Robert Wilkie Quotes

The challenges military families face from frequent relocations and deployments are themselves patches of service, and that's why supporting our military families is one of my top priorities in Congress.

Military families become familiar with trying to contort their lives around deployments and separations.

I was born in Georgia. That's where my grandparents-and all my people-are from. But my family traveled a great deal because my dad was in the army as a helicopter pilot.

I'm trying to raise the awareness of the troops that, when they deploy and go to war, it's not just them at war - it's also their family. Their family is having to go through all the hardships and the stresses.

You're not just going out there, maybe sacrificing your own life. There's also sacrifices still going on at home. You can serve in the military and have a good marriage, but you just need to be aware of it so you can take those steps to take care of it.

These days, it's often women in uniform - moms, wives, even grandmothers - who deploy and leave their families behind.

As the proud home of Fort Drum and the Navy Nuclear Site at Kesselring, our district is home to countless military spouses who make enormous sacrifices on behalf of our nation.

Military families are increasingly living away from military bases, embedded in civilian neighborhoods. It gives military families and civilians the opportunity for greater exposure to one another, yet many feel lonely and isolated.

In military families, the service member is frequently the breadwinner. Constant moves make steady employment a challenge for non-military spouses.

Before my husband deploys, he has a ritual that is familiar to many service members. He sits down with a generously poured bourbon, and he writes letters. One for his adult daughter, Rosalind. One for each of our little boys, Teddy and Antonio. One for his grandma, who raised him, and his family in Texas. One for me.

Increased demands on the members of the Iowa National Guard often means increased time away from home and increased responsibility for those left behind.

Our family lives military and veterans issues in a way few others do.

If somebody in a family is in service, the whole family is in service. I didn't know that. I didn't know our veterans were being deployed seven, eight, nine, 10 times. It's inhumane.

Standing beside each brave servicemember is a spouse with their own unique professional dreams and career goals that shouldn't be stifled by the constant transitions that our military families are subjected to.

Looking at someone in a deployed setting, it's not in their best interest to get pregnant overseas, but if it happens, it happens.

I think I may try and write something about my pretty extraordinary experience with the 101st in Iraq.

I do spend a lot of weekends on the road. I have to pace myself. It can be pretty busy, but I'm not out in the Afghan desert with 70 pounds on my back, away from my family for a year at a time. I keep a good perspective on it.

My father was a soldier and my mother was a great mover. She once counted up how many places she had lived in during the first 25 years of her marriage and it came to 20.

The military lead turbulent lives, but they are people like everybody else.

Military children don't make foreign policy but they live it.

As the wife of a retired Navy commander and the representative of the district covering Fairchild Air Force Base in Spokane, Washington, I see firsthand the permanent effects of war - both physical and psychological - on those who serve our country.

When Radar goes home, Peg and Erin go down to meet him. Erin sees Radar in uniform and calls him Daddy. It so incredibly perfectly captured the heartbreak of being away from your child who was growing up without you.

When my father served in World War II, he wasn't told, 'Go to Europe for four months, for six months, and then you can come back, and there'll be plenty of big bases there for you to serve on, and don't worry about it.'

I had known Colonel Charlie Flynn since he was a lieutenant 23 years earlier, and I remembered how his first child, Molly, had been born while Charlie was deployed to the first Gulf War.

My dad has been in the military for 35 years. My brother's in the Air Force. I'm familiar with what it's like being in a military family - the unusual traumas you carry around with you.