Armed Forces Legacy: A Daughter’s Perspective

What do I want people to feel or understand through my story?

I want people to stop ignoring the impact the Armed Forces has. Because that impact doesn’t just live in the one who wore the uniform, it ripples. It shapes family dynamics, gets inherited in silences, passed on through behaviours, and misunderstood in a thousand subtle ways.

If you're someone struggling, not just with PTSD or C-PTSD, but with feeling out of place, always on edge, disconnected, especially as a veteran or a military family member, I need you to hear this: You are not broken. Struggling doesn’t mean you’ve failed. It means you’ve been through something that changed you. The military trains you for war, not for home. That culture, while necessary for survival in high-threat environments, isn’t designed to help you come back to yourself. It’s designed to keep you and those around you alive. But once the war ends, or your service ends, there needs to be space for something else. Space to rest. To soften. To feel again. To be a fully feeling human being, not just someone who copes, but someone who lives.

And what I mean by that is: emotions belong. They’re not weakness. They’re signals, your body’s way of giving you important information about what matters, what hurts, and what needs care. And the transition into civilian life? It’s brutal for a lot of people, not all, I acknowledge that but for many, it is. It’s often unsupported. And it affects everyone, not just the service leaver.

What I Saw as a Daughter

My dad served in one of the most decorated units in the British Army: 321 EOD during the Troubles in Northern Ireland. A bomb disposal expert in the '70s and early '80s, Mentioned in Dispatches. Say no more, really. But when he left? There was no support. No structure. No preparation for what it would mean to go from life-or-death decisions to picking up the pieces of ordinary life. And when I say ordinary life, I mean the stuff most people take for granted: being present at home, managing emotions, facing loss, doing school runs or shopping or making small talk, just being human.

It was tough for him. His wife had just left. His father had just died. Suddenly, he was a single dad to two small kids, carrying the weight of a career full of trauma, transitioning after 22 years of service, and facing it all alone. It was a perfect storm. There was no transition programme. No mental health check-in. No practical or emotional scaffolding. Just... the edge of a cliff. And he fell. We all did, in some way. I wasn’t the one transitioning but I lived the transition, as a daughter. And I’ve spent my adult life trying to make sense of what that did to us.

What I Wish Had Existed

If someone had just asked, “What do you need right now?” If there had been space and support for him to make sense of the invisible stuff he carried. Not just medals or memories, but the changes in his mind, his body, his identity. If there had been something like trauma-aware education, not therapy-speak, just someone helping us all understand what was happening in his nervous system, in our relationships, in the way silence took over our home… So much might have been different.

Because the impact of trauma isn’t just about what happened then. It’s about what gets stored in the body, in the brain, and between people, especially when no one talks about it. When you learn its language, the body tells you what it needs. It’s not just “in your head.” The army teaches you to push through, but eventually, the body keeps the score. That tight chest, short temper, insomnia, disconnection, it’s all part of the story.

I didn’t know that then. I spent years anxious, avoidant, fixing my pain in unhealthy ways, always bracing for something bad. I just thought something was wrong with me. It took decades, but I now understand: It wasn’t personal failure. It was my nervous system stuck in “survival mode”, just like my Dad, like my body was still living in a war zone long after the danger had passed. And I inherited that from him. This isn’t about blame, it’s about understanding what was never explained. I didn’t know. Until I did. And in that knowing, I could finally start doing something about it.

What I’ve Learned

Healing is possible but it’s not easy. Anything worth doing rarely is. It’s not quick. There’s no magic wand. But you can transform a stressed-out, always-on-alert nervous system. You can find ways to feel safe again in your own skin, and in your own story.

For me, it started by dipping my toe into something I’d learnt to avoid: vulnerability. By letting myself feel again, the full range of emotion, I began to untangle from the patterns that once trapped me. I’ve studied how trauma works in the body. I’ve leaned into practices that some people roll their eyes at, like breathing exercises, mindfulness, grounding techniques, but they’ve been used for centuries and backed by science. And honestly? They help. They bring space where there was tightness. They bring clarity where there was chaos. They gave me the ability to respond, not just react. And my world started to open up.

Most of all, I’ve learned this: Asking for help is not weakness. It’s one of the bravest things you can do. The bravest people I know aren’t the ones who stayed silent, they’re the ones who felt again, who rebuilt, who asked for support and showed up anyway. Because in our capacity to feel that pain is also our capacity to feel joy. And in our discomfort, we begin to see what really matters.

Why I’m Sharing This

Because others are still living it. Veterans who were never asked what they needed. Families who lived through silence and its unspoken aftershocks. Leaders who don’t understand what transition really feels like. Children, like I was, trying to be brave without knowing why it’s so hard. I am learning to make space for both grief and pride. I’m only just discovering that they can co-exist.

All of my family, except me, were in the Army. My dad and my brother are incredible men. My mum gave up her career to marry my dad. (That’s how it was in those days, she couldn’t continue if she wanted to marry.) But it’s so important we start to recognise that the journey home, really home, to our fullest selves and the people who love us, is just as brave as the missions abroad.

So If You’re Reading This…

Whether you served, loved someone who served, or are just curious, thank you. If you’re struggling: please, don’t give up. Maybe you can’t sleep. Maybe you snap at the people you love. Maybe you feel numb, or like you’ve lost who you were. Maybe you drink more than you used to, or feel like you’re just going through the motions. You’re not alone. You’re not weak. You’re not broken, you're just a bit stuck. You’re carrying the weight of service and you’re doing the work of transformation. That’s legacy. That’s courage.

That’s love. And for me, that’s why I write, because underneath it all, I know this: We can break generational patterns. We can live meaningful lives.

There are organisations that can help. My dad didn’t have access to those when he left the army but you do. Please use them. Yes, the system isn’t perfect, it still needs work, but there are good people out there who do understand. Seek them out. Do not go it alone.

If my dad were leaving service now, I believe with everything in me that he would’ve taken those opportunities, not just for himself, but for us too.

Learn from us. Be brave. And get the support you need.