Marta McClintock knows that being a Navy spouse can be a trial by fire.

“When my daughter was younger she had to have surgery three weeks after my husband deployed and then our car broke down,” she said. “I had to look to other spouses for help.”

Whether it’s a medical emergency, car troubles or knowing how to handle family finances when a military spouse is deployed — sometimes the direction to take isn’t clear. But a new program will soon give Navy spouses at Whidbey Island Naval Air Station the direction they need to support their family with confidence.

COMPASS is an orientation to the Navy lifestyle. Its three-day sessions — the first of which is being offered Jan. 23 to 25 — provides free insight to the world of the Navy and Marine Corps mission, history, customs and traditions, dependent rights and benefits, pay, deployments, moving, interpersonal communication, and investing in self and the community. Over the three-day course, coffee, food and babysitting are all free.

“It’s Navy 101,” said spouse and COMPASS mentor Harold Mahieu.

“COMPASS approaches subjects you don’t learn about in other areas,” said COMPASS mentor McClintock. “It’s stuff you won’t get in briefings or that your husband will necessarily think to tell you.”

The COMPASS program is nothing new to the Navy, just to Whidbey Island. Naval Services Family Line already has COMPASS programs at bases in Hawaii, Japan, South Carolina, Italy and other locations.

Whidbey Island COMPASS team leader Kim Graf has been a military spouse for 15 years. When national COMPASS program director Rosemary Ellis asked her to bring the program to Whidbey she gladly obliged.

“I believe in this program and its ability to be helpful for Navy spouses,” Graf said. “The Navy lifestyle can be a challenge and we need to know our resources ahead of any situation that can arise.”

In a mixture of lecture and interactive learning styles, COMPASS will cover everything from personal finance management to relocation.

“You’re moving all the time and each time there are so many things to do,” McClintock said.

They’ll talk extensively about deployment.

“You learn to rely so much on other spouses so this will also be an opportunity to meet them,” McClintock said. “I’m good friends now with a number of other spouses I’ve met through this program.”

Mentors will help translate and break down some of the abundant Navy acronyms such as BAH: Basic Allowance for Housing.

“Being a military spouse you have to learn a completely new language because everything can be so foreign with all those acronyms,” Mahieu said.

It might make some nervous, but the mentors insist covering etiquette will ease their nerves.

“We want to help them feel more comfortable in ceremonial situations,” McClintock said.

McClintock admits that even though she grew up in a military family when she married a sailor she felt a little lost.

“When I first married into the Navy I didn’t know all the details,” she said. “I had to gather it along the way. COMPASS will be one-stop shopping for all the things spouses need to know.”

There are no last names and no rank when attending COMPASS. Talking about specifics of your spouse is off limits in order to maintain an even keel. In fact, the leaders were reluctant to share their last names for publication.

“No one is above anyone else — we are all simply Navy spouses,” McClintock said.

Getting beyond rank and first impressions is fine with Harold Mahieu. He realizes he’s not what people usually picture when they think “Navy spouse.”

“People don’t think I’m the spouse,” he said. “We’ll go through the gate and the guard will say ‘good day’ and salute so I lean back so my wife can respond. It’s still most common for people to only think spouses are female.”

But Mahieu wants that perception to change.

He himself was active duty Navy for 20 years, but these days he proudly carries a dependent card along side the veteran’s ID in his wallet.

Mahieu said the COMPASS program is proof of a new military realization.