What does your family (i.e. parents, siblings, spouse, and children) know about your service?

SGT Joseph Gunderson I come from a military family and thought that we had talked about everything but that all changed when my son got shipped to Iraq. My father, who was a veteran, did not serve in any conflicts, and I never served in any conflicts. Today's military is a totally different ballgame!!

In my case very little,outside of some humorous incidents that took place in training and Vietnam,in the latter I only feel comfortable on sites as RP and my battalion web site or CIB association site mostly because I feel my memories would only be relevant to those who have served,

Pretty sure they don't like it. I didn't even get letters in basic, and I'm fairly certain I won't get packages or letters if deployed. I don't think they support the fact that my brother and I joined up. Outside of military stuff they're supportive and want to help it seems, but anything involving the military is, "Well you chose to join". I've discovered I have two families, my brothers and my civilian family. If I need to talk about Army stuff, I go to my battles. If I need to talk about other stuff I go to my family.

I had a Sergeant who said if Soldiers aren't bitching they're not having fun. It's kinda true when I think about it. When we get together to have some fun, we bitch about stuff. Things that happened in the field, or in my case basic stories. To my family it seems like we're complaining rather than telling a story that we're all getting a laugh out of. Sometimes a response is, "if you hate it so much why don't you get out?" Maybe there's a gap that I haven't been able to bridge, maybe it can't be bridged. They also surprise me at times when they talk about being proud, and then there's some bitterness to it for me because if they were so proud why can't they communicate?

Went on for a bit there, anyway I'm learning that there's other support channels besides traditional family. On top of that, my brother and I share even more now both having joined up. My sister-in-law is about to have my nephew. We're surrounded by friends who have or do serve if not in the military than in police or fire so I see good things down the road.