I just felt from personal observation that there is nothing more dislocated or alienated than a lifelong military person trying to cope in civilian life. It's like two completely separate planets.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
It's very strange getting out of the military, when you've lived in Iraq, and people you know are going overseas again and again. Some of them are getting injured.
From the depths of the Pacific to the deserts of Iraq, more than a million American soldiers, Airmen, midshipmen, and Marines have laid down their lives for their friends, their families and our nation.
Much as soldiers come back, they've been in combat or the edge of it and suddenly that adjustment back to civilian life is a real challenge.
It's hard for people sometimes to relate to me. They weren't in the military, they weren't injured overseas in Iraq, they weren't burned, they didn't go through 33 surgeries, or two and a half years in the hospital.
I've grown up, luckily, with only a distant relationship to war and soldiering.
A family's love is often the best medicine, and in difficult times, I believe that our military families deserve the option of staying together.
Some people wonder all their lives if they've made a difference. The Marines don't have that problem.
Marines dying or being seriously wounded is commonplace in combat.
The military lead turbulent lives, but they are people like everybody else.
A military life has ever comported with my inclination.