Married to the Military

CHAPTER 1 Welcome to the Adventure of Military Life!

Welcome to the sisterhood of military women! We are military wives, girlfriends, moms, and women in uniform. Just like you, we had to familiarize ourselves with military life and get to know the community pretty darn quick, sometimes while getting engaged and planning a wedding and other times while reeling from the shock of our Reservist husband suddenly being sent off to war. With all the crazy acronyms, rules, and bureaucracy on top of finding bridesmaids’ dresses, it’s easy to get overwhelmed—but don’t! You can master this, and we are here to help you.

In effect, this book is an orientation manual on military life based on the collective knowledge of military wives and women at CinCHouse.com. CinCHouse.com is the Internet’s largest community of military women all over the world. In fact, the name “CinCHouse” is military jargon for “Commander in Chief of the House.” That’s what you are! And don’t you forget it.

You are the CinC of your house because, while your husband is out playing G.I. Joe, you are primarily responsible for raising the kids, managing the household finances, and establishing yourself and your family in the community. This is no job for the faint of heart. Don’t be deceived by the feminine looks of many military wives standing next to their macho men; underneath lies the heart of Scarlett O’Hara. Besides, although the military may joke that “if we wanted a service member to have a wife, we would have issued one,” your needs and personal and professional goals are just as important as your man’s.

Just remember this cardinal rule: Success in military life is all about knowledge and perspective. The purpose of this book is to give you information and a well-rounded perspective on military life so that you can make the right choices for yourself and your family, especially if you are starting a new life as a military wife. This book will:

• Introduce you to daily life in the military and what you can expect in terms of services and the community—and what is expected of you.
• Help you understand the benefits and how to get the most out of military life (the business of your marriage).
• Help you understand and take control of the two primary threats to your sanity: relocation and deployment.
• Strengthen your marriage by helping you develop a strategy with your service member on how to live together.

Dealing with Jargon, Political Correctness, and Other Nonsense

Unfortunately, military jargon has become a language all its own. You can refuse to learn it and find yourself corrected or stuck not knowing what was said, or you can become familiar with the basics. We prefer the latter approach, although we limit our use of jargon as much as possible. After all, our hubbies signed up for the job, not us.

To help you through, every time a new acronym is introduced, we write it out fully and explain what it means. We explain military jargon in the same manner. Chapter 14 is a glossary entitled “Really Stupid Acronyms and Jargon” for your reference. The glossary is also good for translating lingo when on base, especially with the die-hard Marines.

Also, let’s skip the political correctness and just acknowledge that this book is written primarily for women, namely military wives and women in uniform. The Department of Defense (DoD) is required to use the term “spouse,” but we use the more accurate term “wife.” While the number of military husbands has increased slightly, they still represent only 7 percent of all military spouses, and the vast majority previously served in the military and are already very familiar with it. That is very different from a 20-something civilian woman who is just entering or marrying into the military for the first time. We are women, and we want to act and be treated as such.

WAR STORIES

Help, I Need to Talk!

I was working 14 hours a day in Washington, D.C., at a high-powered corporate public relations agency when my husband first joined the military. Although most of the wives at our command worked, the spouse club was run by stay-at-home moms. That meant most meetings and social events consisted of hours of lunch and bingo or mom ’n’ tot play groups.

My girlfriends and I needed more information about military life and what was in store for us. The command was threatening to relocate our families all over the place. Our lives felt completely out of control, and we didn’t have a clue how to work the system. However, we also didn’t have time to participate in spouse club events and, very frankly, we resented being left out. So did the female service members in our command who wanted to hang out with fellow girlfriends. So we jimmied up a website with a discussion forum that allowed us to talk during the day at work or late at night after the kids went to bed.

Apparently we weren’t the only ones who felt this way, because the website had 40,000 hits in the first month of its existence. By 2003, that little website received nearly 900,000 visits each month. Thus was the birth of CinCHouse.com.

Additionally, this book takes a fresh approach by recognizing that women in uniform and military wives have common concerns. While military wives are primarily addressed because there are so many of us, many female service members will find it useful because they share the same responsibilities for raising kids and managing households, finances, and relocation. There are plenty of orientation books on military jobs and protocol, but there are almost no good books about handling the family and personal aspects of military life. Thus, the term “military wife” also refers to those female service members who feel married to the military and want solutions to these issues.

Finally, before I get hate mail from nitpickers, let me say that this book covers the general concepts behind key aspects of military life. Different military services, bases, and offices, however, will do things slightly differently. Form 840 on Base A may be referred to as Form 850 on Base B, even though they say the same thing. The two forms are just printed on different-colored paper. What the Navy calls a “detailer” the Army calls a “branch manager”—but they do the same thing. What is important is that the concepts are the same, and this book will give you the tools to get through them. It is not intended to be a bible to address every situation under the sun.

Your husband, boyfriend, or fiancé may freak out when he sees you reading this book. Why on earth, he’ll say, do you need to understand this stuff? He’ll take care of everything! And he can explain what you do need to know when you need to know it. Right?

Wrong! You need to know about military life so you can control your family’s destiny, and he may not always be around to explain how things work or to handle the situation. Your gut instinct tells you that. What you can tell your man is that, by reading this book, you will feel better about entering the adventures of military life, and you will be better able to support him in his mission and have a stronger relationship.

The Least You Need to Know

• You are neither the first nor the last woman to face the complicated world of military life.
• This book is designed to help you succeed in taking control of your destiny and strengthening your relationship with your service member.
• The key to controlling your destiny is to learn about military life, including all its acronyms and jargon.

RESOURCE

• www.cinchouse.com—The Internet’s largest community of military wives and women in uniform.