FORT SILL, Okla. -- Fort Sill hosted the Army Wives Network (AWN) for an event Nov. 20-21at the Patriot Club.
Over 200 spouses registered for the event that highlighted this year's theme, "Battle Buddies."
In partnership with Corvias Military Living, the four-hour interactive seminar was designed to help Army spouses network with each other and provide them with a chance to meet new people who are sharing the same experiences as themselves.
"We start with what is a battle buddy, then how can you be a better battle buddy, what type of battle buddy you are, and what type of battle buddy you gravitate toward," said Tara Crooks, co-founder of the Army Wife Network. "We have people really look at their friendships and see are they really where they want to be? Then we help them figure out how to go find some new friends, conversation starters ... it's all just focused on friendships."
Past field exercises have focused on deployments and care packages, and loving life as a military spouse. This year's intent was relationships which helped to address one of the challenges that many military spouses face.
"Personally, on our side (AWN) we focus mostly on relationships, which intertwines that friendship and relationship with your spouse. We get the most questions about that. The second most is permanent change of station questions, which probably relate right back to friendship," said Crooks.
During the field exercise, spouses were encouraged to connect with others, share their experiences, and learn about resources and support systems.
Ashanti Craine, an Army spouse, attended Friday's field exercise after reading about the upcoming event five months ago on the AWN Facebook page.
"When I heard about this one, I was excited. I set my phone to remind me of registration so I wouldn't miss this event," Craine said.
She attended another event AWN held at Fort Polk, La. The setting here was more intimate, there were less people than at Polk, she said, and that made it easier to make meaningful connections with the other spouses in attendance.
As the spouse of a drill sergeant here, Craine said these events are more important to her because the regular avenues to meet friends through family readiness groups are not always there.
"I am so glad they are doing this, I hope they go around to more posts," Craine said. "It's so easy for our spouses to meet people when they go to work, but we are at home and some of us are in school and those that work, so it's pretty hard for us to meet friends. Events like this are pretty important."
"The theme is really focused on friendships, but everything we do we pull it back into the military being who we are as Army spouses," said Crooks. "So when my husband deployed and he always had his battle buddy, I always had my deployment battle buddy. When I think about what makes me make it through my military journey, the things I look back on and the things I appreciate the most after the 17 years we've been in, what is it that I will take away from this journey, it's the friendships."
"This is our life style," said Craine. "It's the same thing if you're married to a doctor you'd have a specific lifestyle if you're married to a football player so this is our specific lifestyle and if we're not going to promote it, who is."
The AWN is based around the concept of social media. With a Facebook following of over 84,000 fans, Twitter followers, Pinterest, and Instagram, AWN can connect with military spouses across the globe.
Founded by Army spouses, AWN works to empower spouses in all branches of the military. AWN hosts the original internet talk radio show designed solely for military spouses and also features the longest running military spouse blog on the Internet.
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