“What happens to our natural instinct, as a mother, to protect our child when he or she is ordered to one of the most dangerous places in the world? What gets us through the day? How do we survive?”
Tracie Ciambotti
Tracie’s son, Josh, enlisted in the Army two days after he graduated from high school in 2005. Five months later he was on his way to Baghdad and the reality of war began to sink into the depths of Tracie’s heart. She had no idea when or if she would ever see her son again. As the weeks passed, fear became the master of her days. Josh had received the best training in the world for his new job as a combat soldier with the United States Armed Forces, but Tracie had none for her role as the mother of a service member. While her son was fighting a war in Iraq, she was marching—unaware and unprepared—into her own battle at home.
Battles of the Heart reminds us that freedom is not free. Every American needs to understand the sacrifices that military families endure for our freedom. Journey through two deployments and discover along with Tracie how to survive the challenges that military families face daily.
Tracie Ciambotti is the co-founder of Military Families Ministry, a non-profit organization that supports service members and their families. Her experiences as the mother of an Army infantryman over the past six years have afforded her the passion and knowledge to be an advocate for military families. Tracie is a contributor to the blog, “Off the Base”, which focuses on creating civilian awareness of military life.
Tracie lives in Bennett, Colorado, with her husband, Jeff. She writes short stories for a local publication and produces a newsletter for Military Families Ministry.
Military deployments during wartime can stress a mother’s heart, sometimes to the breaking point. After experiencing this herself with the deployment of her son, Josh, to Iraq in 2005, Tracie Ciambotti happened upon a way to bring herself back to emotional balance, build on that stability and maintain it through Josh’s second and third deployments.
Ciambotti shares her secrets in Battles of the Heart: Boot Camp for Military Moms (West Bow, 2012). No concern is off limits: the frustration of surrendering a mom’s protective instincts to the mandates of Uncle Sam…the realization that one has been blindsided by a different kind of “war” at home…the need to cope with news, or lack of it, from the battlefield…the conflicted feelings that arise when a son marries during his time of service…the disciplines and new maturity that change a service member’s behavior, even toward family members. Ciambotti lays open her experiences with these and other discoveries so that military moms need not be caught off guard, as she was. In the process, she turns each challenge into a strengthening positive.
Battles of the Heart is a must-read for any parent whose son or daughter has enlisted in the U. S. Military. It is an eye-opener for the rest of us. --Laurel West, journalist and author
Laurel West
Battles of the Heart is not a long book, and it’s an easy read, yet it’s full of important information. Tracie is a military mom, just like myself and thousands of others and in her book she shares her personal journey emotionally and spiritually during her son’s two deployments. The second half of the book takes moms through a boot camp that will help prepare them with six essential elements of a personal walk with the Lord that is needed to face her daily battles.
I would highly recommend it to any military mom It will help her to know that there are thousands of other moms walking the same road she’s on so she’s not alone in her thoughts and emotions. It will also help her to focus on what she can do to grow closer to the Lord while experiencing the realities of having a child in the military during a time of conflict
Kathy Guzzo