Military Wellness Collective

EP 17: Finding Joy During Deployments And Holiday Separation

• Military Wellness Collective

Share episode

The holidays can be beautiful and brutal at the same time, especially when you’re stringing lights while your spouse sleeps in another time zone. We open up about years of missed anniversaries, a harrowing IED incident right before a birth, and the quiet ache that creeps into December—and we share the practices that turned survival mode into steady joy.

Grounded in Philippians 4:4–8, we unpack why rejoicing isn’t denial; it’s a deliberate habit that pushes back anxiety through prayer, gratitude, and disciplined attention to what is true and lovely. We talk about the difference between numbing with busyness and actively cultivating peace, along with the simple rituals that help: reading an Advent plan together through an app, using email threads with clear subjects to keep multiple conversations moving, and leaning on the FORD framework—Family, Occupation, Recreation, Dreams—to ask better questions when mission details are off-limits. If you’ve ever wondered whether it’s okay to enjoy Christmas without your spouse, we make the case for permission and purpose: service exists so that families at home can actually live the freedom being defended.

Community is a lifeline here. When travel isn’t possible, we show how a local church and small gatherings can replace isolating nights with meaningful connection. For parents, we offer ways to keep the deployed partner present in kids’ memories through traditions, stories, photos, and care packages. And we share how trials can mature love and make reunions sweeter than any gift under the tree. Separation hurts, but it can also deepen gratitude, strengthen faith, and reframe what really matters.

If this resonates, share it with a friend who needs hope, follow the show, and leave a review so more military families can find these conversations. Subscribe for new episodes and tell us what topics you want us to tackle next.


SHOW NOTES:

Reach out, we'd LOVE to hear from you! 

EMAIL us - hello@militarywellnesscollective.com

Support the show

http://instagram.com/militarywellnesscollective


SPEAKER_01:

Hey y'all, I'm Brittany Brown. Welcome back to another episode. I am joined, obviously, by our favorite people though, Days and my husband. Today we are gonna hit on the topic of trimming the tree, making merry, even when you don't feel so cheery. What if you're separated from your spouse during the holiday season? Deployments, field ops are a real thing. Joshua and I have spent many Thanksgivings and Christmases separated.

SPEAKER_03:

Do you know how many are you married 22, 22 years?

SPEAKER_01:

The one that stands out the most to me is our second. Okay. But we've missed, I think in our first 14 years of marriage, we missed like six anniversaries.

SPEAKER_02:

We did the math at one point, and it was like the first 10 years I was in the military. We only spent like two three years together. It was crazy.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. So we just want to say we empathize with y'all. We have a lot of compassion towards you during this season. And so we just really wanted to speak to this because I know that the holiday timeframe can be really difficult when your spouse is gone. And so we're just going to talk about how we can intentionally move through the holiday season, even if we're separated from our spouse, and how we can do that well, not perfectly, but well. I just want to start with some scripture. Do you have it? I think, Brian, you have it up in Philippians. Can you read from Philippians 4 for me, please?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. Rejoice in the Lord always. Again, I will say, rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable. If there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. That's ESV, Philippians 4, 4 through 8. And it's really important to realize the Apostle Paul talks about rejoicing, like I don't even know how many times, in this really short letter of Philippians. And where is Paul? This is fun Bible trivia question, right? Where is Paul writing this letter from? He's imprisoned, right? And that's kind of the give and answer with where's Paul? He's when he's writing, he's usually in prison. Often he's in prison. And so he's in prison, he's in a really difficult circumstance, and he's telling people to rejoice.

