Parenting Under Fire: Resilience in Children Growing Up in Military Families

Theoretical perspectives suggest that the military family life revolves around the “cycle of deployment” and its stages of pre-deployment, deployment, post-deployment / reintegration and re-deployment bring different stressors for family members, including children. Such stressors bring wide-ranging challenges to the adjustment and wellbeing of military and are thought to contribute to the apparent increase in the prevalence of child maltreatment in military families in the US, in various stages of the deployment cycle.
This workshop will explore challenges and opportunities related to parenting in military families. Drawing on research and policy from across the globe, the presenters will invite participants to consider the implications for children growing up with military but also the challenges for military parents themselves, and family law processes, and explore the issues and complexities in decision-making in relation to such families. Participants will be able to reflect on their professional and personal assumptions about the expectations, concerns and limitations of current perspectives on parenting, including shared parenting, in military families.