Looking back, the first sign of trouble was the day Tatum Baugh, 4, refused to come to the phone. Four feet high and 45 pounds, she always held her own against her two brothers in the battle over who got to talk first when Marine Staff Sgt. Tyrone Baugh called home from Iraq.

That day, though, she wanted no part of her dad. In the months to follow, she would throw a punch at one of her teachers and scissors at another, distinguish herself as a regular violator on Miss Kerry's red light/green light disciplinary chart, and get kicked out of two preschools.

It's been a rough go for a once well-adjusted child whose wish list for a happy life seemed fairly simple: her new bike, macaroni and cheese, shaking hands with Daisy Duck, and her father at home.

With the nation at war for eight years, one of the longest stretches in American history, a generation of military children is growing up with a parent in combat. The effects of wartime separations on children are only beginning to be understood, particularly on the littlest, who cannot comprehend the meaning of "Daddy will be back in six more months."

"It didn't feel fair to her why she couldn't call her daddy," said Bonnie Baugh, 34, Tatum's mother. "Mentally, this last year and a half has really affected her. Everything circles back to not being with her dad."

War demands a price from military families. Sometimes it's a life, sometimes a limb, sometimes a marriage. But experts are becoming acutely aware that it can also be the well-being of children like Tatum, who was 3½ when her father deployed, and, it was long assumed, too young to notice.

A recent Rand Corp. study commissioned by the National Assn. of Military Families showed that approximately a third of children aged 11 to 17 from military families reported anxiety symptoms — sleeplessness, unexplained fears — double that seen in civilian families.

The youngest are also turning out to be more vulnerable than once thought: Tricare, the military's health insurance system, reported that mental health visits for children under 5 jumped 73% between 2005 and 2009.

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The VFW National Home for Children will provide children and families of members of the VFW, its Ladies Auxiliary and active-duty military opportunities for growth and development in a nurturing community, and by doing so, will serve as a living memorial to all veterans.



Welcome to the online home of the most unique community in the United States of America - the VFW National Home for Children! The National Home is a multi-faceted facility created to care for the developmental, social and spiritual needs of the children and families of the Veterans of Foreign Wars. Services are also available for children of active duty military personnel. Our facility is not an orphanage, but a neighborhood of custom homes, service buildings and recreational land administered by a highly devoted staff and fully integrated into its surrounding community.

The Veterans of Foreign Wars established the National Home in 1925 to care for the children and families of our nation’s veterans. Located on 629 acres in Eaton Rapids, Michigan, the National Home stands today as a tribute to the VFW and Ladies Auxiliary members who help support the facility and the families who call the National Home their home.