The stress of part-time military service
It’s easy to underestimate the sacrifices of part-time service members.
There are advantages, to be sure, to joining the National Guard or reserves instead of becoming an active-duty service member. Part-timers get to keep living in their hometowns instead of being stationed wherever the military needs them. They get to pursue their own civilian careers. They don’t need to move their families to another part of the world every time they get a new assignment.
These benefits are real. They are the reasons I chose to join the National Guard instead of the active duty Army.
But there’s no denying the stresses that reservists and National Guardsmen experience as they navigate life with one foot in the military and one in the civilian world. The phrase "weekend warrior" is often applied to us, suggesting that our military service resembles a hobby. The reality is that all military service is a life-altering commitment. Part-time service can prematurely shorten lives just like active-duty service, but it can also make it much harder to maintain full-time civilian employment and stay adequately present with our families.
It’s important to understand the stresses that part-time service members face lest we fail to realize that these troops deserve our respect and support.
A complicated work-life balance
The average part-time service member works more than the average citizen and gets significantly less rest.
Balancing work with family time or recreation is challenging for many people--especially parents or people with demanding jobs--but part-time military service makes a healthy balance much harder to achieve.
One weekend a month, as many of our civilian counterparts sleep in, recover from their workweeks and connect with their families, National Guardsmen and reservists get up before dawn, put on our uniforms and perform tasks that are likely more taxing and strenuous than what we did all week. The following Monday we return to our civilian jobs, often tired and less motivated. Our performance and ability to compete for advancement suffers. Our health is affected. Our risk of burnout increases.
We might have the same number of paid-time-off days available to us as anyone else, but we don’t always feel comfortable using them. In many professions, such as my full-time role as a social worker, the amount of work we’re responsible to accomplish every month remains the same, regardless of how many days we work. For example, say a normal month has 22 work days for a professional to meet his clients’ needs or make his sales quota. A 3-day drill, which often happens in units such as mine, means only 21 workdays. And if I wanted to use 2 days of PTO to make up for losing a weekend, then I’m left with 19 days to accomplish what I otherwise would have 22 days to accomplish.
Vacations become frightening
It's harder for part-time service members to take vacations than active duty counterparts and civilians alike. All active duty members get 30 days of leave a year, and taking their allotted time off doesn't usually threaten their positions. And when civilians have jobs with paid vacation days, they're normally allowed to use them.
But part-time service members might hesitate to take the vacations they deserve. It can be uncomfortable--and even risky--to request a week off from work to travel with our families when we were away for two weeks of annual military training the month before.
“Didn’t you just take a vacation?” a boss actually asked me once.
“Only if your idea of a vacation is running around in the woods with a rifle and 30 pounds of gear in the summer heat and going without a shower for two weeks.”
Job security
I recently reconnected with a National Guardsman I served with years ago and learned that he was fired from a position he had held for several years. He said his former employers weren't clear about the reasons for letting him go but had always made it clear they had a hard time tolerating his military training schedule.
The laws that protect service members' civilian employment only partially mitigate the risks that military service brings to our civilian careers. They don’t guarantee equal opportunity to part-time military service members who are seeking jobs, and they don’t guarantee that service members won’t lose their jobs due to the inconvenience that deployments or annual training present to their companies.
I’ve been asked in job interviews if my National Guard service would affect my ability to handle my responsibilities or limit my availability. The truth: Of course it will. It could affect it a little or a lot. But that’s something that employers should happily tolerate. It's a small price to pay for the benefits that a well-trained National Guard force provides. One day, that employer, or someone he knows, will be pulled out of a flood by me or one of my National Guard colleagues.
Employers can’t legally fire an employee for taking time for military service, but in truth, employers can fire anyone for any reason, as long as they document a reason that looks legitimate. And then it’s up to the employee to fight it. Legal fights are neither cheap nor guaranteed, even when the law is on one’s side.
Employment laws are protective factors, but most protective factors only protect by degrees, never fully canceling out risk factors. And the risk to job security that comes with military service--whether real or perceived--becomes another layer of stress.
Family stress
National Guardsmen and reservists spend weeks or months far from home for military schools or deployments, and that’s on top of the 1 out of 4 weekends we don’t spend at home resting and interacting with our families.
This time away adds stress to the part-time service member’s life for several reasons. One is the sadness and guilt we feel about the time we’re away. We say goodbye to our crying children and stressed-out spouses and when we get back, our children have grown, and our spouses have gotten a little used to our absences.
Another is that when service members with kids sacrifice their weekends, so do their spouses. When a part-time service member has a military weekend, the spouse is alone with the childcare responsibilities. This can be especially trying for stay-at-home parents with young children. They spend all week occupying, entertain, feeding, dressing, bathing and disciplining their children, and look forward to a break or two over the weekends when their working spouses are more available. Usually, the first weekend after a military weekend, both the service member and the spouse are in desperate need for some rest.
(article continued below)
Is it worth it?
Military service can be frustrating, disheartening or even heart-wrenching. Service members often feel they deserve better treatment from their leaders. They think they should have better conditions, more purposeful roles, and more accommodation with the other important parts of their lives. Often, they’re right. They deserve better.
I remember the frightening encouragement a drill sergeant whispered in my ear years ago while I was waiting in the miserable reception station before getting on the bus to basic combat training.
He was asking recruits why they joined.
"I want to be a Soldier," I said.
The drill sergeant told me to lean in close. I leaned in, and he told me to lean in closer. His voice was quiet, stern, humorless.
“Get everything you can out of this job,” he said. “It's a motherf*#%ing sacrifice.”
I haven’t sacrificed what many have. National Guardsmen and reservists have been giving their lives since the war that eventually won our country’s freedom from England. And some who make it through service without losing their lives instead lose limbs. Or marriages. Or jobs. Or they miss out on their children’s childhoods. Or they lose the ability to feel safe in a restaurant or music festival.
Part-time service members deserve respect, wellbeing, and prosperity as much as anyone else. They deserve the patience and appreciation of employers. And they deserve the empathy and respect of a society that knows that they don’t have it easy, even if they usually only put on the uniform one weekend a month.
On a related note: How to stop arguing with your significant other.
Michael Giles LCSW is a psychotherapist who specializes in helping men overcoming anxiety, heal from trauma, and repair their relationships.
Click here to schedule a consultation.
Click here to read about his book, Relationship Repair for Men: Counterintuitive behaviors that restore love to struggling relationships.
