Everything You Need to Know about Military Marriage Retreats

Oct 17, 2019

A few weeks ago, my husband and I had the opportunity to drive down to Anchorage to attend a marriage retreat hosted by the USO. So many of you reached out wanting to know about what it was like that I figured writing an article about the whole thing was a good idea. I’m going to keep this short and sweet and just give you the information you need to know!

Everything You Need to Know about Military Marriage Retreats

Who should go to a military marriage retreat?

The marriage retreat we went to (called the Oxygen Seminar) was definitely something I would recommend to all married military couples. There were a lot of young couples there like my husband and me, couples who were just reuniting after a deployment, couples who needed to work through some serious issues, etc. I was a little nervous going into the whole marriage retreat thing that people would assume we were having problems because of our participation in the military marriage workshop but that was definitely not the case. The military marriage retreat was hosted by the religious support offices at our post so a Chaplain was present for one on one time with couples who needed it while the actual class was taught by a certified family therapist. Our military marriage retreat also provided free childcare throughout the seminar. While we left Jasper with my in-laws for the weekend, it was nice knowing that childcare would have been provided if we had needed it making these military marriage retreats family-friendly as well.

What happens at a military marriage retreat?

Our military marriage retreat was a three-day event. We spent most of the day Friday traveling and the first session kicked off around 6 pm once we had checked into the hotel. We grabbed a quick (provided) bite to eat, stocked up on water and coffee, and found a table with some other young couples my husband knew from work. The dove right into the workshop, passing out workbooks and pens. I would say that the first session lasted about two hours. Saturday, the second day, started with another provided breakfast followed by a session. The nice thing about the schedule was that none of the sessions started super early or anything like that. There was a set time for meals and then the sessions would start about an hour or so after the mealtime. Meaning you could skip the provided meal if you wanted to. There was a great balance between the actual coursework and free time. One of the main reasons we wanted to go on the marriage retreat was to get out of Fairbanks for the weekend and explore Anchorage (okay, and go to Target). We had most of Saturday to ourselves which was great for us. Saturday was a “date night” and you could basically spend most of Saturday doing whatever you wanted if you didn’t need childcare for the date night. On Sunday there was an optional religious service followed by a quick session and we were done by noon so that we could travel back to Fairbanks.

What do you learn at a military marriage retreat?

The main point of a military marriage retreat is to learn skills to implement in order to strengthen your marriage. My husband and I hadn’t really been able to do much in the way or premarital counseling other than reading the 5 Love Languages Military Edition together before our wedding so I was really looking forward to some of the tools we would be learning through this military marriage retreat. Without going into too much detail, we did learn a few very valuable tools to implement in our daily lives that will ultimately strengthen our marriage. Everything from learning how to communicate issues more effectively to our personality types and how they operate within our relationship. Through the breakout sessions, I was able to learn a few really surprising things about my husband that I hadn’t realized in our one and a half years of marriage.

Where can you find out about marriage retreats on your installation?

So we heard about this particular marriage retreat through my husband’s unit and chain of command. However, this particular retreat (called the Oxygen Seminar) was hosted by both the USO and the Religious Support Office at Fort Wainwright. If you’re looking for a place to find information about military marriage retreats offered by your own installation I think those would both be a great place to start. Army Community Services (or the equivalent for whatever branch of the military you or your spouse serves in) may also have information on upcoming retreats.

My only real complaint about the whole military marriage retreat thing is that they could definitely work on being more inclusive to same-sex couples. I know that the demographics of military families are largely heterosexual but representation really does matter. Anyways, I hope this was helpful for you guys!