Tag Archives: PTSD

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Falling Out of Love: The Military & Marriage

“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the Church & gave himself up for her”

“οἱ ἄνδρες, ἀγαπᾶτε τὰς γυναῖκας ἑαυτῶν, καθὼς καὶ ὁ Χριστὸς ἠγάπησε τὴν ἐκκλησίαν, καὶ ἑαυτὸν παρέδωκεν ὑπὲρ αὐτῆς”

Paul to the Church in Ephesus, 62 CE

C4 Foundation Ranch Lodge
Family Retreat, near Julian, CA

One of the toughest sets of phone calls I ever received was from my best friend & his wife. He was deployed to Afghanistan with SPECWAR units doing HUMINT & counterinsurgency. They had been married a few years, and had an adorable little one. His wife was clearly shaken on the phone and in pain. She explained that my friend wanted a divorce. I had been in their wedding & grown up with him. They named a child after me. We were close. They were close. She had patched him back together and stayed by his side after traumatic injuries. She hoped I could talk to him & help.

I rang his phone, when we spoke, he was direct, “Kit, I fell out of love with Deb here in Kunar.”

C-130 on Mission, CENTCOM AOR. Thanks USAF.

Inside I was sad, stunned, grieved to my core. He had been honest, but I questioned his thinking. His emotions had shifted, but was love, & marriage itself, a feeling to be fallen out of?

Emotions can grow cold in relationships. Studies show that after about two years of marriage, the feeling of “newness” wears off. Physically the chemicals spiking our infatuation & all the butterflies recede. It is in this time that life with its dynamics, its “heavies” kicks in. It’s normal to ‘lose that lovin’ feeling’. But it’s not forever.

Another Day on the job. Marriage is dynamic. Nurturing it is harder and more rewarding than most of our work forward. CENTCOM AOR.

This is the moment to roll up our sleeves & really dig into the work -the wonder- of loving someone. The butterflies and excitement come back. A Team Guy recently told me, “the best part of marriage, Chaps, is companionship. I had to learn to give more of myself. I had to let myself depend on my wife—allowing that emotional closeness.”

They are twenty years into this adventure. You know what’s awesome? God cares a lot about the outcome, and is close in to help them, & all of us, to succeed.

The Carlson family connecting from Iraq to Virginia via FaceTime. Nurturing our love, one phone call , one letter, & email at a time.

Paul’s words to the Ephesian Church lift Christ’s supremacy above all competitors. He urges Christians to be different. In the early 60s CE, the Apostle wrote from a Roman prison to young believers in Ephesus. It was a wealthy, influential, west coast port city in Rome’s province of Asia—modern day Turkey. Home to the 7th Wonder of the World, the great Temple of Artemis was a bustling center of learning, which supported many outlying towns. The Ephesian theater seated 20,000!

Inspired by the Holy Spirit, Paul told them, “Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the Church & gave Himself up for her.” He laid out a way of relating that must have felt foreign to them. To the men, a challenging word, ‘your love should mirror Jesus Christ’s for the Church. For the church is His body. Love your wife as you love yourself. Sacrifice your will, your desires for her best. All the time, no matter what.’ He explained that wives were to respect their husbands & submit to their authority as husbands. For women, from a city dedicated to the feared goddess of the hunt, this was likely a hard pill to swallow.

‘Respect and submit to this man? How can I trust his decision-making & intentions?’

Honestly, this dynamic cannot work in the world. But among Christians it can. Why? Because both want what is best for the other. They both recognize they are equals made in God’s image. The wife, seeking to honor the Lord, yields place to her husband, to protect, honor & cherish her & the family, as Jesus would. The godly husband is locked-on to serve his family & seek his wife’s best & her counsel in all things. But he also ‘owns’ the moment with critical decisions affecting the family’s spiritual & physical well-being.

Think back to times you were deployed or separated from your partner due to operational requirements. Many of us were married, some engaged, many single. Today I share these thoughts with you, because I believe God wants each of us to elevate our belief about marriage, to align our covenantal promises with His truth. Ultimately He’s calling us to deepen our resolve to faithfully love our spouse for the long haul. The journey is an adventure, & the destination’s outcome: enduring love, trust, and half a century of memories & wins. Totally worth it.

Near Saipan en route to Arabian Gulf & 5th Fleet. We were 7 months pregnant with our child #1

For those considering marriage. I am excited for you. It’s also a great time to look UP, look ahead, & to God for discernment. Check in with wise older friends for counsel that’s specific to your life.

Marriage & family life is quite the Trip! With the Lord in the Center, you will make it!
Praying for you today. -Chaps KC

Follow On

• Go to a Marriage Retreat annually. Weekend to Remember does a great job. They hold retreats across the country. https://www.familylife.com/weekend-to-remember/

Most Pastors of churches would love a call or text asking them what local workshops or retreats might be good for you.

