Seeking undivided loyalty: can motherhood and military life coexist?

There is an old military saying: ‘if the army wanted you to have a wife, they would have issued you one’.

The same could be said about having a child in the service, especially if you are a mother, according to Maureen Montalban, a PhD candidate at the National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health at The Australian National University (ANU).

As an active military officer and psychologist, it is Montalban’s own experience as a mother that inspired her to study how Defence manages women’s healthcare and career during pregnancy, birth, and motherhood.

Montalban interviewed 30 serving Defence members including servicewomen, commanders, managers and healthcare providers about their experiences and reoccurring theme emerged during these conversations: identity.

Identity, or simply put: ‘who you are,’ encompasses the various values and beliefs people hold, and can provide a sense of belonging.  

Montalban was particularly interested in how Australian Army women made sense of their identity as a soldier or officer compared to their identity as a mother, and the expectations of these roles from society and themselves.

“A lot of what we do in the military is tied to our identity,” Montalban says.

“Service in the military is not just a job, or just a career. Service life looks very different to working for a civilian organisation.”

Members of the military are required to deploy locally or internationally, often at short notice, and risk their life for their country. As part of this lifestyle and military identity, personnel place a high value on mateship, prioritise service above self, and have a firm ‘yes’ mentality.

But a mother can’t always say yes.

One woman Montalban interviewed summarised this conflict between motherhood and military service: “I am on an hours’ notice to move … [there] were some days I didn’t come home. We gave away our dogs, I can’t give away children.”

Greedy institutions

In her research, Montalban references the phrase ‘greedy institutions’ – a term coined by sociologist Lewis Coser to describe establishments that demand exclusive loyalty from members. The military, for example, has certain cultural norms and obligations, meaning service life takes priority over family. It could also be said that one’s family also requires similar devotion – making it a greedy institution too.

Research undertaken by the Australian Human Rights Commission found that there is a common perception that female Australian Defence Force members must make a ‘choice’ between their career and having a family.

“Many of the women I talked to discussed that when they became a mother, there was an acknowledgement and commitment that their child would come first over their job. However, this is not an easy task to achieve nor come to terms with,” Montalban says.

Montalban says the military needs to do more to develop a culture that helps bridge the tension between the identity of parenthood — not just motherhood — and military service. This could involve normalising the commitment of motherhood by encouraging fathers to be part of the solution.

“The majority of women I have spoken to in the military are partnered with a serving spouse. They ask – ‘if I’m in the army, and my husband is in the army, why am I the one expected to go part-time?’

“We need to make it more acceptable that fathers take six months off to be the primary carer,” Montalban says.

While family-friendly policies exist, they are not seen as a viable option due to cultural expectations informing who is seen as the ‘primary parent’.

According to Montalban, there can be a negative stigma attached to men requesting and accessing flexible work arrangements.

Pregnancy also impacts service identity and expectations. As a mother’s body changes, her ability to undertake certain physical activities also changes, the most obvious instance being a woman’s capacity to be deployed in a combat role.

Defence has made some progress on this front, with an updated pregnancy policy that involves education and changing cultural expectations, such as allowing women to forgo overnight duty while heavily pregnant or breastfeeding.

Keeping both motherhood and military service

Fundamentally so many organisations, not just the military, have been built by men and assume no consideration of family ties and obligations. So, in our modern era, is there a way we reimagine military culture and identity to be more inclusive of motherhood and fatherhood, and at all levels of service?

Montalban says yes. But for this to happen in a more meaningful way, the status quo needs to change. We need to further challenge gendered assumptions of parenthood in the military, and work to navigate the balance between the needs of the military, families and service personnel.  

“At the individual level, it is about enabling women to have informed choices about their service and role as a mother, so they can take ownership of the decisions they make about their career, their health and their family life,” Montalban says.

“At an institutional level, we need to further identify and remove the systemic structures that have been barriers to their progress.”

**If you are an military family and want to find out more about the support services offered by the ADF please visit the Family programs and services webpage.

This article is co-published with ANU College of Health and Medicine.