“Pull up your big girl panties – It doesn’t get any better from here.”

“You knew what you were signing up for when you married them, get used to it.”

“Well, I’ve done (insert some event) while my husband was (pick from deployment, school, TDY, etc) and it’s not that hard.”

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen something along those themes spouted off. And each and every time it gets me so frustrated and my heart bleeds a little bit for the person having to read these words. Somehow we’ve managed to create this culture that despises ‘weakness’ in any form. While it’s not unique to the military community in any way, shape, or form, I feel that one some levels it is much more rampant than it is in the civilian world.

If my husband wasn’t in the Army, we would likely be living within a couple hours of one of our families. (They are in two different areas of the country, so we’d have to pick.) But they would be close enough to support us if one of us got sick, or a kid got sick, or there was an emergency. I’d be living near friends that I had for a decade that if I needed an emergency pick up from school, or even just a night out with my husband, they’d help pick up the slack. I never would have had to stress over who was going to watch my eldest when I went into labor with my youngest. I’d have a built in support network.

As military families though, we just don’t have that. We (on average) move every 3 to 4 years and while we may make lifelong friends, there is never a guarantee that we’ll be stationed anywhere near them again in the future. Each time you move, you have to rebuilt your support network and if you are kinda introverted like me, it’s hard. It sucks. We’ve been at our current duty station for just over 2 years and I still don’t really have anyone that I could just pick up the phone and ask for a favor. Granted, the year of isolation due to COVID hasn’t helped any, but again – see introvert.

So how does this and the phrases above tie together? Because as a result, in general we’ve learned to be strong as spouses. Many of us can handle basic or even more advanced home maintenance. We’ve learned how to sleep without our spouse and how to juggle the demands of life along with the demands of their job. And from the outside, this makes us look ‘strong’ and self sufficient. And it’s also hardened a lot of spouses to how hard it really can be at times.

Instead of responding with empathy and support, we fall back on the stiff upper lip mentality that was taught to us when we were younger or that was given to us when we started this military journey. To some extent, I see it like how abuse is a learned behavior and passed from generation to generation. It takes a strong person to realize and recognize that it’s wrong. To make the conscious decision that we are going to stop this before it takes root in the next generation. That’s what we as spouses need to do. We need to recognize that phrases like what I listed above are toxic as hell and have no place in our community.

Those phrases and the mindset they produce aren’t conducive to creating a welcoming environment or positive space. By dismissing or diminishing someone’s struggles, you are helping to ensure that the next time they are less likely to reach out. If they try enough times with the same responses, eventually they are going to stop reaching out and that could end up being so detrimental in the future.

I could go on a huge rant about those phrases and everything that is wrong with them, and maybe I will in the future, but for right now? For right now, if you’ve used those phrases before, I challenge you to think about the impact they can have on someone and their mental health. If someone is reaching out for help or advice, or even just trying to vent about something that is on their mind, basically telling them to get over it doesn’t make you a better person. I challenge you the next time you are tempted to use that phrase to instead think back to when you were brand new to the military world and remember your struggles – How would you have wanted someone to respond to you? How did someone respond to you that created a positive impact on your life?