The mental development of a military child is effected by military life and the overall lifestyle of the family from their beliefs, morals, and spirituality. When counseling and mentoring children, challenges they endure need to be taken into consideration such as disability, deployment, and family culture. Deployments impacts children emotionally, academically, socially, and causes them to react with anger and violence. Counselors and community resources play a role in assisting military families through these significant events. Factors that affect the mental development of a military child includes but not limited to military divorces, long separations, due to extended training events or combat deployments, long work hours and parenting style. Having a child that shows signs of a serious intellectual, emotional, or physical disability can be very problematic for a military family. Children with disabilities that cause their behavior to affect their reaction to life can place a significant strain on the family dynamic. Everyone in the household will be affected by the disability and will have to receive counseling to better understand how to live a productive life. The problem not only affects the family’s life but it also affects the child’s ability to learn and be productive at school. Children requires a lot of attention and love on a daily basis, however, having a child that has a disability requires extra attention and love because they are trying to understand the world through a different set of lens. This could become a problem especially if there are multiple children in the household. In often cases, the amount of attention that the parents give to the child in need obstruct the family dynamic because of the pa... ... middle of paper ... ...national tragedy. Retrieved September 10, 2003, from http://ericcass.uncg.edu/vrituallib/stresstrauma/1007.html National Institute of Mental Health. Transforming the understanding and treatment of mental illnesses. Depression in Children and Adolescents (Fact Sheet). Retrieved March 6, 2014, from http://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/publications/index.shtml SAMHSA’s National Registry of Evidence-based Programs and Practices. (2014). Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). Retrieved March 5, 2014, from http://www.nrepp.samhsa.gov/ViewIntervention.aspx?id=191 Sogomonyan, F. & Cooper, J. L. (2010). National Center for Children in Poverty. Trauma Faced by Children of Military Families: What Every Policy Maker Should Know Sweeney, P., Rhodes, J., & Boling B. (2012) Spiritual Fitness: A Key Component of Total Force Fitness. Joint force Quarterly, 66, p. 35-43.
Unfortunately, a lot of parents may have a difficult time accepting their child, and coping with their needs and the responsibilities. From the book “The Elephant in the Playroom,” some families dealt with depression and physical and mental deterioration of their health. These struggles were shown in the story by Laura Cichoracki. Laura’s son’s name was Patrick. Patrick was a 6-years-old boy with autism. “I wasn’t eating right, I wasn’t showering regularly, I wasn’t sleeping well” (Brodey, p. 64). I also read the story told by Susan Marrash-Minnerly, which highlighted emotions that parents face. Susan also shed light on how wonderful children with special needs can be to a family, such as her ten-year-old third grader who had autism. Susan talked about how it was normal to feel angry at times, especially with the ups and downs a child’s disability may come with. “When I look back, I want to tell other parents that a child’s future is worth grieving over – but it’s not the end of the world” (Brodey, p. 75). After reading these stories, it became apparent to me that families who are raising kids with special needs, need support, kindness, and available resources. “I was fortunate to be surrounded by other moms who understood my pain…who could be supportive and emphatic.” (Brodey, p. 67). Overall, educators can use this kind of information that was shared in “The Elephant in the Playroom” about family systems and risk/resiliency by creating lines of open communication between families. This is to connect parents together that share similar struggles. By creating open communication is can allows for the teacher and parents to be on the same page when it comes to the issues affecting special needs students and
These children often miss their deployed parent dearly. In The New York Times article Military Wife During Deployment Is Asked, ‘Is It Worth It?’ The wife and 5-year-old daughter of a navy helicopter pilot are at a wedding when the daughter started crying uncontrollably “‘Daddy,’ she said, sobbing. ‘I miss my daddy.’ … ‘I don’t want YOUR daddy,’ she cried to me. ‘Not Finley’s daddy, or Addie’s daddy, I want MY daddy.’” She saw a picture of him and broke into tears because he wasn’t there to share in the happy memories. Situations like these are
There are several aspects of military life that are unique, and often misunderstood by educators. There are five main demands the military makes of the families of servicemembers, such as frequently moving, being separated from loved ones, deployment, risks such as injury or death, and behavioral norms (Segal, 1986). Permanent changes of station (PCS) make it difficult for families to build community ties, build strong relationships with school personnel, and receive continuous services, especially if children have special needs. Deployment is merely one aspect of military life that is strenuous for the families of active service members. Another hardship that many face is psychological issues. Some
"NAMI - The National Alliance on Mental Illness." NAMI. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 Feb. 2014.
