Dr. Rita Brock recently shared her thoughts on moral distress and injury and COVID-19 frontline workers with me. Dr. Brock has spent much of her career as an academic in philosophy and religion, obtaining her doctorate in this field in 1988. Her interests turned toward moral injury after a 2009 article by Dr. Brett Litz “grabbed me and wouldn’t let me go.”
During my 20+ years working in the mental health field, I have worked with multiple military-connected couples. Often, the entry point for couples’ work was a spouse who had been given an ultimatum about working on resolving marital conflict or face separation/divorce. In one study by Pflieger et al. (2018), researchers found that while military couples face additional stressors, the majority of marital dissatisfaction can be explained by stressors not unique to the military service. In my work with couples, I found this to be true. While many of the stressors may have surfaced during their military service (i.e., conflict regarding parental responsibilities during the deployment cycle), the stressors themselves are also found in civilian couples
The ongoing pandemic has created an environment of chronic stress, fear, tension and vigilance. While this is a difficult combination for all of us to experience, it can be especially difficult for those who have experienced this combination before, such as our combat Veterans. Traditions and rituals can help us remember more peaceful times and experience subsequent emotions, temper difficult memories from our past and stress of our present.
During the month of May, CDP is focusing on reintegration. I initially planned to share about my transition from active duty service to Veteran status and the resources available to Service members. However, as I was doing some initial research I came across a program that supports military spouses throughout their military journey. Given that there are not a lot of resources focused on spouse transition, and being a military spouse myself, I was eager to find out more. The program is called the Military Spouse Transition Program or MySTeP for short