Why an Air Force spouse created this new holiday to celebrate military marriages
Air Force spouse Bree Carroll with her husband and three children. (Bree Carroll)
Move over National Doughnut Day. There’s a new holiday in town — and it’s all about celebrating military couples.
Aug. 14 was the inaugural Military Marriage Day — a new holiday started by Air Force spouse Bree Carroll, a wedding and event planner and winner of the 2020 Armed Forces Insurance Air Force Spouse of the Year award.
Carroll joined The Spouse Angle podcast on episode 41 for a behind-the-scenes look at creating a new holiday and why she and other organizers thought it was important enough to celebrate military marriage in the first place.
“You know how you see the little funny, ‘Today is Taco Day,’ or, ‘Today is National Milkshake Day’ or, you know, little things like that?” said Carroll. “I was just like, ‘Why can’t we have a holiday that celebrates marriages, and specifically military marriages?’”
Carroll, who has been married to her Air Force pilot husband for six years, said marriage isn’t easy, deployments can be frustrating and the spouse left behind often feels like a single parent.
In those moments, it’s important to focus on the “end game,” or the future you want with your spouse, she said.
“Just have that vision in your mind that can propel you into whatever is next — whatever that next deployment is, whatever the next TDY is, whatever that next PCS, as I’m going through right now is — but whatever keeps your mind on that end game.”
“The marriage that I have is special. It’s unique,” said Bree Carroll on episode 41 of The Spouse Angle. (Bree Carroll)
Carroll said she’s passionate about strengthening marriages because she’s been in bad relationships before. She shared a story on the podcast about getting strangled by a boyfriend she thought she would marry, only to have that experience make her realize she no longer recognized herself and needed to start on a different path.
“That’s why even though I talk a lot about marriage, I like to talk about what you do personally, your individual growth and how you show up because had I not started that self-care, going through just getting myself just mentally well and valuing myself, then I never would have been able to receive the opportunity of being in a union, in a covenant with my husband,” she said.
“So that’s why I get really passionate about seeing couples thrive because I know the relationship that I have, the marriage that I have is special. It’s unique. I’ve seen the bad stuff in other relationships, and I really am excited about being proactive about how we care for our relationship, how we continue to make it exciting and just kind of how it will help us and propel us into doing some things that we want to do in the future.”
The inaugural Military Marriage Day featured a week of online events, giveaways and special guests, including Taya Kyle, a military family activist and the widow of U.S. Navy SEAL Chris Kyle, of whom the film “American Sniper” was based.
Carroll hopes to grow the event beyond a virtual celebration in 2021 (COVID-19 permitting) into a staple for the military community, where couples can set aside time to focus on their marriages — six months after Valentine’s Day — for years to come.