SPEAKER_02:

In no way are we saying if you're in the military, you're in prison. But it mimics prison ways.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, it mimics it because you're trapped. Sometimes you're trapped and you can't leave. You're you're on base restriction or you're on a tether or you're deployed or whatever the case is. So it does mimic being in prison in some ways.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, if you're on a boat right now, I'm sorry for Navy guys out there, ships. Okay, it's a ship, not a boat. But if you're out there floating around and you're stuck in this big tin can, feels like you're in prison. But we're not saying it's imprisonment as in like it's a super negative thing either, because quite honestly, you signed up for this. Like you wanted to serve your country, like you can serve and thrive and do this well. And and Paul, even though he's in prison, he actually could have gotten out of this, but because he appealed to Caesar, because he wanted to go to Rome, because God had different plans for his life, he was placed there for a reason. You likewise in the military, you're there for a reason. And so I just want to point out that yeah, there's some similarities, but there's it's also for a good reason.

SPEAKER_01:

So I love this passage and had really spent a lot of time here in Philippians 4. And I Brian asked how many holidays we spent apart. But the second, I I mentioned our second deployment stood out to me the most because I had our second daughter on November 19th. We went to Thanksgiving prior to November 19th, 10 days before that, Joshua was in an IED accident. Then I had Elyssa, then we had Thanksgiving and Christmas. And so our pastor was very wise and he knew I was struggling. I was anxious about a lot of things and just really encouraged me to just sit in Philippians 4 for a while and to rejoice that I had had a healthy baby, to rejoice that our oldest daughter Tatum, who was one, was healthy, to rejoice that I had a community of people around me that were doing life with me, that were there for me through it all. And it really was a sweet passage to me that the Lord used to just breathe life into a really, really, really hard season and then add the holidays on top of it. But I do remember getting to Christmas and enjoying it and being so thankful for so many things. I don't know if I wouldn't have been in that passage, but I mean I was literally reading it multiple times a day when I would feel like anxiety kick in, or and I would just say, Lord, what do you want me to rejoice about? And really realizing that when it says, and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. When we rejoice and we give thanks, it is protecting our heart, like Proverbs 423 tells us to guard it with all village uh vigilance. And so when we talk about walking through deployments and separation, we can do it and we can do it thriving. We don't have to stay in that place of anxiousness. If we stay there, it's usually because we made the choice to. And I always tell younger women now, you it's hard either way. You can do the hard work to pull yourself out, like and just trust in the Lord and lean into him, or you can, and that gives life, or you can do the hard where it really breathes death. So we have to choose which hard we want to do. Um, but I love that passage. I it's really, really precious.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. There's a lot going on during that time. I uh so I I know it's odd to think through this, but when you were at home for that second deployment, and so you were hearing about the the combat things we were running into, and then at the same time you're like super pregnant because she was born like shortly thereafter, and then rolling right into the holidays. I'm thinking back on that deployment, I don't even like we were so busy with other things, it was almost like the holidays didn't exist. Right. Every day looked the same, or we were the same, but there was no markers night ops too. So we were sleeping during the day, waking up as the sun was going down, prepping and going out, and then we were just living through either night vision goggles or in the darkness, and then going back to the to to where we're stationed at, and then being asleep during when the sun was up most of the time. So those were our days and like and in this rhythm. And I I remember just like the holidays just kind of coming and going, and the only reason we knew that there was a holiday even happening and not really paying attention to the days was the Chow Hall had a little bit better food.

SPEAKER_04:

Um we'd be like, oh man, you saw all at all.

SPEAKER_02:

Like, yeah, something something like that was was the only thing that was like made any difference. So to think through what how you were going through that and how you needed to lean on these passages during that time really makes me think of where I was at and what was happening during that time as well. And what stood out to me in this passage is there's only one, I think, unless I'm reading it wrong, do not be in this. Like there's all these do's rejoice, you know, have this understanding, do these good things. But there's one in verse six where it says, do not be anxious about anything.

SPEAKER_03:

Right.

