Publication year
2012
Citation Title
Iraq and Afghanistan veterans' experiences living with their parents after separation from the military.
Journal Name
Contemporary Family Therapy
Journal Volume
34
Issue Number
3
Page Numbers
362-375
DOI
10.1007/s10591-012-9196-4
Summary
Interview data of Veterans living with their parents after separating from the military were utilized to explore their reintegration experiences. Several themes emerged, including parents serving as a source of instrumental and emotional social support, and a struggle for role definition and independence.
Key Findings
Parents were able to provide both instrumental (a home to live in) and emotional support to their Veteran children; while some Veterans reported more open and honest communication regarding deployment, other felt their parents could not relate to their experiences.
Redefining family roles could create conflict, particularly if parents treated the Veteran like a child or conversely gave the Veteran too much responsibility while readjusting to civilian life.
Parents were often the first to notice mental health and adjustment problems.
Implications for Program Leaders
Provide further support for parents when welcoming home their adult children who have served in the military
Educate parents regarding symptoms of mental health problems Service members may experience after returing home from deployment and resources to get help
Utilize a family resilience model for programs that focus on families' strengths and resources
Implications for Policy Makers
Extend and support policies that include education for parents of Service members
Encourage awareness campaigns among Service members' parents about post-deployment support
Continue to provide support for programming for parents of Service members
Methods
The present study used a subset of interview data from a larger study investigating Iraq and Afghanistan war Veterans' reintegration experiences.
Participants were recruited via email, flyers, and postings on social networking sites to complete semi-structured in-person or phone interviews between 2009-2011.
Interviews focused on the Veterans' experiences after separation from the military within specific social domains, including family, friends, and work or school.
Participants
The study was comprised of only Veterans who lived with their parents (n = 11), including Air Force (n = 2), Army (n = 3), Army Reserve (n = 1), Marine (n = 3), and Navy (n = 2) Veterans.
The majority of participants were men (n = 9) who were 25 years old or younger (n = 8).
At the time of the interview, time since separation from the military ranged from two months to five years.
Limitations
Interviews were limited to Veterans perspective and did not include parents' or other family members' perspectives, which limits what can be understood from the results.
Perspectives of 11 Veterans provides an understanding of their experiences, but is not indicative of all Veterans experiences living with their parents after they separated.
With only two women in the study this is too few to make any claims about differences in experiences by gender.
Avenues for Future Research
Include parents and other family members' perspectives
Follow Veterans and their parents over a period of time in order to assess trajectories of support and conflict
Investigate Veterans use of mental health resources and their effectiveness
Focus
Multiple Branches
Target Population
Population Focus
Military Component
Abstract
When military service members separate from the military, many return to their families of origin, living with their parents for a period of several weeks to years. While research with veterans and their spouses has documented the particular strain of this reintegration period on veterans and their partners, little research to date has examined veterans' experiences living with their parents. The present study sought to fill this research gap by investigating veterans' experiences living with their parents using qualitative, in-depth interviews with Iraq and Afghanistan veterans in California. Overall, veterans appreciated the instrumental and emotional support their parents provided when they separated. However, in some cases, living with parents also produced conflict and strain. In situations where adult veteran children had difficulty with the transition to civilian life or returned with mental health problems, parents were often the first to identify these problems and to support their children in accessing appropriate care. We analyze these findings in light of family systems theory, identifying ways in which adult veteran children continue a process of differentiation while living with their parents and maintaining emotional connectedness. We suggest ways that clinicians can better support veterans and their parents through the reintegration period and recommend that programming for military families explicitly include parents of service members in addition to conjugal families.
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