Building Military Family Resilience

Description:

This 90-minute training module provides civilian behavioral health providers with a general overview of military family resilience.  A summary of the basic demographics of military families will be presented, in addition to the normative stressors associated with military family life.  Factors that can promote or impede military family resilience will also be reviewed.  The presentation then concludes with an exploration of military family resilience models, with an emphasis on how clinicians can promote resilience in military families.

Learning Objectives:

  1. Explore normative stressors of military family life
  2. Specify the 5 common family resilience domains
  3. Develop skills to help build resilience in military families

Outline:

  1. Who are Military Families?

    1. Who Gets Counted?
    2. Family Demographics
    3. Military Marriages

i.Research: Divorce Hazards

ii.Research: Marital Functioning

  1. Military Spouses
  2. Military Children
  3. Variability Among Military Families
  1. Military Family Life

    1. Family Stressors
    2. Normative Military Life Stressors

i.PCS Challenges

ii.Military Spouse Employment

iii.Emotional Cycle of Deployment

iv.Family Separation

v.Transitioning Out of the Military

  1. National Guard/Reserve Families
  2. Research: Longitudinal Data
  1. Building Family Resilience

    1. Defining Family Resilience
    2. Threats to Resilience
    3. Family Resilience Factors

i.Family Belief System

ii.Family Organizational Patterns

iii.Family Support System

iv.Communication/Problem-Solving

v.Physical & Psychological Health

  1. Research: Findings/Implications
  2. Building Resilience

i.Identify Coping Strategies

  1. Military Kids: Stress & Resiliency

i.Research: Familial Deployment

ii.Research: Adverse Outcomes

  1. 7 Cs of Child Resilience
  2. Resilience Training: Families OverComing Under Stress
  1. Application to Clinical Practice

    1. Case Example #1
    2. Case Example #2
  2. Military Family Resources
    1. Military Family Programs
    2. Mobile Apps for Military Families
    3. Additional Military Family Resilience Resources