What Things Were Difficult to Communicate to Family and Friends About Your Military Service? Login & Share to Win!

It was difficult to convey how exciting military life was, especially compared to civilian life which I have felt is quite boring in comparison.

Those difficult-to-communicate things that were impossible to understand for my family and non veteran friends were just plain ole understanding. When I came back home, I was an emotional and mental mess but didn’t necessarily realize it. I used to cry and get angry at the drop of a dime. I would get into it with just about anybody including but especially my mother and I didn’t know where it was coming from. I was slowly losing my mind and knew it was bad when I got into with my cousin at Thanksgiving over food. After that, I sought out a therapist and began therapy and was feeling better. My family and friends did not understand what I was going through mentally and emotionally and it was difficult for me to convey that I was not okay. Also, it is difficult for them to understand what you endured in the military and what certain military language mean. I am sooo grateful for my military friends; I can always be able to relate to them

The most difficult thing for my family, and anyone who hasn't lived under similar circumstances, is the ability to COMPARTMENTALIZE. While deployed, I would often go for days without thinking about my family...NOT because I didn't care, but because I care so much. I was an engineer, and repair party, and flight party, and etc., etc., etc., and A LOT of that stuff is wicked dangerous... and people die when your head isn't in the game. My point is, I HAD to put my feelings for my family in a secure compartment to prevent worry and missing them to overwhelm my ability to do my job. Mail Call was a convenient and predictable venue for taking out those feelings and doing a "status check" before putting them away until the next Mail Call.

Civilians do not understand the brother and sisterhood of those who served. Even those civilians who are from or part of a military family. Belonging to a group of people who know the meaning of sacrifice, co-operation, and responsibility that goes far beyond anything a civilian will ever know. Teamwork and loyalty to one another that cannot be understood unless you've been there. Trusting your very life to one another says it all.

the older generation, WW II vets, and Korean War vets, when told about me having PTSD, were quick to say, "WTF is that? You aren't missing a leg, arm, eye, etc. Suck it up buttercup." I couldn't talk to them about what I felt nor what happened, without feeling kind of ostracized, looked down at, or 'bested'.. "you shoulda been there at D Day ya little pussy..." stuff like that, for that generation, they, to me, never got it...

I was in Guam and on my way to Vietnam when I sent a letter home to my mom and told her I would be out of communication for a while. She asked why and I told her I was on a special mission. (Which I was). I wanted to tell her where I was going but decided to back off because my dad died 4 years prior and didn't know how she would handle it. I was either 21 or 22 at the time. It was tough.

Mandatory training, why I had to go in on my off days for things like recall formations just to name a couple.

As an infantryman in a combat area, there is no such thing as "an 8 to 5 job", it is a 24 hour 7 days a week job. And you don't get weekends and holidays off because all days are the same.

The truth

The suck, and how to embrace it...
Even my parents, both of whom are veterans, can't grasp the nature of service at the "tip of the spear."