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As wars lengthen, toll on military families mounts
2008-07-19
FORT CAMPBELL, Ky. - Far from the combat zones, the strains and separations of no-end-in-sight wars are taking an ever-growing toll on military families despite the armed services' earnest efforts to help. Muzi.com News 10074653-0 (muzi.com)Divorce lawyers see it in the breakup of youthful marriages as long, multiple deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan fuel alienation and mistrust. Domestic violence experts see it in the scuffles that often precede a soldier's departure or sour a briefly joyous homecoming. Muzi.com News 10074653-1 (muzi.com) Teresa Moss, a counselor at Fort Campbell's Lincoln Elementary School, hears it in the voices of deployed soldiers' children as they meet in groups to share accounts of nightmares, bedwetting and heartache. Muzi.com News 10074653-2 (muzi.com) "They listen to each other. They hear that they aren't the only ones not able to sleep, having their teachers yell at them," Moss said. Muzi.com News 10074653-3 (muzi.com) Even for Army spouses with solid marriages, the repeated separations are an ordeal. Muzi.com News 10074653-4 (muzi.com) "Three deployments in, I still have days when I want to hide under the bed and cry," said Jessica Leonard, who is raising two small children and teaching a "family team building" class to other wives at Fort Campbell. Her husband, Capt. Lance Leonard, is in Iraq. Muzi.com News 10074653-5 (muzi.com) Those classes are among numerous initiatives to support war-strained families. Yet military officials acknowledge that the vast needs outweigh available resources, and critics complain of persistent shortcomings -- a dearth of updated data on domestic violence, short shrift for families of National Guard and Reserve members, inadequate support for spouses and children of wounded and traumatized soldiers. Muzi.com News 10074653-6 (muzi.com) If the burden sounds heavier than what families bore in the longest wars of the 20th century -- World War II and Vietnam -- that's because it is, at least in some ways. What makes today's wars distinctive is the deployment pattern -- two, three, sometimes four overseas stints of 12 or 15 months. In the past, that kind of schedule was virtually unheard of. Muzi.com News 10074653-7 (muzi.com) "Its hard to go away, it's hard to come back, and go away and come back again," said Dr. David Benedek, a leading Army psychiatrist. "That is happening on a larger scale than in our previous military endeavors. They're just getting their feet wet with some sort of sense of normalcy, and then they have to go again." Muzi.com News 10074653-8 (muzi.com) Almost in one breath, military officials praise the resiliency that enables most families to endure and acknowledge candidly that the wars expose them to unprecedented stresses and the risk of long-lasting scars. Muzi.com News 10074653-9 (muzi.com) "There's nothing that has prepared many of our families for the length of these deployments," said Rene Robichaux, social work programs manager for the U.S. Army Medical Command. "It's hard to communicate to a family member how stressful the environment is, not just the risk of injury or death, but the austere circumstances, the climate, the living conditions." Muzi.com News 10074653-10 (muzi.com) An array of studies by the Army and outside researchers say that marital strains, risk of child maltreatment and other problems harmful to families worsen as soldiers serve multiple combat tours. Muzi.com News 10074653-11 (muzi.com) For example, a Pentagon-funded study last year concluded that children in some Army families were markedly more vulnerable to abuse and neglect by their mothers when their fathers were deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Muzi.com News 10074653-12 (muzi.com) In Iraq, the latest survey by Army mental health experts showed that more than 15 percent of married soldiers deployed there were planning a divorce, with the rates for soldiers at the late stages of deployment triple those of recent arrivals. Muzi.com News 10074653-13 (muzi.com) For the Army, especially, the challenges are staggering as it furnishes the bulk of combat forces. As of last year, more than 55 percent of its soldiers were married, a far higher rate than during the Vietnam war. The nearly 513,000 soldiers on active duty collectively had more than 493,000 children. Muzi.com News 10074653-14 (muzi.com) Jessica Leonard at Fort Campbell says family support programs there have improved since her husband's first combat tour, helping her feel more self-reliant. Yet she's convinced that domestic violence and divorce are rising at the base, which is home to the 101st Airborne Division. Muzi.com News 10074653-15 (muzi.com) "Infidelity is huge on both sides -- a wife is lonely, she looks for attention and finds it easier to cheat," she said. "It does make even the most sound marriages second-guess." Muzi.com News 10074653-16 (muzi.com) Among soldiers coming home, whether for two-week breaks that often end with wrenching good-byes or for longer stays, she sees evidence of lower morale and rising depression. Muzi.com News 10074653-17 (muzi.com) "They come home, and find that problems are still there," she said. "Instead of a refreshing R-and-R, a nice little second honeymoon, it's battle for two weeks." Muzi.com News 10074653-18 (muzi.com) There have been some horrific incidents shattering families of soldiers back from the wars -- a former Army paratrooper from Michigan charged with raping and beating his infant