Page 65 - 2020 JSOM Winter

Many participants reported that they did not have sufficient the helicopter, and I was packing up my bag. And I
time to recover while in garrison or between deployments, and was compartmentalizing and packing, and I was like
consequently, were burning out. In particular, being in garri- “I can’t do this right now. I can’t focus, I can’t go
son appeared to be a time of stress for participants. Several eight knots, I’ll f**king die.”
participants mentioned that their schedule in garrison had
been constantly filling up, leaving them with limited personal Some members also spoke about the guilt and sadness asso-
or family time, and therefore making it difficult to recover ciated with missing important events or milestones in their
mentally and physically and to repair family bonds. Time in children’s lives. Participants indicated that while work-related
garrison is meant to be a period of recovery for members, but stress had a minimal impact at home, personal stress affected
several participants reported that being in garrison was the their ability to perform their work-related tasks:
most stressful time in the cycle of operations:
There’s a lot of sacrifice on my part and on the part
I call it the bucket. Your bucket can only fill with of my family as well. My children are older now,
so much water, and your ability to evaporate that but when they were younger, it was harder because
water when you’re at home or in garrison should I couldn’t commit to things and I missed a lot of
be maximized. The problem is that most guys just events. I could not promise to be at something, and
keep filling it and filling it without evaporating it, I was deployed a lot. I had to be flexible, and it put
and then they get deployed and then it overflows. In strain on my family.
garrison it should be at that evaporation phase, but I left [deployment] when my kid was 7 months
it’s not. Now garrison is filling the bucket as much as [old], and [when] I came back, she was over a year,
deployment, and it’s burning people out. I’m starting and she didn’t like me and I didn’t like her. You have
to feel like I’m in a fog all the time now. to figure out your relationships again.

Another chronic stressor commonly reported by participants Some participants indicated that stress and physical and men-
was the inability to balance work demands and family respon- tal injuries sustained in CANSOFCOM were their most critical
sibilities and the resulting conflict and guilt of “letting their challenges. High operational tempo, which involved frequent
family down”: consecutive deployments (and exposure to combat) over long
periods, had led to mental and physical fatigue and injuries:
I would say in recent years it’s balancing family and
work. All the time it feels like it’s overwhelming and I have been through things that broke my soul. Now
I’m not bouncing back from it. Just trying to be there after being through all that, I am more gun shy,
[with your family], trying to support [them] and not weary, afraid, and [I] should not feel that way. I have
knowing if you’re going to be there next week or the not bounced back from this yet, and I may not be the
week after, and if white space gets filled up and you same person again after this experience.
have to cancel things for your family, that’s huge.
Letting them down. Participants who had experienced a physical or mental injury
indicated they felt pressure to recover quickly to return to
High work demands (i.e., heavy workload, time away from work or maintain their ability to deploy. Participants also in-
home, high readiness/immediate response team, and unpre- dicated that having made important sacrifices to reach their
dictable schedules), paired with the participants’ commitment goal made it hard to “take a knee,” referring to taking an
to the organization, determination, and drive to perform, of- extended recovery period and/or being posted in a nonoper-
ten resulted in work taking on a more dominant role in the ational unit:
participants’ day-to-day lives:
I had an injury that put me out for about 2 years, and
You can get really caught up in this place, the people, I’d say that it was the biggest stress that I had. I was
the job, and a lot of the times you’re not realizing the right at the cusp of that promotion zone and then
residual effect that you’re leaving each time you walk right away, you’re out.
out the door. It’s like an axe chopping a tree. It’s a lit-
tle chip out each time. You really have to understand Resisting and Recovering
that if you’re in it for the long haul, everyone has to In this study, resisting refers to individual, social, and organi-
be on board. You have to be able to devote some of zational factors that help a member to buffer or maintain their
yourself to your family. level of well-being and functioning while experiencing stress.
Recovery refers to the individual, social, and organizational
Many participants reported that their work-life imbalance factors that help a member return to their previous levels of
had negatively affected their relationships and their families’ well-being and functioning following adversity.
well-being. For several participants, the job demands had cre-
ated marital discord because constant operations and prolonged Individual Level
and unpredictable time away from home had been frustrating When asked what characteristics participants believed con-
for their spouses. Many members reported separating from their tributed to their resilience, the most commonly reported
partners or in some cases getting divorced, both of which had characteristics were determination and a strong will. Many
considerably impacted their well-being and ability to perform: participants, particularly those in an operational role, indi-
cated that their determination and strong will had allowed
[Following my divorce] we were on high-readiness them to work to the best of their ability, achieve their goals,
work-up training, we were supposed to rappel out of and persist when faced with setbacks or challenges:

Adversity and Resilience Among Special Forces Personnel | 63