SPEAKER_02:

Like anxiety is not good. To be anxious about these things is to be opposite of rejoicing, because if you're rejoicing, you're content and you're having Thanksgiving. If you're anxious about something, there's some sort of worry that's happening. And so for me, there was no anxiety going into those things because we were able to just rejoice in where we're at. And sometimes we confuse, and I think this is where I fell into a lot, is we confuse busyness and not thinking about it with actually rejoicing and being thankful. And people will try to get through the season, like you were just saying, and just kind of put their head in the sand, try to get through it, and just stay busy so that they don't have to think about the difficult part of it. Instead of voicing this difficult that you're going through, walking through it well and then getting to the point where you can rejoice in it. And I think that's where you were getting. And I think that's awesome because so many people just try to get through it.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah.

unknown:

That's good.

SPEAKER_03:

Did you so you were injured in early November? I don't remember the date, but she does.

SPEAKER_02:

So November 9th, I think.

SPEAKER_01:

It would have been actually this year was Mark's 20-year anniversary of it on time change, November 30th. I mean, I don't know if it was the 30th, but this year.

SPEAKER_03:

Not November. Not November 30th. Are you yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Sorry.

SPEAKER_03:

Whatever it was. Yeah, whatever the time changed. Anyway, but then you November 1st. You probably left the fight for a little bit and then went right back into the deployment. You never like came home or went to Germany or anything like that.

SPEAKER_02:

No, I I never I never left the area. We just we I just there was an aid station at the FOB.

SPEAKER_01:

So we you were there for like 10 days, I think.

SPEAKER_02:

Okay.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I just 12 days, something like that.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I don't remember the days you do. I you obviously obviously don't remember the days.

SPEAKER_01:

So this is you were out of it.

SPEAKER_03:

So I wanna I wanna highlight something. So this was 20 years ago, and you guys are doing a little bit of discovery learning on each other's perspectives during this thing that happened 20 years ago. And I think it's important to realize that like there was no big conversation you had post-deployment where, like, tell me everything that happened. Like, that's actually impossible because you were in combat, injured, out of the fight briefly, right back into the fight, night ops doing all of those things. Brittany, you're back here having a kid, but you also already had another kid, and so and holidays and your husband just your husband's gone, and you're like processing through your husband's injured, Andy's in combat. So, like all that stuff's happening. Part of what we're talking about here is like you actually do have to live your life.

SPEAKER_01:

Yes.

SPEAKER_03:

You can't live one another's life for them while you're separated. You you can't do that, and you can't look forward to, oh, he gets back on January 21st. And so on January 22nd, we're gonna have an eight-hour conversation where tell me everything that happened. That's not how it works. It's not how it works. So just a little expectation management, I think.

SPEAKER_01:

I think that's good because I one thing that I remember feeling, and Kelly, I don't know if you felt this through deployments when they were when Brian was missing certain like events or like a birthday or an anniversary or something. But like a guilt of like, well, can I enjoy today?

SPEAKER_00:

I've should I enjoy today? Yeah, that's something that I wanted to speak into. It's just like you have permission to enjoy it. Yes. And encourage your husband, your spouse to enjoy it while they're away, too. I was talking to a woman last week and it was it was not about Christmas, but she's sending him a package similar to this for Christmas, but she sent him a birthday package and it had all these decorations and a little birthday banner. And she was telling me the story about how he hung it up on his birthday, but then he also hung it up for his friend and just made his friend like, yeah, this day special for his birthday. And she was like, I'll use the banner that I sent, you know. And I just thought that was so like what a sweet heart that she has for her husband that she wants to make it special. And then she was telling me about the Christmas package and just like she wants to bring that to him and and just like that understanding of like we're in different places, but this can be good and sweet, and I want you to enjoy it, and I'm gonna enjoy it, you know, just it's okay it's it's okay. Yeah, it is okay.

SPEAKER_02:

A practical way to think about that, and I think we we talk about this often is if the roles were reversed, what would you say to your spouse?

SPEAKER_04:

Right.

