A part of being a military kid is having to go through deployments. Some deployments can be as long as six months; others can be a year. But you never really know when a deployment is going to happen.

Once a deployment comes, a strain is put on the family, due to the lack of communication.

“It’s pretty hard, because I barely get to talk to [Dad] because he’s gone,” sophomore Alissa “Michelle” Sanchez said. “He emails me when he can, and he calls me on the weekends. It’s hard because he’s nine hours ahead. So when he’s sleeping, I am awake, and when he’s awake, I am sleeping.”

Military families often use video calling to communicate, if it’s available.

“We have a couple of times [used video calling]. But he doesn’t know how to use it really well so he struggles,” Sanchez said. “Actually we do a lot now, because he uses a different [program].”

With the constant stress of having a parent in a combat zone, sometimes the best thing children of military parents can do is forget about it.

“You kind of just put it in the back of your mind, and you just go day to day without thinking about it,” junior Alyse Maender said. “Of course I thought about ‘oh my gosh! I hope everything is OK,’ and all that. But it’s mind over matter, and if you have a positive outlook it helps you get through it.”

When someone is deployed, it’s guaranteed that someone else’s soldier is deployed too. It helps to find those people.

“My neighbors are my best friends, to be honest, like the adults, the kids everyone,” Maender said. “They’re all really welcoming, more than likely if you’re in a neighborhood especially on post and one person is deployed. Then everyone around you, their husbands are deployed, their sons are deployed. They know, so we all have this strong community, and support system.”

Things as simple as family dinners feel lonely without the deployed parent there.

“[At home] it’s me, my mom, and my sister, and then my stepdad comes home really late [from work,]” Maender said. “But we always make a point to always eat dinner together, so I guess that changed. I guess we act more a family unit, when all of the family members are here.”

As with every military family, deployment is always lurking around the corner, so family time is a priority.

“We try to make family time a priority, especially since deployment is always an opportunity,” Maender said.

Once a deployed soldier comes home, it means that they are in the states for at least a year.

“Well [my step-dad] just got back from a deployment a couple months ago, and they have a rule that they can’t immediately send them back,” Maender said. “So he’s here for a year at least, but after that we don’t know.”

After soldiers get back from a deployment, there is a high probability that they will get reassigned to a new post., which means that they and their families will be moved.

“Common core is really great because wherever I go I will be learning the same stuff as other seniors,” Maender said. “Even if it is my senior year I am still looking forward to seeing the world.”