how did narrator react when Shahid spoke about his death for the first time why
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Deployment and its Effects
Deployments for military members in the United States have increased in both frequency and length over the past 10 years. As a result of these deployments, many children from military families have experienced absences of one or both parents. More than two million United States children have been affected directly by a parent’s deployment.5
The effect of parental deployment in previous wars has shown children having an increase in behavioral problems.1,2 More recent findings with deployed service members with children have shown problems with sleeping, higher stress levels and anxiety, declining grades, an increase in maladaptive child behaviors, and increased rates of child maltreatment. A survey showed 20 percent of military spouses reported increases in problem behavior exhibited by their children at home in response to parental deployment, and 21 percent reported increased levels of fear and anxiety with their children.3 Another study showed that mental and behavioral health visits increased by 11 percent in children of deployed military members, behavioral disorders increased by 19 percent, and stress disorders increased by 18 percent. Rates especially increased in older children.4
The evidence is clear that deployments are stressful on families and that children can be affected by these deployments. A study by Chandra et al5 shows that caregivers and children from military families report child emotional difficulties at higher levels than have been observed in the general United States population. The total number of months of parental deployment in the previous three years was strongly related to the number of challenges that children faced. Thus the greater total months a parent is deployed the more stressors the child faces. This study also found that girls had more problems with reintegration—the time when the deployed parent returns to the home—than other boys. Older children and particularly those in middle or later adolescence experienced more problems with parental deployment and parental reintegration.5
A study of Army spouses with a deployed service member with children aged 5 to 12 years showed one-third of the children were at high risk for psychosocial morbidity. The most significant predictor of child psychosocial functioning during the deployment was parenting stress.6
Children of deployed personnel experience higher levels of depressive symptoms. Families of deployed personnel report significantly more intervening stressors; however, deployment rarely provokes pathological levels of symptoms in otherwise healthy children. Although older children and girls have more problems with reintegration, boys and younger children appear to be more vulnerable to the effects of deployment itself.7
Wives with school-aged children were examined before, during, and after military deployment of their husbands to the Persian Gulf War. They reported more internalizing and externalizing symptoms in children than those whose husbands’ deployment was routine.8 Children whose fathers had been absent one or more months during the previous 12 months experienced significantly higher self-reported depression and anxiety.9