Mike Farrell Quotes

In 'Off to War, Voices of Soldier's Children,' kids from Canada and the United States talk about what it is like when their mother or father goes off to war - and comes home again.

I have barely seen my son since he came into the world. Even though I hear his voice on the phone almost every day, it is very tough to not be present while he is growing up.

When I used to leave behind my wife and kids and go into training camp for nine weeks at a time, I felt it, especially if you're having young children and leaving them literally within weeks of them being born.

If your parent is deployed and you are that young, you spend the whole time wondering where they are and waiting for them to come home. As time passes and the absence is longer and longer, you become more and more concerned - but you don't really have the words to express your concern. There's only this continued absence.

I used to say that my own father was dead, because he might as well have been. He was in Argentina and didn't play a part in my life. He and my mother divorced when I was only two.

My parents divorced when I was 3 years old. They had a lounge act in Las Vegas, where I was born. The band broke up and the marriage dissolved, and my mother, my sister and I moved to Southern California. And I didn't see my dad a lot growing up; he was on the road a lot. I'd see him every couple years.

It breaks my heart that I don't see my daughters every day, don't get to hug them and brush their hair.

Being away from home for six months of the year and seeing your kids grow up on Skype all that time - I think I saw Molly walk for the first time on Skype. That's not good.

The most that hurts is I couldn't see my kids growing up. They grow and go. Most of the time, I'm in training camps. I couldn't see that happening. This hurts me.

It's excruciating to be away from your child.

I didn't see my son walk for the first time. I've left my wife at home with two kids for long periods of time to go to training camps, to foreign countries.

My father went into the armed service and I never saw my mother - I don't know what happened to her.

I was six when my parents divorced, and that was tough for me.

I suffer every moment of every day that I am not with my son. All I want is to be reunited with my son.

I'm going to be in another city when my kids are teenagers. I'll be like, 'Give me a call when you're done with all that.'

When a father, absent during the day, returns home at six, his children receive only his temperament, not his teaching.

I lost touch with my son in terms of advice early on. Maybe it had to do with being gone so much, doing location films when he was at an age where he needed support and guidance.

The hardest part of it was really being away from my family - I have two small children. Last year I took over 20 business trips, so being away from them was hard.

You're in a combat zone one day. You come home, and then you have to readjust, and it takes a few days. We just sit in the house, hang with the family and then things get better.

I went to elementary school in L.A. I was born in L.A. My mother was from Redondo Beach. My father was French. He died six months before I was born, so my mother went home. I was born there. Not the childhood that most people think. Middle-class, raised by my mother. Single mom.

I grew up in a broken home. My dad was out of the home when I was five years old. I never knew him very well.

When my dad divorced my mom it was kind of like him leaving me also.

I would lay awake nights and cry a lot thinking, is my dad gonna come home? Is he gonna go to jail again? Is he going to get killed?

I don't think any child could really be happy between five and eight away from their parents.

There are lot memories to take home but the most emotional moment has been when I was touching down in New Delhi. Tears rolled down when I saw the red soil in Delhi from the plane.