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The chaplain knocks, and grief answers

May-25-2005 » Filed Under: 1/25 SBCT

Even when it's not on your door, pain bonds families

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By MIKE BARBER, SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER

It is the terrible mix of relief and guilt that bonds military families at times like these.

Relief that the Army chaplain did not show up at their house, and guilt that in passing them by, the chaplain knocked on someone else's door.

At 26 and with two kids at home and a husband serving with Fort Lewis' Stryker Brigade, Jessica McCarthy felt it again this week when word spread over the weekend that three Stryker soldiers were killed in Iraq.

"If it's not your husband, it's somebody else's dad, husband or son," said McCarthy, who left Fort Lewis after her husband was deployed to Iraq. She lives with in-laws in Florida. "I can visualize it. I'm sure when the chaplain shows up at the house to tell you the bad news, they don't have to say anything. You already know," she said. "That's why we as families support each other so much. We all feel it."

The wait has been unbearable this time in part because of a blackout imposed by the Army. To control information before official notification has been made, the Army shut down e-mails from soldiers in Mosul to families at home.

Yet everyone soon knew -- the wife of one of the casualties, Spc. Tyler Creamean, shared her grief with her Stryker family on the Stryker Brigade news site.

McCarthy is among the many moms, dads, husbands, wives, kids and siblings of soldiers who write in to the site to reassure and support each other. [...]


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