"The Military Father": a great resource!

Unfortunately our family is in the pre-deployment stage, getting ready for another looong deployment starting in a few months. Right now I'm trying to set everything up to prepare the kids and to make it as easy on them as possible. During my search for resources I stumbled upon this book:


"The Military Father: A Hands-on Guide for Deployed Dads" by Armin A. Brott, an ex-Marine. I would have given it to Dear Husband immediately, but he happens to be away on training. So I read (most of it) myself, and I was amazed. It's such a great all-in-one-place handbook that helps the whole family to deal with deployment.
Not only does the author describe the different emotional stages the service member is going through, but he does the same for the non-deployed spouse and the children, divided into age groups. Since this is not our first deployment, I found myself nodding and thinking "Yes, that's exactly right!" in places, as well as discovering new useful information (like "Why you should never tell your son to be the man of the house and to take care of Mom and the siblings"). The book also gives lots and lots of suggestions on what Dad and Mom can do to keep the connection between the service member and the family strong, and lists many activities for the kids that are realistic, doable, but still cute.
To round it out, the author included practical check-lists to prepare for deployment, like e.g. what documents you need. Sure, you can get that kind of information from the military too, but to have it all in one source is really handy. As I said before, this book is made out to set the whole family up for success in all aspects of deployment.
But the best part about it? It's written by a tough guy in a funny way, so that chances are good that the men are actually going to read it and don't have to puke when they read about "emotions" or "feelings".
Well worth the money, whether this is your first deployment or not!

By the way, I bought the book myself and this is my honest opinion, I did not get paid or anything to write this!