Developed by the American Red Cross, the Coping With Deployments course addresses the stresses and strains that deployments place on the families of service members. This course was created for military family members (spouses, parents, siblings, and significant others) from all lines of service.
The Coping with Deployment course helps with information on how to strengthen your ability to cope with the challenges that military families deal with during the deployment cycle. Also included is information on how to provide psychological first aid to others experiencing stressful feelings or events.
if you live around Fairfield County, Ohio, the American Red Cross in Fairfield County is sponsoring their “Coping with Deployment” course on March 20 from 9 am – 3 pm. Lunch is provided and the course is free. Just register by calling 740-687-5585. Click here to find out more.
For more information about this course, click here to download the PDF brochure.
To find out if there is a Coping with Deployments course in your area, contact your local Red
Cross chapter by visiting RedCross.org.
Have you taken this course? Please leave a comment and let us know how you liked it 
In peace or war time, the Armed Services Blood Program (ASBP) helps provide quality blood products for Service members and their families. The ASBP has many components that work together to collect, process, store, distribute, and transfuse blood worldwide. This program is a joint operation between military services including the Army, Navy, and Air Force.
Now, the program’s most important mission is supporting troops in Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. Blood is shipped to those locatoins several times per week. According to Lt. Col. Deehr, “Having an adequate supply of blood in forward areas can mean the difference between life and death for those injured in the line of duty. To make sure blood is available for those who need it most, the ASBP relies on strong donor support and routinely scheduled blood drives.”
Military donor centers can accept blood donations from military service members, their immediate families, retirees, and DoD employees. Donations from non-DoD civilians who fit the ASBP eligibility criteria and have access to the blood drive will be gratefully accepted.
You Can Help by Donating Blood
ASBP has 20 blood doner centers in the U.S. and around the world. Visit the website to get information on locations and scheduled blood drives.
Even if you cannot donate blood, ASBP has many other ways that you can help! You can help:
- Organize a blood drive
- Encourage others to donate
- Help a friend donate
- Volunteer at a blood drive
Visit the Armed Service Blood Program website for more information about how you can help!
I was walking at the beach one day, not far from where my son lived before joining the Army. He loved being near the ocean and I was thinking of him that day. So I stopped in the store and picked up a postcard and addressed it with a quick note to let him know I was at his old stomping grounds — far from the cold, landlocked, and mountainous Afghanistan that he now calls home. Fortunately I always carry stamps so I then mailed it at the post office just a block from the beach.
A few days later, I found myself wandering another beach with a friend. I was drawn again to the postcards and got one with a beautiful ocean scene, scribbled a quick greeting to my son, and dropped it in the mailbox nearby.
I repeated this several more times, even mailing one on my way to work one day. I didn’t hear anything about the postcards from my son. A few weeks went by and I asked during an Internet chat one day if he got a postcard from me.
He responded, “Yes! I love getting all the postcards. I hang them on the wall! Thank you!”
I then enlisted the help of a few friends around the country. I asked each person if they could just pick up a postcard from their city the next time they were out and mail it to my son with a brief note about the weather or anything happening that day. They agreed.
Postcards cost 30 – 50 cents and are a quick, easy way to let my deployed soldier son know I am thinking of him at a given moment in time. It’s different then a care package. It’s a little slice of home that brightens my son’s day from a 1/2 world away.
Next time you are out and about, pick up a postcard and send it your deployed son or daughter. I am sure they will appreciate a little slice of home!
Air Force FitFamily is a web based goal incentive program. Families have the opportunity to set goals and monitor their progress. If you have young children, or grandchildren, take a look at this program. You can help create good habits for kids early in life.
FitFamily is open to all active duty, Air Force Reserve, Air National Guard, DoD and civilian families.
Air Force FitFamily encourages the ABCs of family Health and Fitness. You can try them with your family and see the difference small steps can make!
FitFamily stresses that it is never too early—or late—to teach children to make healthy lifestyle choices. With childhood obesity on the rise, it’s more important than ever for parents to make exercise and good nutrition part of everyday family life.
