Emotional Cycle of Deployment

I am putting together a series of monologues written by military family members, both men and women, about how they coped with, are coping with, or are coming to terms with an Afghanistan deployment separation. My husband is going to be deployed there at the end of September 2010 and the news of this, and the conflicting emotions that accompanied it, has brought the whole subject sharply into focus for me.

The purpose of this project is to highlight the experiences and needs and fears of families - to make other people aware of the far reaching personal effects of conflict and to show that military families might want and need support too. In the process of this we will raise money for forces charities as chosen by all those who take part in sharing their experiences. 

I hope to hear from you whether you are a wife, husband, partner, child, parent or sibling of someone in HM Forces who is going to Afghanistan, was in Afghanistan or is still in Afghanistan.  It doesn't matter what your experience was or is.  Any experience and feelings are valid.  You may have felt a wide variety of emotions both positive and negative.  You may have felt sadness, fear, joy, loss, anger, bitterness, resentment, detachment, relief, panic, guilt.  There may have been funny moments along the way.  Anything you want to share may help someone else to come to terms with their own feelings.

If you would like to take part by sharing your thoughts and experiences, you can do so in several ways.  For example:

By writing down what you want to say.  The writing can take any form you want - either narrative, a letter or even a poem.

Telling me over the phone - I will record what you tell me and type it up later.

Tape recording a piece yourself and sending me the recording.

It would be good to include with this a few details of your family situation.  For example your age, relationship to the deployed, number and ages of children, etc.  As much information as you feel comfortable giving. 

However, I do stress that your anonymity will be guaranteed.

Some of these will be selected for a stage production and it will be my intention to try and publish a collection of all the accounts in book form so that the pieces can reach as wide an audience as possible and perhaps give comfort to those who read it.

In submitting a piece you will be giving me permission to use it in any form for the purposes of raising money for Forces charities.  All profits will be shared amongst the Royal British Legion, Help for Heroes, SSAFA and other Forces related charities as chosen by those who participate.

I am an actress, my husband is in the Royal Navy, and I will seek the voluntary services of actors to bring this project to life.

You can contact me, Claire Carroll, on: ecod2010@hotmail.com or via the Royal British Legion website.