• Marriage coaching or counseling is a gamechanger! Check in with your Unit Chaplain, Family Life Chaplain (Army) or CREDO Chaplain (USMC, NAVY, Coast Guard), or Base Chaplain (USAF/Space Force). You can also look for a Christian Counselor with an LPC, LCSW, LMFT license or a Biblical Counselor via Focus on the Families Network: https://www.focusonthefamily.com/get-help/counseling-services-and-referrals/

• If you want to listen to podcasts check out material from the Gottman Institute https://www.gottman.com , Love & Respect, with Dr. Emerson Eggerichs has excellent webinars & regular content updates, https://www.loveandrespect.com also TWJ.org features a podcast with my sister and her husband a retired Marine, Nora White and LtCol. Danny White. They are a blended family who overcame the traumatic auto accident death of Danny’s previous spouse & two children: https://thewarriorsjourney.org/podcast/episode-75/

• 4 Book Recommendations:

The 5 Love Languages Military Edition

Sacred Marriage

His Needs, Her Needs: Building an Affair Proof Marriage

Daily Strength for the Battle (Vol. 3): Building Resilient Marriages & Families

**Names & Locations were altered to protect confidentiality

With my “Chilena”, Dámaris. Pray for us, 14 years, 7 months, 10 days married! We’re praying for y’all.

About Blog Author:

Kit Carlson has served alongside Marines, Sailors, Soldiers & Special Forces, and has completed three deployments. In 2020, the Navy assigned him to Duke University’s Divinity School to earn a specialized Master’s Degree, ThM, in Pastoral Care, where he focused his studies on challenges to Active Duty personnel, Veterans and their families. His specific areas of interest include care for persons with Complex Trauma, strategies for healing from PTSD, Moral Injury, & mild TBI. A key personal mission of his is to leverage the strengths of faith-based Veteran Service Organizations as strategic partners to chaplains, the VA, and the DoD in their ongoing resiliency & suicide prevention initiatives. He is married to his Chilean sweetheart, Damaris. They have two young children, who are the delight of their hearts.

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Just Warriors: Navigating Complex Ethical Decision-Making in Combat

“Victorious warriors win first & then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first & then seek to win.”

Sun Tzu 孫子,The Art of War, 6th Century B.C.E.

In “another life” I served alongside individuals in the Special Operations community. Many remain dear friends. I would fight for them & alongside them any day for just cause: freedom for the oppressed and establishment of rule of law where anarchy & abuse reign. I believe this is Biblical & humanly speaking—right.

With that said, I believe that wrongful ethical actions in everyday life, even repetitious, poor micro-decisions, sabotage warriors’ ethical compass, and “bang it up” right before it’s needed most-when the burst of choices present themselves in war. We can nurture this compass and win the ethics battle ahead of time, by training ourselves through the reps, sets, and muscle memory gains of choosing right on the daily basis.

I also think that God’s Divine Spirit cares about us, and even the aspects of mastering the craft of war. One of which is gaining a razor sharp, ethical edge, among non-negotiable tools in our warrior’s kit.

So, here’s a short brief I gave to some teammates to help prepare them to carry out just war & live from that center. My hope is that even as the Marines say, we would “keep our Honor clean”, & also that we’d sharpen our ethical North Star each day. For surely it gets nicked & dulled by the ambiguity inherent in dynamic mission sets, the continuous unit level training preparing to kill, and in actioning death to our targets in the battle-space.

We cultivate our decision-center intentionally. On the job and off the job. In the morning and at night. When we make our bed & when we wash the dishes. When we show patience with kids, and when we remember the disabled and burdened. Seneca said, “No man was ever wise by chance.” Ethical decisions spring from preparation, they spring from desert times of knowing ourselves, and public strain when we enter the marketplace. We have to become hungry to “buy the truth and not to sell it.” I’ve found that peer mentors, and especially elders, have been a crucial source for gaining wisdom and learning to cherish it.

The impacts of high-octane operational living can lead even the strongest to feeling like we are careening into oblivion and losing ourself. When we sin, are betrayed, or mortgage our own integrity through selfish choices, sadly there is a steep price paid which can be tough to recover from. Some never recover from the free fall. Premature death, and self-harm, is sometimes the end state when ethical decision-making is ignored due to convenience, or the hubris we fall prey to when we appear to have mastered the deadly craft of war. But life is far too precious for the free fall to rob anymore of my brothers and sisters. They have given the best years of their youth to be sheep dogs for the Nation. We need them. And You, if you’re scanning this, because you are the hero your children and nation need! Even if you only think you’ve done your job, or were second rate compared to a brother or sister who didn’t make it. Ultimately our warriors are loved as “Robbie” and “Sarah” -people with names and elementary schools they attended and grandparents & blood types and unique gifts, and interests beyond war. Loved not for what they do, but who they are before & after war entered their life.

This issue is easy to write about…and read about, but the deepest insights probably come over a cup of coffee with a true friend, or out on rugged mountains, a desert or even on a surfboard in silence on a weekend in Bali like Charlie Keating would do…I think the simplest word for homing in to the ethical center is Grace. We give it to ourselves and we receive it. And its counterpart is “Love which covers over a multitude of sins.”

Much love.

Kit


Complex Ethical Decision Making for Warriors, Chaplain LCDR Kristian L. Carlson

Blog Author: LCDR Kristian Carlson is a Navy Chaplain. He has served alongside Marines, Sailors, Soldiers, & Special Forces, and has completed three deployments. In 2020, the Navy sent him to Duke University’s Divinity School to earn a specialized Master’s Degree, ThM, in Pastoral Care, where he focused his studies on challenges facing Active Duty personnel, Veterans and their families. His specific areas of interest include care for persons with Complex Trauma, strategies for healing from PTSD, Moral Injury, & mild TBI. A key personal mission of his is to leverage the strengths of faith-based Veteran Service Organizations as strategic partners to chaplains, the VA, and the DoD in their ongoing resiliency & suicide prevention initiatives. He is married to his Chilean sweetheart, Damaris. They have two young children, who are the delight of their hearts.