how we grow. How boring would it be if we were all the same, and how could we support each other if we all had the same needs all the time?

Listening, supporting, helping…. that’s how you be a great friend. Whether it’s to other military spouses or to your civilian neighbours.

When we tell everyone they have no right to post their struggles on their own facebook because our struggles are ‘harder’…

When do we draw the line, friends?

Life isn’t a giant pissing contest of who has it harder, it’s actually just a bunch of people on this planet experiencing their own, unique lives and sometimes, hopefully, connecting with others around them, both people similar and people very, very different.

I have friends who are families of farmers.  For weeks in the spring and fall, they are MIA, coming home in the early hours dirty and exhausted and then leaving again before dawn every day.  They make their food for them and they effectively act as though they are not home during harvest and planting because that’s their job.  And it’s hard some days and I hope they feel like they can tell me that.

I have friends with spouses who are firefighters.  And some Christmas’ they are alone for dinner because their spouse is on call.  They have to do weeks of night shifts where they are effectively parenting alone because that’s their job.  And I hope they feel like they can tell me when that sucks.

I have friends with spouses who drive truck.  There’s a good chance in their life their spouse has been away more nights than mine has.  But they live with that, because that’s their job.  And when they miss them, even on an overnight trip, I hope they feel like they can tell me that.

I have friends with spouses who work on oil rigs, 2 weeks gone 5 days home or whatever other shift they work out.  Constantly, without fail, they come and they leave on schedule.  And I hope they feel like they can confide in me when that starts to get old. 

Because they sure as hell have heard me complain about nights Dh has been in Afghanistan and nights he’s been on duty.  Never once telling me I had no right to complain because they had something harder.

And that’s not even to mention the friends who themselves serve in the forces, the ones travelling for work as much as their spouses do, the ones who are veterans.
My favourite part of all the people I connect with is how different they all are.

And yet regardless, they’ve had tea late into the night, they’ve brought chocolate and sugar and they’ve cried with me.  And they’ve told me to suck it up and keep moving when that’s what I needed to hear.
With grace.

That’s what friendship looks like.

And we might find more support from the ‘civilian’ community if we replied to a friend’s post about her husband’s week long business trip by offering to take the kids for a play date or asking if she’d like company. Or offering any of the supports you wish you had while your spouse is away.

Chances are, that friend might even reciprocate next time you’re the one alone.

And we’d have a real friendship on our hands.

Isn’t that a beautiful thing?

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