My latest post for SpouseBUZZ is about the relationship between women in uniform and those of us married to someone in uniform. Hard-to-shake stereotypes on both sides can turn command social functions from fun opportunities for colleagues and families to get to know one another into ordeals fraught with tension and dirty looks. Are military women and military wives doomed to be adversaries, forever incapable of mutual trust and understanding?

The comments section had yielded some interesting discussion already. Naturally, everyone has a story about “that wife” or “that female soldier” which seems to justify the stereotype and makes it hard to give other members of a group the benefit of the doubt. What I’m really interested in hearing, though, is some idea about how we can alleviate that mistrust. What can military wives do to ensure we’re not treating all of our husbands’ female colleagues like potential homewreckers? How can women in the military avoid seeming to “look down on” military wives (an issue that was brought up by a few spouses in the comments)?

I would love your feedback on my post. I truly want to believe that people living different facets of military life, in uniform or out, can build a supportive community together, but it obviously ain’t easy.