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Yellow Ribbon brings family closer

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Crystal Charriere
  • Contributor, 624th Regional Support Group Public Affairs
JOINT BASE PEARL HARBOR-HICKAM, Hawaii --  Saying farewell to a husband, wife, father or mother who is leaving on a deployment can be difficult, and when they return it can be equally challenging to get back to the way things were before. The Yellow Ribbon Reintegration Program helps families cope with saying goodbye and welcome back.

The Yellow Ribbon program provides information, support and outreach services to reservists and their families. It's made up of chaplain, personnel, family readiness, finance, health, legal and military personnel flight support services, and places emphasis on staying connected to families.

"It's very informational; you're always learning because there are so many different topics," said Napua Warnet, wife of Tech. Sgt. Sean Warnet, 48th Aerial Port Squadron. "Yellow Ribbon offers a bunch of classes that help you prep for the deployment, and when your family member gets back from deployment, the classes help you get back to how it was before they left. After the classes each day, you get to spend the rest of the afternoon as a family."

The Warnets have been married for seven years and have three young children. In the last six years, Sergeant Warnet has deployed multiple times. Mrs. Warnet says Yellow Ribbon has helped her family handle her husband's absences.

"Before his deployment to Qatar early last year, we went to a pre-deployment retreat with the Yellow Ribbon," Mrs. Warnet said. "I thought it would be really interesting, and after we went I asked him why he didn't tell me about this before!"

Since their first retreat, the Warnet family has been to several Yellow Ribbon events, and Mrs. Warnet says she continues to learn something new from the classes.

She says it's refreshing to participate in the Yellow Ribbon retreats because it's stressful when her husband leaves, and she enjoys being able to reconnect as a family.

"On one of his deployments, we had issues come up while he was gone and it was hard because we were arguing and he was in a different country," Mrs. Warnet said. "But the classes at the retreat helped us talk about everything more and work things out. It's made us much closer. I strongly encourage everyone to go on the retreats."

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