SPEAKER_02:

So, like, if if you're worried about back here at home, you the the wives just like, oh man, I don't know if I have if I can feel good about this or have fun doing this while my husband's away. Well, if you were away, would you want your husband to have some time to just enjoy themselves and have a good time with family and friends and make some good memories? Of course you would.

SPEAKER_01:

Now, some people would probably answer no to that.

SPEAKER_02:

Because I have the wives that are no, but that's wrong. Those are the crusty military wives that we're trying to keep away from. Right. We're trying to read it.

SPEAKER_00:

Or help them see a different way. Yeah, there's a better way.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, I had to wrestle through this. Full disclosure, Kelly and I have never been separated on Christmas. Thank you. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00:

It always ended up being early in the new year, yeah. And through the summer. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

I was deployed yeah, February, March, lots of anniversaries. Through summer, early fall, whatever. Yeah, we missed a seven out of our first ten anniversaries, but never Christmas. So for me, I had to wrestle through like Kelly, Kelly likes to vacation in the summer, like a lot, which is great. And so I was deployed a lot during the summer, or mini deployments, or whatever the case is. And so I had to wrestle through this a little bit, and I had to remind myself why I joined the military. I joined the military to protect the freedoms of people here, right? So for us, I joined post-9-11, and so like we're gonna go try to stop and interdict terrorists elsewhere so they're not flying planes into buildings here, right? Right. And so I it's good for people back here to enjoy life and enjoy the freedoms that we have. Like, what's the point of it all if people here aren't enjoying the freedoms that we're purchasing elsewhere? And so I I think it's just important for us to keep that in mind. So to answer the question, like, should I be okay with my wife going on vacation or enjoying Christmas while I'm deployed? The answer's yes, right? Like, I I appreciate Joshua, you're you're wanting to think the best about people. Like, of course you would want that. Well, you know, on our worst days, no, we wouldn't. On our worst days, no, I'm miserable and I want everybody else to be miserable around me. On my best days, you're right, no, I want other people to to enjoy that which I can't enjoy right now. And so, yeah, just just try to remember why why you did these things and and and rejoice where the Lord has you.

SPEAKER_00:

And to to be thankful too, I think I've talked we have a deployment group that meets at our house during the week, and we were just talking about the holidays coming up. And I think a lot of times we forget the spouses that are deployed, they don't have the comforts of home or the the family around them or whatever. So just like yeah, just being mindful of that and being thankful, even though your spouse is not there, that you do have the comforts of home. You do have a tree to put up and you know, you can read the Bible story, you can carry on those traditions even though you know they're not there, you can still do that. And yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

And if you have kids, I think it's really important to do that. Yeah. And to just keep uh your spouse like present in the memories of your kids. Like, hey, let's daddy loved it when we did this. So today we're gonna do this, you know. We're gonna send it too. Yeah, and we'll put it in a box and send it overseas.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

And if I can get back to some of the mantra that we've been saying for majority of this podcast, if you're in the military, married or not, find a local church, get involved in the community, get plugged in. And for all of those families and spouses that are have deployments going on and you're not going back to your home state for whatever reason, if you're here, link up with the other community that's here and have those times of getting together with those Bible studies and having people in your home, go to other people's homes, invite each other in so you don't have those lonely like times of silence in your home where during the holidays, limiting those as much as possible, but also being thankful and rejoicing in it as well.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, that's good. One thing I was gonna talk about too is just this is a little different. It's not necessarily being separated from your spouse, but early on in our marriage, well, first our first Christmas together, you had to be on 24-hour alert. So we could not go to see family. And that was really hard for me because the holidays are about family, right? Getting together with family. That's how I grew up. We just we're both from big families, and I remember having to work through that and grieve it as we knew it was approaching and like we found out that okay, we're not gonna be able to go see family and we're gonna be here. But it ended up being just a really, really sweet time. Just the two of us on Christmas morning, different than I thought I imagined it, you know.

