Be Safe, Love Mom
A Military Moms Stories of Courage, Comfort, and Surviving Life on the Home Front

When you enlist in the United States military, you dont just sign yourself up for years of dutyyou also commit your loved ones to a life of service all their own. No one knows this better than Elaine Brye, an army brat turned military wife turned military mom of four officers, each serving in a different branch of the military: Air Force, Army, Marine Corps, and Navy. Bryes father and mother met while both serving in the US Army, and her childhood was that of a typical army brat, with frequent movessome to faraway countriesdinner-table conversations full of military lingo, an ever-present anxiety during her fathers deployments to Vietnam and elsewhere, and family vacations to national monuments and battlefields. In 1976the first year women were accepted in the service academies and ROTCBrye herself enlisted in the Air Force, where she would later meet her husband, an Air Force pilot. Now Elaine Brye is a mom to four military officers, and for more than a decade shes endured countless teary goodbyes, sparse communication from boot camps and training summers, deployments, emotional airport reunions, empty chairs at Thanksgiving dinners, and sleepless hours waiting for phone calls in the night. Shes navigated the complicated tangle of emotionspride, worry, fear, hope, and deep, enduring lovethat accompanies life as a military mom. In Be Safe, Love Mom Brye reflects on her familys military service and offers a lifetimes worth of insight, comfort, wisdom, and a bit of humor to fellow military moms who are navigating the unpredictable life that accompanies having a childor childrenin uniform.