Active Duty Members

Having a family member, friend, relative, or anyone close to you that is an active member of any military branch can be a tough experience for an individual. An active duty member is someone who signs a contract for eight years (four reserve and 4 active duty) and do active military service for the United States. Being enlisted in the United States Military, you are able to enlist into one of the five branches: which include, the Army, the Marine Corps, the Navy, Coast Guard, and the Air Force. This makes the United States Military one of the largest in the world and most of the recruit that end up joining are volunteers, not ones who are drafted. A military deployment is when a group or division in the military branch moves or relocates to
This cycle involves leave, a time when members are allowed to go home for a certain period of time to see their families. The first phase is the pre-deployment phase, where members do special training tasks and evaluations before they are sent to another area. When not deployed, these members do traditional training, whether its physical training, or taking classes or ranges in the field, it is done to prepare them. This is considered a regular work day, however, everyday their schedule changes. As a alert comes up to get ready for deployment, multiple things happen such as briefings, trainings, and evaluations. During the deployment, which is the next phase, the unit finally gets to the operational base. This can be overseas or in the United States, and this is primarily where it gets extremely hard for the families. The phase varies in length but towards the end of it, members begin to prepare to go back to their stationed base. The last phase is the post deployment phase, where members get back to their stationed base and get back into their daily routines, which will include the general briefs and training operations. This phase will include something called “reintegration”, which members have to try and adapt back into family life and the
“Active-duty families typically move every two to three years, potentially hindering their ability to establish a sense of belonging to a community.” (Lester, P., & Colonel, L. (2013).Because members can change duty stations very frequently, it can definitely affects families who have children in the military. “Families must repeatedly adjust to being in new and unfamiliar environments and the negative impact of family instability is likely magnified for dependent spouses and children as compared to nonmilitary families.” This can give a child unfamiliar education in different areas and frequent moves can cause problems in the education system. Many military families also do not receive support from the school system because schools believe that military children have lower motivation that those whose parents aren't in the