Did you get much support after?
Support during and in the immediate aftermath were second to none. Military medical services are top notch, highly trained and absolutely incredible at their jobs. Surgeries and rehabilitation were amazing too, and ongoing support or “resettlement” after leaving have been good. Not as good as the support could be, but the money just isn’t there to give everyone the support they need.
Guessing it was quite a male dominated environment ypu were working in, how did you find that? Do they try and make women feel included or not really?
I was the only female in a team of six, and only one of 3 women in the battery (equivalent of an infantry company in size).
In my experience, the way you are treated as a women very much depends on how you conduct yourself. There are women who will act very much like a girly girl, and expect the lads to put up with that and treat them like some special little flower because they have a vagina 
Does not work that way. You conduct yourself as a soldier. Obviously banter is a huge part of military life, so getting taken the piss out of in a lighthearted way for being a woman was just part and parcel of the job - but it’s very easy to tell when that is just jokes and banter and when it’s meant in a nasty way. Luckily, I never experienced the nasty side of things. I essentially grew up with 3 out of the 5 lads I worked closely with. We went through training together, so were more like siblings to me than anything else! The most important thing for anyone to remember is you are a soldier first and foremost. You do your job to the best of your ability regardless of what genitals you have, and don’t ever expect any kind of special treatment just because you’re female. You carry the same weight, you face the same physical and academic testing as your male counterparts.
The first time you went out into an actual warzone (eg not training or at the base camp thing) were you really really scared? Or does the training mean you can handle it ok?
Your training does kick in. But anyone who says they aren’t scared every single time they leave the safety of a camp/compound/fob etc is a bullshitter.
What did your parents think when you signed up?
My dad was a military man so wasn’t really bothered - it’s what would have been expected of me if I was a boy, so I think he was pleasantly surprised when I made the decision to do it.
My mum has never really talked about it, but knew I’d do it with or without her blessing, as my dad would have signed the paperwork if she refused.
Whats your most interesting story from your time in your job?
Probably concerning a friend of mine and her accident. You know how in movies something goes “boom” and then it’s all chaos and drama?
She was driving a vehicle, I was a few vehicles behind, and she drove over what we think was an old Russian mine. Her vehicle goes boom. Once we got to her, we expected a mangled mess. Instead, the front of the vehicle was a mangled mess and she was sat in the drivers seat, still strapped in, with a single cut to her face, a broken wrist and knocked out.
She woke up half hour later, thought she had hit a electricity pylon and just kept saying “How fucked is the vehicle? The boss is going to chew my arse” 
I had to break it to her that in fact she was the luckiest fucker I’d ever met and explain what actually happened while 4 other blokes were stood round her bed pissing themselves with laughter!
How do you find life now as a spouse? How much longer will your husband work for the army and do you wish he didnt now?
Life as a spouse is different. But a good different 
I can give my kids the stability of always having at least one parent around. We’ve been at our current posting for 6 years which is quite a long time as postings go. It’s hard essentially being a single parent to two very small kids when DH goes away - which has been a lot over the last couple of years, but it’s part and parcel of this lifestyle.
DH has another 14 years that he’s contracted to serve. He’s the kind of guy who’s very much a career soldier. It’s all he’s ever known and he loves his job
How do you talk to your children about it? Do you talk to them about the potential dangers or not? Does the army give you guidance as to how to handle it?
Kids are still very little, so don’t really understand what daddy does in the grand scheme of things. They know he goes away a lot, so we try to prepare them as best we can for that - we tell them that daddy is going on a little holiday, which is an in-joke between me and DH as one of his jobs a few years ago was in Cyprus where all he did was lay on them beach and stag on towers My little one was a tiny baby when he went away the first time in his life, and that was a good 4ish months, so the fact he didn’t recognise DH when he came back was hard on everyone - especially DH. He spent most of DS’s first year hear there and everywhere, so they still have a bit of a weird relationship. DS will play with DH etc, but will always come to me for everything else and gets very upset if I go anywhere without him. I totally understand though - I’ve been the only constant in his life and he clings to that as if his life depends on it. DD is very much all for her dad, and she gets very upset when he leaves 
But she has a better understanding of time than her brother, so I can do countdown charts and things for her so she can see just how many days until daddy comes home etc.
If a whole regiment or battalion are going away together, there’s usually well organised families briefings where we get info on welfare services and advice etc, but when it’s just the odd one or two going somewhere, like it is majority of the time for DH, there’s none of that. But I’m fine with dealing with it myself nowadays I have some amazing friends here who are like a solid wall of support, so I will be very sad to leave them when the time comes