How can you get your little couch potatoes off the sofa and on the road to good health? The answer may be as easy as ABC. Start with these baby steps, get the kids involved in the choices, and make healthy eating and movement part of the entire family’s routine:
- “A” is for Activities
- “B” is for Building Habits
- “C” is for Counting Progress
- “D” is for Day Trips
- “E” is for Eating Healthy
- “F” is for Fun
From walking and raking leaves to hiking and cooking healthy meals, FitFamily participants are doing all kinds of fun activites to stay active—together!
There are many helpful resources available on the Web site to help you and your family stay fit and healthy! You can also enter competitions and register to win prizes.
Visit FitFamily: http://www.usaffitfamily.com/
When SPC Troy Yocum came home from Iraq, he had just one thing on his mind: hike 7,000 miles across America while drumming to raise $5 million for Military families.
Starting April 17th, 2010, Iraq war veteran Troy Yocum will hike daily for 16 months to spread the word that help is needed. His plan is to drum up support in various ways with a great team backing him up!
Troy will be hiking though 37 major U.S. cities and hundreds of small towns with his loyal dog Emmie (Emerson Elaine Eskridge the Superdog) at his side. They will hike through 20 baseball stadiums and be joined by support groups throughout the journey. Troy’s hike will also be streamed live on the Internet – through DrumHike.com, and pinpoint his location in real time on Google Earth. Stay tuned for the book, a film, and events organized by his team and volunteers around the nation.
Why is Troy doing this? Troy is responding to the needs of our nation’s warrior citizens. In the last 6 years over 19,000 Military families have applied for assistance and nearly 50% of those soldiers have been helped. By spreading awareness he hopes to save the homes and lives of his fellow brothers and sisters in arms. “They have fought for us, and now I will fight for them. If I reach the goal of $5 million then many families will 
be helped.”
Find out more about how you can help at http://drumhike.com
Support Drum Hike on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/HikeForOurHeroes
Find out how Emmie is doing her part for our Nation’s heroes!
Every Military Mom has a heartwarming story to share about strength, sadness, and love when their son or daughter joins the Military and especially when deployed.
Patti Correa, Published Author and Military Mom is seeking stories from Moms. It’s time to tell the mother’s side. This new book will feature stories from mothers of servicemembers coping with their sons and daughters serving this great country.
For more information contact Patti Correa at correahouse@cox.net.
Patti Correa is the author of “From a Pebble to a Rock
A unique prayer effort for U.S. deployed troops is happening close to Fort Hood Texas, at Skyline Baptist Church.
About 200 churches are part of this interdenominational prayer ministry, called Pray FAST (Pray For A Soldier Team). Local congregation participate by praying for soldiers deployed from Fort Hood to Iraq and Afghanistan. Each “prayer warrior” is assigned three soldiers to pray for by name.
FAST coordinator, Cecil Wolfe goes through proper channels to ask all soldiers deployed from Fort Hood if they want someone to pray for them. If the soldiers do want prayer, they each fill out a card with information and prayer requests. This information is sent to their prayer warriors.
The desire for prayer amongst deploying soldiers from Fort Hood has spread, with as many as 85 percent requesting a prayer partner.
More churches are needed to provide prayer warriors because approximately 2,800 soldiers are still waiting for prayer partners.
In addition to volunteers, Pray FAST also needs donations of Christian literature and pocket-sized Bibles for deployed soldiers.
Churches wishing to participate in Pray FAST should select a point person to e-mail Wolfe at cecilwolfe@clearwire.net. The point person should be competent in using the Microsoft Excel computer program and will work with Wolfe to match each prayer warrior with soldiers. Pray FAST is geared to churches, he noted, to avoid being overwhelmed by e-mails from individuals.
“It’s critical to start getting names as soon as possible so that I can fulfill the requirements of soldiers,” Wolfe said.
Since Priority Mail® supplies are the packaging of choice for families and friends preparing care packages for service members overseas, the post office has created a “Mili-kit” based on the items most frequently requested by the military. This kit is available for free to military families.
The contents of the kit change from time to time. Right now, each kit contains:
- 2 large priority mail flat-rate boxes
- 2 medium priority mail flat-rate boxes
- 2 medium shirt box priority mail flat-rate boxes
- 6 priority mail labels
- 1 roll priority mail tape (yay!)
