
Military Widow: A Survival Guide
By Joanne Steen and Regina Asaro
Naval Institute Press: Annapolis
Published: June 2006
ISBN: 9781591148340
Contact the authors
Military Widow: A Survival Guide
With an insider’s understanding of military loss, authors Joanne Steen and Regina Asaro wrote this survival guide for you—the military wife who became a widow. You didn’t volunteer for widowhood. No wife ever would. But life’s tragedies never ask for permission.
This book can help you if:
- Your husband died in the military
- You’re too young to be a widow
- You’re looking for ways to move forward
Military Widow is a survival guide for the military wife’s journey from wife to widow to woman of her own right.
The United States Naval Institute awarded the Distinguished Authors of the Year Award for 2007 to Joanne M. Steen and M. Regina Asaro for Military Widow: A Survival Guide.
Endorsements for "Military Widow"
As a retired Navy Captain and 2-time Casualty Assistance Officer I read this book in continual head-nodding agreement and with extraordinary admiration for the authors. There is enough information in this slim volume that any military officer or leader will be remiss if they do not, at least, skim the material. This information is not available anywhere else. Being aware of this book will make life much easier if/when tragedy does strike. This book is a force-multiplier.”
I became a Gold Star widow at 24 and was left to raise our two-month old baby. I read countless books about grief and widowhood, but none addressed the issues that come with being a military widow. MILITARY WIDOW: A SURVIVAL GUIDE addressed those special issues in straightforward chapters. It’s full of countless “Aha, I feel that way too!” moments.
Whenever a military widow questions if she can survive, this book will assure her that she can and guide her through her journey. Very well done.”
Hands down, this is the most valuable resource for military widows. It provided me with answers to questions I couldn’t find anywhere else. It’s a must read, not only for widows, but also for everyone who stands by them.”
Love the Military Widow book. Here in Canada we call it the “Manual”
About the Authors
Joanne Steen, MS, NCC is an author, instructor and speaker on grief, loss and resilience with a specialty in line-of-duty loss. She is also a board-certified counselor and a military widow. Joanne is the founder of Grief Solutions, a training company on grief, loss and resilience, and has worked with more than forty diverse organizations, to include the U.S. Department of Defense, the Canadian Armed Forces, and a host of government, corporate and non-profit organizations. Her professional audiences have totaled more than 11,000.
She is also the author of We Regret to Inform You. A Survival Guide for Gold Star Parents and Those Who Support Them. (Central Recovery Press, Memorial Day 2019) Contact Joanne at info@miltiarywidow.com

U.S Naval Institute’s Distinguished Authors of the Year Regina Asaro and Joanne Steen with USNI CEO, Maj. Gen. Tom Wilkerson, USMC (Ret)
Regina Asaro, MS, RN, CT, FCN is a psychiatric nurse, certified in Thanatology: Death, Dying and Bereavement. Regina has given over 150 workshops on grief and traumatic loss, criminal victimization and life skills development, and has published more than a dozen articles in professional mental health journals. Regina has advanced training in Community Crisis Response, War Trauma, and Critical Incident Stress Management, and has been a part of national and international crisis response teams in the wake of violence, air disasters and war,
Regina is writing her first novel, exploring issues of loss and hope. Contact Regina at info@militarywidow.com.