They work long hours and write longer letters.

They lean on friends and talk to family.

And they pull themselves away from the televisions they can’t stand to watch, yet can’t bear to ignore.

They are the parents and siblings, grandparents and lovers of the thousands of men and women who have now been fighting for more than a week to oust Saddam Hussein and bring regime change to Iraq.

“I guess I’m doing better,” said Angela Noah, whose 23-year-old son Landon has been in the Persian Gulf since early January.

“When it started I was just watching TV all night long until like 5 o’clock in the morning, and I just have to get away from that,” she said. “So the last few days I haven’t been watching as much.”

She thinks her son might be in the 3rd Division they keep talking about on the news. And she knows he rides in the back of a “Bradley,” a tanker that holds about six soldiers.

When she sees live video of U.S. troops, she looks into their eyes and hopes she’ll catch a familiar gaze.

“I’m just looking to see if I can see my son, and I just want to hear that he’s OK and I don’t want to hear of any casualties,” she said.

Kinda Skea, Lawrence, and William Elston, Ottawa, show their support for U.S. troops in Iraq. Skea, who has family serving in the Persian Gulf, and Elston, a Vietnam veteran, waved the British and U.S. flags Thursday on 23rd Street.

Most military families in Lawrence feel the same — “We’re all kind of on news diets,” one military mom said. And they are doing everything they can to keep their hands and minds busy.

“I speak with at least one mom every day,” said Christine Kaplan, whose son is also in the gulf.

Kaplan helped start a support group for those with loved ones fighting the war, and she said the result had been incredible.

She said the group, comprised mostly of women, looks out for each other: After missing a session one day, she came home to find about a dozen phone messages.

“They were really concerned about me,” she said.

Stephanie Cabral, whose boyfriend, Jared Myers, was shipped overseas Thursday, said she was thankful to have a 3-year-old daughter and classes at Johnson County Community College to keep her mind off the war.

“This is probably the most difficult thing I’ve had to do,” she said. “I’ve had a lot of bumps in the road … but this is just a little hard to swallow.”

¢ See stories on the war in Iraq

And Kinda Skea, who has a brother, niece and nephew in the military, is coping by taking action: On Friday she carried British and American flags down 23rd Street from Harper Street to Iowa Street and most of the way back.

“I wanted people to know that you fight for what’s right, and this is right,” she said.

Skea plans to send her brother a picture of herself in front of Kentucky Fried Chicken, where she met a Vietnam veteran who helped her carry the flags back to Harper Street.

“I’m going to tell my brother this is what I’m doing to support him,” she said.