During this pandemic when people are being asked to stay home, many clinicians are moving their practices to an online format. Providing telemental health is not new; however, prior to this pandemic, many therapists and clients still preferred in-person therapy. Since that is rarely an option right now, behavioral health providers must find ways to transition to using technology to provide clinical services.
Military deployments and family separations due to trainings and other military duties are not easy – not for the Service members nor for the spouses left behind. These military experiences can place significant stress on couples which can result in marital dissatisfaction. Therefore, understanding the specific ways these military experiences impact couples as well as identifying interventions that help combat relationship distress is of critical importance.
The first time my husband deployed was just a few short weeks after we got married. We had a son who was three and a half at the time, yet the three of us had never actually lived together. To say we received more than our share of doubts that our family would “make it” would be putting it lightly.
Periodically, I like to scan the literature to see if there have been any new articles related to military families and couples. Recently I ran across an article by Dr. Pflieger and colleagues (2019) focused on the strengths of military couples, and I was intrigued to learn more – if only because most research focuses on challenges that these families need to overcome
While the majority of military spouses are female, male military spouses represent a unique and often unrecognized segment of military dependents. In this blog, we examine what, if any, advances in understanding this population have been made through recent DoD demographics and research publications