Military marriage presents uncommon hurdles Published Feb. 7, 2014 By Chief Master Sgt. Richard Tallman 660th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. -- I bet you could ask anyone who is or has been married if their marriage is unique from others and many would tell you it is. This is absolutely the case and military marriage adds another dimension of distinct qualities and characteristics like no other partnership. Just one of the many challenges that military couples face starts with one of the service member's core values, service before self. This value can easily suggest putting duty first and the spouse dutifully obliges. This inherently comes with its own unique set of features that partners must endure and grow from. It seems, at certain times, that many military couples often lose their sense of identity since the priority on the couple is directly dictated by the mission and obligation to their service. When the mission demands are increased, it is as if an unspoken, choreographed dance of maneuvering those demands forward takes place while the spouse maneuvers the family demands back to allow the military member space to accomplish what they must do. This dance is often a learned, skillful art that usually evolves with time and experience. Another, less subtle, barrier that military marriages face is time apart from one another. Whatever the obligation is, when a spouse has to leave the family for any extended amount of time, the couple has to take on new challenges. Essentially the couple is living separate lives and having experiences that they cannot truly replicate or transfer to the other. This segregation can often cause anything from minor misunderstandings to loss of accepting the others intention to complete disconnection. Depending on where the couple is on this spectrum, it will most certainly have an influence on the reintegration phase of the partnership and perhaps the endurance of their marriage as well. Leveraging technology to continue the connection and share as much of your lives while apart can be a critical preventative maintenance measure. Choosing to stay plugged into your partner's life while apart can greatly reduce miscommunication on couple and family matters while decreasing the turbulence during reintegration into the family system. While it may seem that the special bonds of a marriage could appear endangered in a military marriage with the additional hardships, it is also true that the marriages that overcome these unique obstacles grow even stronger. Have you ever found yourself truly enjoying that holiday with your spouse that you weren't able to celebrate together last year? Or, when you get nervous because you're about to Skype with your spouse you haven't seen in weeks? Some of the things that other married couples take for granted may be your cherished moments and conversely, what some may seem as highly prolific, dramatic and heart wrenching you may find to be the small stuff. The point is, with all of this uniqueness and otherwise added flavor to the marriage, military couples have a great potential to walk away resilient, strong and, shall we say tested well in their levels of patience and understanding.