daughter; a sergeant from Hawaii's Army National Guard accused of killing his 14-year-old son as the boy tried to save his pregnant mother from a knife attack by the soldier. Muzi.com News 10074653-19 (muzi.com) In one of the saddest cases, a recently divorced airman who served with distinction in Iraq chased his ex-wife out of military housing with a pistol in February before killing his two young children and himself at Oklahoma's Tinker Air Force Base. Tech. Sgt. Dustin Thorson's former wife had sought a protection order against him, saying he threatened to kill the children if she filed for divorce. Muzi.com News 10074653-20 (muzi.com) Officials at Tinker, while confirming that Thorson had been getting mental health care, would not say whether those problems related to his service in Iraq. Muzi.com News 10074653-21 (muzi.com) His brother, Shane Thorson, a sheriff's deputy from Pasco, Wash., who also served in Iraq, has no doubt Dustin's war experiences contributed to the tragedy. Muzi.com News 10074653-22 (muzi.com) "He didn't want to go -- he was afraid, but he had a job that he'd signed up to do and he went and did it," Shane said. "I do think it led up to everything that happened. ... It opened up a world of death and chaos and uncertainty." Muzi.com News 10074653-23 (muzi.com) Shane, who is married and has an 8-year-old daughter, is sure the deployments have damaged many marriages. Muzi.com News 10074653-24 (muzi.com) "My wife and friends, they tell me I'm not the same person before I came back -- not as loving," he said. "You really realize how insignificant you are in this world, and life moves on whether you're there or not." Muzi.com News 10074653-25 (muzi.com) Overall, the Army says its domestic violence rates are no worse than for civilian families. However, critics say there is a lack of comprehensive, updated data that reflects the impact of war-zone deployments and tracks cases involving veterans, reservists and National Guard members. Muzi.com News 10074653-26 (muzi.com) The Miles Foundation, which provides domestic-violence assistance to military wives, says its caseload has more than quadrupled during the Iraq and Afghan conflicts. Muzi.com News 10074653-27 (muzi.com) "The tactics learned as part of military training are often used by those who commit domestic violence," said the foundation's executive director, Christine Hansen, citing increased proficiency with weapons and psychological tactics such as sleep deprivation. Muzi.com News 10074653-28 (muzi.com) Jackie Campbell is a nursing professor at Johns Hopkins who served on a Defense Department task force examining domestic violence. She says the military's data on the problem is based only on officially reported incidents, and should be supplemented with confidential surveys such as some that were conducted before the Iraq war. Muzi.com News 10074653-29 (muzi.com) "They have no clue what the rate of domestic violence is -- they only know what's reported to the system, and that's always lower than the actual rate," Campbell said. "I'm disappointed.... I know the system is stressed to the umpteenth degree. But I do think they need to do the right kind of research so they can keep up with this." Muzi.com News 10074653-30 (muzi.com) One complication, she said, is the high rate of post-traumatic stress disorder among service members returning from war. She said PTSD raises the risk of domestic violence, yet many soldiers and their spouses don't want to acknowledge PTSD or any domestic crises for fear of derailing the soldier's career. Muzi.com News 10074653-31 (muzi.com) "They know the power of the military will come down on them," Campbell said. "The women are often reluctant to have that happen." Muzi.com News 10074653-32 (muzi.com) At Fort Campbell, Family Advocacy Program director Louie Sumner -- who's in charge of combatting domestic violence -- has encouraged people to report suspected abuse, to the point where many allegations turn out to be unsubstantiated. Muzi.com News 10074653-33 (muzi.com) But Sumner said his program, though considered one of the Army's best, should do more outreach with the majority of families who live off the huge base, in subdivisions, apartments and trailer parks where many couples' troubles may go undetected. Muzi.com News 10074653-34 (muzi.com) Sumner is sure that the repeated deployments heighten the risk of family violence. "When the soldier goes overseas three, four times, the fuse is a lot shorter," he said. "They explode quicker, and the victim gets hurt worse." Muzi.com News 10074653-35 (muzi.com) He marveled that some of the hasty marriages by youthful soldiers survive the rigors of deployment. Muzi.com News 10074653-36 (muzi.com) "My wife and I have been married 38 years," he said. "I'm not sure we could have stood being apart 30 of the next 42 months at the start of our marriage. That's a long time when you're real young." Muzi.com News 10074653-37 (muzi.com) The independence that wives develop at home alone leads to friction when a returning husband seeks to restore the old order in household decision-making. Muzi.com News 10074653-38 (muzi.com) "Somebody who's violent and controlling of his partner before he leaves will spend a lot of time while he's away wondering what she's doing, worrying that he doesn't have that day-to-day control," said Debbie Tucker, who co-chaired the Pentagon's domestic violence task force. "He comes back with the attitude that it needs to be re-established as firmly as possible." Muzi.com News 10074653-39 (muzi.com)
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