What children go through when you PCS

Confession: Watching my kids grieve because of a decision I supported is the most painful part of military life as a parent. 

PCS = Permanent Change of Station

I cannot tell you how many times people have told me, “kids are resilient.” I know they are. But they are also human and allowed to have big feelings and say that life feels unfair and too hard. Kids are resilient but not all kids are the same and my kids may not have the same amount or type of resiliency as other kids. Telling me that kids are resilient in an effort to lift my spirits as I deal with the reality of having to PCS is like telling someone, “your next home will be great” as they watch their current home being burned to the ground. It just isn’t always helpful in the moment. 

If you want to know what kids really go through when you PCS, then you should be asking them and not me. I can only write about my observations as the parent. I have some friends who are adults and grew up as “military brats” and now that they are in their 30’s and 40’s they can look back on their experiences and acknowledge the hardness of it but also the unique privilege of it—getting to travel to new places and see parts of the world that most people won’t ever be able to experience. I don’t expect 6 and 8 year olds to be able to fully articulate what they go through in a PCS, especially if there could be more coming their way. 

The reason I wanted to write about this topic is because of something that happened recently in our family. We were planning to take a fun spring break vacation to Florida—visit some friends, eat some good food, see a couple of extended family members, go surfing, etc. When we made this fun announcement to our kids we were not at all expecting the response from our oldest: “I don’t want to go.” Umm…what? Who doesn’t want to go on vacation to the beach? His reason shocked me. And it was good enough for me to cancel the vacation plans. 

Before I tell you his reason, I need to explain that we had been settled and living in Virginia for 21 months when we shared the vacation plans. Our kid had made friends, loves our home, and enjoys going to our church. All in all, things seemed rather normal and good. So imagine my surprise when he told me that he didn’t want to go on vacation because of his fear that I would like Florida a little too much and that we would end up moving the family there for our next duty station or simply just to retire there as a family once our time in military service was done. All of those conversations between adults that come through our home asking us where we will go next or if there will even be a “next”? Little ears are listening. He was so afraid of the possibility of moving again that he didn’t want to go on vacation in case we found ourselves happy there because that would influence what we do next.

Huh. 

I know that a lot of parents would respond with, “suck it up because we are going and we are going to have a good time,” but I chose not to on this occasion. I needed him to trust that I was listening to what he was sharing with me. I needed his trust in this smaller decision so that when it comes to bigger decisions, he has something to fall back on. I needed him to know that I could hear everything that he wasn’t saying in those words:

• I miss my friends in Mississippi
• I am scared of having to leave the friends I have now
• The unknown of the future feels too big
• I feel like I have no control over what happens in my life
• I don’t want to keep starting over
• When things change it is really hard for me to get caught up to the changes
• I want to be like the kids I see in movies where they have buddies whom they have played with for years and years and years
• Sometimes the new things or the changes that have happened in my life have brought pain and I didn’t like it

Cancelling the vacation plans was a small thing. I had to stop comparing my life to whatever I saw on social media. I wanted to push my kid and tell him that it would all be fine and we would have fun if we went. But I didn’t. Instead, I chose to remember the times that I have already pushed him in other seasons of his life and specifically in the three moves he has already experienced. I thought about what happened after pushing our kids forward through all of those hard times:

• Not wanting to go to a new Sunday school class
• Not wanting to say hi to kids at our community pool
• Asking me when we will visit friends from our last duty station when it has been almost two years since we saw them
• Asking when their friends will write them letters when I already know the friends won’t be writing them letters
• Refusing to let go of clothing, toys, trinkets, etc. because they are attached to memories of a different place and different friends

I’m not a psychologist and I don’t plan to write about the things kids go through in a PCS related to grief, anxiety, excitement, anger, etc. I’m sure there are many books and resources from every military command on those subjects. I’m simply writing about how a PCS can affect a child while they are not currently in the process of moving—the part that comes long after—even the stuff that happens nearly two years later. 

Sometimes we forget about the after part. We tend to think that the PCS is just those few weeks or initial months of moving into a new house and registering at a new school. I realize now that for kids the transition is deeply complex and we should not oversimplify it by saying that kids are resilient. I know they are. I am too. It’s just that we are so much more: sad, scared, grateful, uncertain, and fighting to stay optimistic. 

If you’re the kind of person who needs to feel useful or proactive or needs some tangible takeaway from this post, here it is: parents, encourage your kids to befriend the military kids. Encourage them to look for them at schools, invite them over for social things and meals. Maybe your kid doesn’t need more friends because their social life is already full—good for them—but when military kids have to start over with zero friends, they need the local kids who know the lay of the land.

My other suggestion is a little out there. I wish that churches would host socials for military families at their church towards the end of summer. And maybe invite a few of those special non-military families and students who have been pillars in your church and are the great connectors and somehow know everyone and are extroverted and love to meet new people. It would be a time just to have a meal together and meet other Christian military families and allow kids to naturally connect on that common ground. Maybe going to the new Sunday school class or middle school group would feel less intimidating because they’d meet another kid their age and they could go be the new kids together. 

I suspect that these initial positive connections help military kids build that resilience. When they can connect with friends early on, I think that the next PCS isn’t as scary for them. Hard? One thousand percent, yes. But probably less scary because they will remember how quickly they found community and friends and felt at home during the previous PCS and they’ll have faith that it’ll happen again. I want more than just a resilient kid. I want a kid who develops a deep faith that God is with him and can look back and see the faithfulness of God from a very young age. I hope one day to hear that my kids are not only resilient but that they also have incredible faith in God’s goodness and providence.