People will ALWAYS assume you are the one serving!
I’ve been asked so many times now what I do within the military I’ve just got used to it. There's nothing to be embarrassed about when you have to tell them that it’s actually your wife that’s in the forces and that you’re the civvi! I have a beard as well so people often mistake me for being in the Navy.
You will get called the ‘wife’
It’s almost guaranteed that this will happen... But take it as banter, the people saying it aren’t trying to annoy you (well they might be) and you will probably end up jokingly calling yourself now and then because we are in a military environment and as we know they thrive on #bants
Learn to enjoy moving house!
As your Wife get's posted around the world with her job you will have to move house a lot! This usually happens every 2 years or so but it will be different depending on what your wife does.
I've only actually done it twice up to now but it's going to be happening a lot more in the future!
The ‘Wives' Clubs...
Now this is a massive bugbear of mine, there are a lot of activities that go on within the community that are aimed at the spouses but because nobody likes change you will find that many of these clubs are named as the wives clubs... You’ll have things like the wives running club, the wives book club, the wives cooking club etc but don’t let this put you off going and getting involved!
If they see you attending maybe the name will change to what it should be... It’s my mission to change the names of any wives club to a gender neutral named club as it should be!
Social Events
When you go to social events understand that the majority of people there are military so you won’t understand much of what they’re talking about because they love to talk shop
On a positive note you’ll probably get to know some of their jobs really well, but yeah try and get them to talk about what they do outside of work because after all their job isn’t everything...
Get ready to make loads of new friends again and again and again...
This is mainly the case when you move to a new posting. Your wife will settle in just fine because she will have her work colleagues and they in turn will introduce her to loads of new people.
You on the other hand will have to make a bit more effort to get out and about to meet new people
There will always be help available, big community groups on Facebook and all stations tend to have a ‘Hive’ which is the go to place for details on upcoming local events. You will also have a welfare or family officer and let’s not forget many locations will have a Force Radio BFBS Station which will broadcast details on upcoming events as well.
Don’t get jealous
Your wife is obviously going to be spending a lot of time with other men because let’s face it the military is still massively male dominated.
DO NOT take your wife's rank!
Finally... This is my number one rule! No matter how high ranking your wife is, YOU ARE NOT so don’t talk to people as if you are.
There are many military wives out there that do this (you know who you are) but it's just not cool and nobody takes you seriously...
So don't do it!
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