You’ve changed, they’ve changed

When grief isn’t attended to, it can affect behaviour, physical health, emotions, and thinking. Grief can change us in ways we don’t even recognize.

Many RCMP spouses struggle with grief and loss. But when they come face to face with it, they often don’t recognize it because their person is still physically there. So we’re grieving the loss of something intangible and that’s really tough. This… ambiguity creates so many problems. Grief was tied to the loss of my partner, the loss of my friend and to the presence of the stranger I was living with now. - Family Member

He was a different person after Croatia. I don’t know what he saw. I don’t know what happened to him. He wouldn’t talk about it. All I know is he wasn’t the same. I wouldn’t say the kids were afraid of him, but they sure weren’t comfortable with their dad the way they were before Croatia. - Family Member

When you spend over 800 days apart in 3 years, you kinda come out of it as different people. I think we’re still very good co-parents but, yeah, we took different routes in life. - Military Veteran

If there have been prolonged periods of separation, there’s the potential that one or both of you have changed in significant ways during your time apart.

If the service member has experienced trauma and is living with an occupational service injury (OSI), the change may be significant to the point that it is hard to recognize them. They may be agitated, irritable, numb, or unable to really engage with family and friends.

See Grief and trauma.

The emotional challenges of living in a home with anger caused by PTSD ()

PTSD destroyed our home ()

Family anger and seeking treatment ()