U.S. military families have become the unseen victims of the war in Iraq, with those left behind suffering when Soldiers go off to fight and when they finally return home.

“I don’t know one military family that is still together or anything like they were before the Soldier in the family went to war,” 30-year-old Mylinda, whose husband was among the first Marines to be deployed in Iraq, told AFP.

Mylinda’s husband returned home from Iraq around a year ago after “we both decided then that he should leave the military because otherwise he would have had to go back,” she said.

“We did pretty well when he first got back, but he never spoke about Iraq.

“I could see he was unhappy and he lost self-confidence when he left the military and couldn’t find a job,” she said.

But then came the bombshell.

“In March, he said he didn’t want to be married any more,” Mylinda said.

The majority of Iraq veterans who took part in a recent study acknowledged having “some family problem at least once a week,” said Dr Steven Sayers of the Veterans Administration (VA) Medical Center in Philadelphia.

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