Mission: Family: Resources help military families navigate special challenges - Air Force Community, Air Force Spouse and Family Resources - Air Force Times

Mission: Family: Resources help military families navigate special challenges

Every military family has its own set of challenges and triumphs, large and small.

I’ve noticed that strong families are hungry for resources. And thankfully, more resources are becoming available that are both timely and timeless. Here are two:

• “Special Needs Families in the Military,” by Janelle Hill and Don Philpott, is a new resource guide published by Government Institutes.

Hill is a former military wife and mother of a child who was severely brain injured at birth. As a result of that painful and difficult journey, she writes in her foreword, she wants to provide “insight into what persistence, determination and resourcefulness can do in terms of making a vast difference in the quality of a child’s enjoyment of life and ability to function at the highest possible levels of their individual capabilities.”

The book is not a guide for families of children with a specific medical condition, she writes, but rather “an overall compass to help families familiarize themselves with their options.”

Its 270 pages offer an overview of some of the challenges faced by special-needs families; details about the federally funded Specialized Training of Military Parents, or STOMP, which provides support and advice regardless of the type of medical condition the child has; details about all of the services’ exceptional family member programs; resources available in the military community, from education to child care to Military OneSource; and local community support.

It also addresses compassion fatigue for caregivers, things to consider when moving, being an effective advocate for your child, and navigating health benefits and insurance. A 25-page chapter on resources offers sample letters for different needs and listings of dozens of organizations that can assist.

• “My Sailor Dad,” was written by Ross H. Mackenzie, a Navy commander and pilot, after his first son was born in 2001.

“I was holding this infant, thinking of what this child might ask later: Why do you have to go away? Do you still love me? Are you coming home?”

The book was published in late 2008. While it was in development, he was being deployed, and his son Stuart did ask those questions. “It was helpful to think that in the future, this would be available,” he said. Stuart, 9, has a younger brother, Cameron, 7. The book explains what the sailor dad is doing while he’s away, and reassures the child of his love all during the deployment. It’s also a puzzle: Signal flags are used in three spots in the book, and each grouping spells out a different message. Mackenzie suggests that sailors decode the messages with their kids.

Mackenzie is developing a companion volume, “My Soldier Dad,” which he expects to be published later this year. He’s contemplating what’s next — and listening to feedback from women in the military who want to see books about military moms. For more information, visit www.patriot-kids.com.

If you’ve found a resource that has proved to be especially helpful for your family, let me know so we can help spread the word.

Karen Jowers is the wife of a military retiree. E-mail her.