Lessons Learned

MA1 Glen Bednarz, who recently returned from Iraq on an Individual Augmentee posting in detainee operations, shares advice for Sailors on an IA assignment to lessen the high stress level often associated with the nontraditional deployment.

Pre-deployment:

1. Ask your command ombudsman to personally contact your spouse at least once a month. Even if the spouse declines, at least the assistance has been offered.
2. Have at least three points of contact from your command.
Become familiar with the rank structure of the Army, Air Force and Marines.
3. Keep a positive attitude. "Leaving under negative conditions can be an eval, fitrep or career killer," says Bednarz. "It's not worth it."

During Deployment:

4. View the IA assignment as an opportunity to build on your people skills.
5. Develop new working relationships and friends.
6. Express an interest in the other rates, platforms and communities that you are working with.
7. Make the best effort to accept that you are on assignment for the duration of the tour and "stand out" among your peers.
8. Keep an open mind because it is an ever-changing environment for operations and duties.
9. Don't keep negative thoughts bottled up. Talk to someone you trust.
10. Don't say, "This is how we do it at my command."

Preparing For Post-deployment:

11. Gather contact information of the fellow troops with whom you've served so you can stay in touch after you are home.
12. Get contact information from a trustworthy staff member of the unit to which you were attached.
13. While every Sailor anticipates a happy homecoming, realize it may take weeks or months for life to seem "normal" again. Once home, it's not unusual to experience any of the following: nightmares, lack of sleep, irritability and anxiousness, anger, hyper-alertness and a suspicion of people in public.

How The Parent Command Can Help

14. Sailors are very appreciative when commands are actively engaged with IAs and their families, and they are grateful of a "job well done" acknowledgement during a command event.
15. Ask the Sailor how he or she is. Watch the Sailor who says he or she cannot talk about the deployment job, and look for signs of irritability, depression or frustration.
16. Always be available to talk to the Sailor.
17. Don't talk to the Sailor as if he or she is a "patient." IAs who experience a difficult, but "normal" adjustment period can be too easily labeled as having post-traumatic stress disorder.
18. Recommend the IA keep in touch with the troops with whom he or she served on deployment.

(First published in 2010)