“Focused on Everything but Themselves”: Centering the Voices of Trauma-Exposed Military-Connected Mothers

Background and Purpose: The US Military and the family unit can both be considered “greedy institutions,” in that each demands deep commitment, loyalty, and emotional investment from their members. When individuals are dually embedded in these institutions, overlapping demands can lead to significant conflict. This is especially true for Military-Connected Mothers (MCMs), who often serve as a bridge between the military and the family, and who face unique logistical and cultural obstacles. MCMs also disproportionately face trauma-related challenges, as they are at elevated risk of having experienced both adverse childhood trauma and military-specific trauma compared to civilian mothers. These compounding struggles can impact MCMs in many ways, including their parenting and family dynamics, emotional regulation and coping skills, and mental health service utilization. However, there is a paucity of research on how trauma-exposed MCMs navigate these challenges while maneuvering the competing demands of military and family. We aim to investigate this gap, and this qualitative study focuses on our process centering MCM voices to guide our analysis.

Methods: In-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted with MCMs (n=10) and clinicians and administrators (n=11) from three community mental health clinics that serve this population. Interviews were audio recorded, transcribed, and manually reviewed for accuracy. The iterative “Sort and Sift, Think and Shift” approach was then used to drive qualitative data analysis. Research team members were paired and each assigned two military-connected mother (MCM) interview transcripts, producing two episode profiles per transcript across four transcripts. Pairs were then assigned to create a combined episode profile for either all clinician (n=5) or all administrator (n=6) interview transcripts, yielding two episode profiles per group. Remaining MCM transcript profiles were created by the lead analyst. The team met via Zoom to discuss episode profiles, establish inter-profiler consistency, and develop a topic monitoring list that was then refined through consultation with content experts.

Findings: Six primary themes were identified through episode profile creation and analyses: (1) MCMs disproportionately shoulder household and parenting responsibilities with limited resources, (2) MCMs are obligated to prioritize and adapt to cultural, logistical, and vocational military demands, (3) MCMs with lifetime and/or military trauma exposure struggle with emotional identification and regulation, leading them to adopt various coping strategies, (4) MCM seek strong bonds with their children but struggle to manage challenging behaviors, (5) MCMs strive to disrupt generational patterns perpetuated by trauma and military norms, and (6) MCM need integrated institutional and social support systems to help ease conflicts between the greedy institutions of military and family.

Conclusions and Implications: Rooting our qualitative analysis in participant narratives allowed us to authentically reflect the salient needs of MCMs. The six primary themes identified through our episode profile analyses indicate that MCMs can benefit from tailored mental health services that (a) acknowledge and address the tension between the military and family institutions, (b) teach coping strategies and tools to manage the challenges posed by parenting, trauma, and their intersections, and (c) support the disruption of intergenerational trauma- and military-related patterns.