The Military Wives Choirs go a long way to help their members who experience loneliness and separation. With choirs across the UK and internationally, many women join when they’re posted to become part of a familiar community built on the joy of singing.
Angeline is a long-standing member of Warminster Military Wives Choir, she joined in 2012 when she found herself alone in a new area. Instantly, she felt welcomed into the network, who became like a second family.
As a military wife and mother she found the support invaluable: “It’s very different marrying a soldier but when your child becomes a soldier it’s very strange, and the choir was my rock and constant – the only thing that was set in stone at that time.”
Devastatingly, her new husband was diagnosed with leukaemia, and she found that the only thing that got her through was the support from her choir, not just emotionally but practically too.
Following her husband being given the all-clear, Angeline stepped up to be choir lead, but during her last few months in post, the family received the news that his leukaemia had returned, and he sadly passed away 12 weeks later in 2018. Her choir friends rallied around her: “I cannot express the love and compassion the ladies gave to me and my family at this time. I was so frightened of the new world as a military widow but the ladies in the network made it so much less scary. Through the last ten years we have proved time and time again we are ‘Stronger Together’; we are something special… we are the Military Wives Choirs.”
Want to join? Head to militarywiveschoirs.org