It is very common for people to underestimate the importance of the developmental milestones that a human being completes throughout a lifespan. The way a newborn is looked after in it’s mothers womb, followed by its birthing and by the taking care processes during its first few years of life, determines the way a child will be able to achieve and complete the so called developmental milestones, also known as the stages of development. Anything varying from an accidental teratogen intake or several prolonged extra minutes, or even just seconds, without oxygen during birth, can cause life long developmental damages, including both cognitive and/or physical. How do parents of children afflicted with these disabilities work through the growth and development of their child, knowing that their life, both the parents and the kids’, will forever be impacted by such a seemingly small and insignificant event? How do the second-born children learn to interact, and in a way accept and look past the differences of their siblings? This paper will focus on discussing the effects that children with mental retardation and learning disabilities have on their family’s adaption to their unique approach at the developmental stages. Those above are both questions that will be considered throughout this paper via the aid of personal anecdotes from my family and individual experiences with my brother, and several other papers that reported the results from different related studies.
This article mainly examines ways in which parents can deal properly with the news of being told that their child has a disability. There are a few stories in the article which emphasize the way the parents felt when they found out about their child’s disability. In most cases, the parents felt shattered, overwhelmed and completely shocked. The article explained that parents have an expectation of having that “perfect” child and when one is told that the child is not so perfect, their dreams and their lives become devastating. The reading examines ways in which to build a support system as well as ways in which to keep a balance in your life. The author indicates the importance of keeping a positive attitude when in this situation.
The children in military families face daily challenges because of deployment to war. Some do not understand why their parent has to leave, how long they will be gone or where they are going. The effects of deployment on children differ from the age they are. For example, an infant is going to act completely different than a teenager. Depending on the child they may feel unsecure because their comfort level has changed once their parent, guardian or older brother or sister has left. These people may be the only people around their house that they can trust. There is many different factors in how your child will react during the deployment process. You have to mentally and physically prepare your child for deployment, you must know how they are going to react, in order to watch out for them to keep them secure. Not only you have to prepare yourself and your child for deployment but you also need to prepare for them to come home and the challenges you may face as a family. Parents should support and watch their children of every age through every aspect of deployment, even when the family member is coming home, help them feel secure in their home, and help them talk though the emotions they face throughout the process of deployment.
Andy grew up as a military child and he assures, “Being in a military family I can appreciate the veterans and their families more.” (Moore) Military children recognize the importance of sacrificial service that their parent committed. This ensures parents that raising a child in the military can help develop an appreciative, respectful, and prideful child by experiencing and interacting within the military lifestyle. The military provides a strong structure or values and traits that promote a healthy development of characteristics for
Hayes, S. C. & Strosahl, K. D. (2005) (Eds.), A practical guide to Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. New York: Springer-Verlag.
... health problem caused in child soldiers is Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). It is a health problem in which after a traumatic experience danger and painful memories does not fade away from a person brain. A number of studies have shown child soldiers developing PTSD. Okello, Onen and Musisiv found that 27% to 35% of Ugandan child soldiers suffered PTSD. Kohrt study show 52.3% of Nepali children met the symptoms of depression, and 39% met the symptoms of PTSD. Why does every study show the highest rate of child soldiers developing PTSD? Because more and more children are affected by this disease every day. They are forced to see the death of others, and violence all around them. This cruelty never leaves their life alone. If they go to school they cannot learn properly, if they go to bed they cannot sleep properly the memories of war are always in their head.
There are several challenges and blessings to being a parent of a special needs child. Additionally, the challenges have changed as our child has grown. When she was little the greatest challenge was probably accepting the disability and how others perceived the disability as well. As she grew, it was the worry about educational and medical options that would best benefit and assist our child. Currently, the greatest challenge is learning how to handle the frequent outburst and tantrums our child is having at home and at school. Every new stage in growth and development seems to present its own blessings and challenges.
As a military spouse I am well aware of the sacrifices that I have made and continue to make to support my husband in his chosen career. However, just recently as my children began to grow to an age of asking questions and learning to understand I began to question how this lifestyle may ultimately impact their emotional and physical wellbeing. With that in mind I decide to look at research that had a focus on how recent deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan had affected the children of those deployed men and women.
According to Dunst, Bruder, (2005), through participation in daily family and community activities children with disabilities will be provided with a wide range of learning opportunities. In addition, if learning activities take into consideration child’s interest and motivation and adults’ priorities and choices for the child, the early intervention services that are provided to families will be more sufficient (Raver & Childress,
Raising a child with a disability may have some difficulties and challenges but it will have a lot of rewards; just as having a normal child. A parent want their child to live a normal fulfilling life as any other normal child. This life style will take extra patience, time and adaptive equipment and a special person to do it. When accepting that your child has a disability it is good to get all the literature on that type of disability. This will help you understand your child’s disability. A parent involvement is needed to find support groups, so they can get some insight on things someone from the support group has done to get certain things accomplished.
...ermore, the conflict provoked a high risk of be prolonged psychologically in a serious brain disturbance. It has ruined their any chances of getting rid of this trauma by compromising any of them academic future. The many children facing this “massive war traumas show evidence of Post- Traumatic Stress Disorder” (PTSD).