SPEAKER_03:

But I don't know, it just Yeah, we had just moved from we had just gotten married, and then we right after, I mean hours after we got married, we went to Oklahoma. Our families are on East Coast, and then we had just moved back here. As soon as we moved back here, I got on ship for a workup for this deployment that was upcoming. So like life was just running. And then all of a sudden, like on top of all that, it was hey, and by the way, nobody's going home for Christmas because you you're on this like 60 mile tether where you can't go more than 60 miles away. But yeah, God just be reminded, God is doing something, God is is growing you in certain ways, and that was a really sweet time, and it just kind of like started us on the start line of our military career of like, we're going to choose to make the best of it, whatever's going on, and trust that God has something for it in us.

SPEAKER_01:

I love that. Are there any ways that you guys could recommend how spouses who are separated could celebrate together even though they're so far apart? Like something that they could do together during the Christmas season, even though they're so far apart. One thing that I'm thinking of right now, just is since I just brought that out of a bit nowhere, is y'all mentioned in an earlier episode about the he reads truth and she reads truth advent studies. I mean, I know we're a little bit into the game here, but you could be doing something like that together. I don't know, anything else?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, you know, it'd be a little tough logistically almost anywhere somebody would be deployed right this moment to get a book to do together, but you could do an advent reading plan through an app or just Google Advent Reading Plan and do a similar reading plan together, and that would give you something to talk about.

SPEAKER_01:

So the He Reads Truth and She Reads Truth does have an app.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh.

SPEAKER_01:

So you can download the Advent study there, and you could just pick up on it further in, you know, who cares if you are behind.

SPEAKER_03:

Or you could listen to this podcast separately and talk about it.

SPEAKER_01:

That's a great idea too. Are there any other things you can think of to like just build that camaraderie together with your spouse?

SPEAKER_00:

One thing we did on your deployments is we an email. Well, that's how we communicated back then was email. I know it's sounds so old. Like now, what do they do? Text because they have phones. I don't even know. But we would just always have little side conversations going. So I I always thought that was fun, like asking each other random questions about the holidays, like what's your favorite tradition you grew up with, or what's new traditions you want in our family for the holidays? What are things that you want me to do with the kids this year since you're gone, or you know, like just asking each other questions and continuing to just learn more about each other and yeah, there's there's a there's a hurdle to get over in that too.

SPEAKER_02:

It typically when a when a man and a woman come together, the man or the woman is the talker, and then the other one is more the listener.

SPEAKER_04:

Right.

SPEAKER_02:

So understand that that doesn't change when you're on the other side of the world. But you still have to break out of your shell a little bit. I'm not the talker in the family. Brittany is more so the conversationalist.

SPEAKER_00:

It's brand new information for me.

SPEAKER_02:

So even on deployments, she would write me these letters, she would write emails. When we would get on the phone and talk a few times we did, she would do most of the talking. And I would ask questions and keep the conversation going in that way and say a few things. But like, I just want to point out that it doesn't change. So if the husband is not the talker and he's out on a boat somewhere and you're sending him all these things and you don't get it in your head. Maybe don't expect a whole lot more. Like he's gonna try, but like, and guys out there might try and like give some thought and intentionality to what your what your conversations are gonna be and actually talk to each other more as much as possible. Cause there's a lot of stuff you can't talk about. You can't talk about your work, you can't talk about what you're doing. Literally, every hour of the day that you're awake, you can't tell your spouse about what's happening. So you can't just have the normal like, this is what happened in my day, honey. You can't talk about it. So you really need to be intentional and think about the things that are going on back home, ask good questions and and talk through those things because it can get awkward and weird sometimes, especially during the holidays when all those things are happening. So but Brian, you were gonna say something and I jumped in.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, I think it's good. I I do want to say something. Email is really good. I'll make a case for email on this topic because there's a subject line and you can keep a thread going on multiple subject lines. So you could have can we have lots of different ones? So you could have like Christmas traditions, and so there's this longing. We want to be together on Christmas. So have a conversation next Christmas or future traditions. What do we want to build in our conversation? What do we want to, or in the traditions of our family? You could have a whole conversation on that that's separate from hey, the alternator is out on the car, which is separate from our he reads, she reads truth, you know, conversation, which is separate from whatever else, right? So you can have some of these different conversations going on at the same time. Yeah, I love that. Like turn that longing for we wish we were together into, hey, when we are together next Christmas, Lord willing, what do we want to do? What do we want to prioritize? What are things that we want to do together? Or look forward to maybe, hey, this summer when we are together. What are some really intentional things we want to do this summer when we're gonna be together?