- 6 customs forms and envelopes.
Request your FREE Military Care package kit by calling 1-800-610-8734. Select your language (1 is English, 2 is Spanish). Select option 1 (it states it is for Express Mail®, Priority Mail or Global Express Guaranteed® products).
When you reach a live agent, request CAREKIT04, the “Military Kit. Allow 7-10 days for delivery. You can request up to 4 kits.
You will also be issued a customer ID number to make it easier for you to reorder supplies next time.
YOU CANNOT ORDER THIS KIT ONLINE – This Military kit is only available via the phone number.
Mail sent to APO and FPO addresses overseas require special customs forms. All mail addressed to military post offices overseas is subject to certain conditions or restrictions regarding content, preparation and handling.
The cost to mail the large flat-rate box to APO/FPO is $12.50.
When a soldier in Iraq wanted to send his kids a gift, he was limited as to what he had access to: a couple of band aids and some sun screen! It didn’t matter too much, his kids were thrilled to received anything at all! That story is the inspiration behind “Dog Tags for Kids”!
The Dog Tags for Kids project is dedicated to helping United States Service men and women in harm’s way, to connect with their children at home. The idea is to send something to a deployed Mom or Dad that they can easily send back to their kids!
Dog tags were just perfect! Each one is engraved with “With Love From Dad, U.S. Army, Iraq 2010″. (or Mom; or Kuwait or Afghanistan). The tags are small enough to easily fit in an envelope and send home.
The dog tags must come from the parents so all dog tags are sent to Iraq, Kuwait, or Afghanistan at the request of the service members. Then the service members can send one to their child at home.
Rose Sliepka is the amazing woman behind this grassroots project that depends entirely on volunteers and donations to continue the missions. Rose actually engraves all of the tags and has volunteers in California that help bag them and box them for shipping.
Each parent soldier that is in harm’s way can receive a dog tag at no charge!
Since the project’s beginning, they have now sent over 500,000 tags to our men and women fighting in harm’s way. Soldier’s love sending them and their kids love receiving them!
How YOU can help:
- Request tags for deployed soldiers
- Make a monetary donation or learn more
- We need your votes! You can help Dog Tags for Kids win $2500 for their project which will help supply another 5000+ tags that will result in a lot of smiles! Simply click here and vote for Rose Sliepka from Lanacaster, CA who has unselfishly dedicated herself to this wonderful program. Thank you!
The national media finally picked up the news, and it ran on Fox stations across the country.
Helping our troops phone home is the mission of Cell Phones for Soldiers (CPFS), started by Brittany Bergquist and her brother Robbie (14 and 13 years old) back in April of 2004.
Through donations and recycling of cell phones, Brittany and Robbie use the proceeds to purchase prepaid phone card and distribute them to deployed soldiers. AT&T donated half a million dollars in phone cards and established drop off locations at each of its 2,000 stores across the country.
Since 2004, this brother and sister have provided more than 60,000,000 minutes of free calling cards thanks to a national network of individual and corporate supporters donating phones and money.
“There are more than 130 million phones retired every year in the United States,” said Robbie Bergquist, cofounder of Cell Phones for Soldiers. “If just 2% of all American’s were to donate their phones, we could supply every troop with a phone as a small measure of the gratitude of a nation.”
Here are some great ways you can help:
- Donate a Phone – Drop off your old or unused cell phone at any of AT&T’s more than 2,000 company-owned stores across the U.S. You can also mail your used phone with free shipping anywhere in the U.S. Click here to find a drop off point.
- Donate Money – Don’t have a phone to donate? Support the troops by making an online secure donation. Click here to donate money.
- Set Up a Drop-off Point – Show your support for the troops by setting up an offical drop-off point for Cell Phones for Soldiers. Click here to set up a drop-off location.
- To request a calling card for YOUR soldier – Each phone card provide an 800 number, which the user may call, and supplies the user with an hour of talk time. Request a calling card.
You can also visit the AT&T Cell Phones for Soldiers Web site.
Learn more about Cell Phones for Soldiers
Help keep Military families connected – donate a phone! Watch more of Cell Phones for Soldiers Charity and how it is helping our troops around the world!
