THE HIDDEN STRAIN: WELLNESS STUDY LOOKS AT MILITARY LIFE’S IMPACT ON SPOUSE WELLBEING
While there is very little research about military spouse mental health, two organizations are changing that fact, partnering together to create the Military and Veteran Spouse Wellness Survey. Survey findings were recently released, revealing that military and Veteran spouses experience depression and anxiety at two to three times the rate of the general population, confirming stories that have been shared by the military community for years.
This study's goal was to take beliefs that have been gathered over the years through stories and turn them into tangible numbers that could be used to advocate for military spouses. The Military and Veteran Spouse Wellness Survey was released on June 27th of this year, and was the first survey to focus on, “a positive state of being that involves more than just the absence of illness,” said the study’s authors.
How Did the Survey Work?
The survey broke wellness down into eight categories:
- Emotional
- Physical
- Intellectual
- Social
- Occupational
- Financial
- Spiritual
- Environmental
Previously conducted studies had also studied spouse satisfaction with military life, the impact of frequent moves, and other challenges military families face. However, this study was different in that it was the first to use a holistic wellness framework (laid out above).
Lyndsey Akers, senior consultant for AFA’s United Forces & Families program, has been a huge advocate for the creation of this study explaining, “Behind our service members is a backbone of strength, sacrifice, and fortitude, the force behind the forces. And yet the comprehensive wellness that we’re going to dig into today has been underrepresented in the conversations that shape outcomes. That’s why today matters.”
How Did the Survey Come to Be?
The survey was developed after Independent reached out to the Institute for Military and Veteran Family Wellness about partnering on a study.
According to Evie King, a study to look at military and Veteran spouse wellness was on their five-year plan. The collaboration with IMVFW allowed them to speed up the study creation timeline. It also provided them with the resources needed to gather the data and help translate it into a report that could be shared.
For Advocacy to Occur, Data First Needed Collection
While policy change is an impactful outcome, it can’t change with stories alone. Data is needed for support. This understanding is ultimately what led to the creation of this impactful study. When asked about the study’s rationale Evie shared,
“We really want to approach our efforts from a data informed perspective. Anecdotal is great, but in order to be effective and to speak to the needs of the community, like programs and advocacy, it is not as effective as if you only have stories.”
Overall, the purpose of the study was to use demographic data to examine, across 8 dimensions of wellness, the state of military and Veteran spouses and related challenges.
For the researchers, it was important to include the spouses of Veterans to see if the impact of being a military spouse had an influence on wellness after their service member left the service.
The researchers utilized an already evaluated wellness survey model that had been previously tested and confirmed as appropriate ways to ask questions to measure wellness.
The reason they used a wellness model that contained 8 dimensions (emotional, intellectual, physical, occupational, financial, spiritual, environment, and social) was because they reflected the lived experiences of military and Veteran spouses. Additionally, they utilized a combination of validated measures and newer tools.
According to the research team, this model was, “...important for us to be able to communicate not just why military spouse wellness matters, because often the thing we were told was why don’t civilian resources work?”
Study Reveals Unique Challenges Milspouses Are Facing Related to Their Well-Being
The data collected from the study showed the unique challenges military spouses experience both while their spouse is serving on active duty, Guard, or Reserve, and after their spouse has left the military.
Overall, survey respondents reported moderate overall wellness satisfaction. They also rated their environmental, spiritual, and intellectual wellness highest, while they rated their physical and emotional wellness satisfaction the lowest.
Over half of respondents experienced some level of anxiety or depression, and almost a quarter of respondents said accessing mental health care and physical health care was a challenge.
Loneliness reports were highest among milspouses who reported their occupation as homemaker. Another noteworthy finding was that spouses of Air Force servicemembers reported lower levels of loneliness than other branches.
Evie explained how the study used the GAD 7 and the PHQ 9 for emotional wellness, which are two scales that measure depression or symptoms of anxiety. The researchers did not ask if spouses had been diagnosed with depression or anxiety instead, they asked questions that mental health professionals use to measure depression or anxiety disorder.
What they found was that compared to the most recent data they had from 2022, military spouses are two to three times more likely to have symptoms of depression and anxiety.
When asked about the significance of this finding Evie explained, “I think it is a really important data point. It just shows that we have different needs in general than the American population. We are not the same. Which I think any military spouse out there could have said to any leader. But we didn’t have those numbers to back up our advocacy and our stories.”
One of the more interesting parts of the study was that many military spouses seem to be adept at building a support network. But, having a support network doesn’t mean they don’t feel lonely. Instead, while 38% of spouses said they were struggling with building a support network, 58% of spouses said they were struggling to build a community and 65% showed moderate to high levels of loneliness. 53% of spouses reported struggling with finding a community, which was cited as a contributing factor to loneliness.
Final Thoughts & Takeaways
The results of the Military and Veteran Spouse Wellness Survey make one thing clear—supporting the mental health of service members must also mean supporting the well-being of their spouses.
The elevated rates of depression, anxiety, and loneliness revealed in the findings reflect the cumulative weight of frequent moves, long separations, and the unique demands of military life. These challenges don’t end when service does; for many spouses, they persist long after transition to civilian life.
Addressing these needs requires more than generalized mental health resources—it calls for programs and policies that understand the military family experience in all its complexity. Prioritizing spouse wellness is an essential component of the overall readiness of the military and Veteran community.
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