SPEAKER_01:

That's good.

SPEAKER_02:

And if you're really hanging for some conversation, you can always use the acronym Ford. Have you ever heard of that before? I don't know. Ford. Ford. Like the car. Yeah. Okay. Family, occupation, recreation, and dreams.

SPEAKER_04:

Look at that.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. So you start talking about family. What's going on in the family right now? What are your cousins doing? What are your aunts and uncles doing? Moms and dads. Occupational, you know, if if you're you're a homemaker, like what's going on in the home, what's going on with the kids. Or if you have an outside of the home job, like asking about that. And then recreation, what are you doing for fun these days? Um, what's going on back home? What what soccer league are you in? That kind of thing. Yeah. And then dreams as in hey, what are we looking forward to? What are the things we're we're looking to do in the future, just like you were just saying. That's so good.

SPEAKER_03:

Even for like deployed guys, like I I did recreational stuff on deployments. Like I was busy, even in combat zones, like busy, but you know, sometimes I was playing spades, or sometimes I was I watched with a friend. We watched like this whole season of the show 24, and we, you know, like we just like there's still recreational things you do, and and like that can create some levity in the relationship as well, which you always need levity in the relationship. Same thing, like for those who are back home. Like, what are you doing for fun? What fun activities have you done? Yeah, that's good to that's good. Ford.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, that's good. I love James One. I know I've said it on here multiple times. I just love the book of James. But when he says, Count it all joy, my brothers, when you face trials of various kinds, you're being tested, friends. And a deployment is a test. Like, where's your faith? And it's for something good if you read James One. It's for your endurance, it's so that your faith can be matured.

SPEAKER_03:

That you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. Wow.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. I was really Britney's paraphrase of it. But I just I know if your spouse is deployed right now, it's hard, it's difficult. But still put up the Christmas tree, still put up the lights, enjoy the season, send them pictures, prep a box, be intentional with the time and know that it's not wasted. It is for your good. It is to mature you. And so you can either fight against it or you can trust the Lord that he loves you and that this is a good gift from him. And that embrace it. Embrace it. Yeah, he has something for you in it.

SPEAKER_00:

One of the biggest blessings from our separations were it made it that much sweeter when we were together. Yes. We just didn't take that for granted as much. Yes. As we did before.

SPEAKER_01:

So yeah, that's a great point because I r distinctly remember the third Christmas we were married and Josh was home after having Elissa and all the things. Thank the Lord. Yeah, it didn't matter what gifts were under the tree. It was like, we're together amazing. Like, yeah, so good.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, when I'm around folks who have been married for similar time period as us that just kind of take one another for granted in unhealthy ways. I'm like, man, I'm so thankful for our deployments. You need a deployment. We yeah, you really do. You're like, your marriage could really use a deployment. You don't want to argue about it. It really doesn't matter.

SPEAKER_01:

Well, friends, I know we could probably talk even more on this topic, but we got to wrap it up. We hope that you will continue to join us through the holiday season and that you will share these podcasts if they're helpful. Also, if you're not following us on Instagram, please follow us at the Military Wellness Collective and tell us some things that you want to hear about in the upcoming year. What are some topics that you just would like some counsel on? We'd love to share our experience and the wisdom that we've gained through our military years. So we love you guys. Again, Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas. And we'll see you guys back here next week.