NORFOLK, Va. (WAVY) — From an in-depth look at flight ops to visiting a guided missile cruiser, 10 on Your Side has spent the past five weeks giving you an inside look at life in the Navy in our series “On Deck: The Navy Experience.”

This week, we’re looking at a topic that impacts sailors everyday: their uniforms. Specifically, we’re focusing on how the Navy is helping pregnant women be comfortable and how it is updating uniforms for women.

Wearing a uniform is a hallmark of military life.  However, for pregnant women, it can be challenging. 

“They don’t want to be singled out or segregated, so it’s very important that they are considered Navy sailors, they still look like sailors, they just happen to be pregnant,” said Commander Terri Gabriel, with Navy Exchange Service Command.

Gabriel says maternity uniforms have some special features, like side tabs and belly panels. 

“As a woman’s body grows, she’s not changing uniforms constantly, so the uniform kind of grows with her,” said Gabriel.

For the second year, the Navy is offering its “Maternity Pilot Program.” Pregnant women can get fitted for maternity uniforms at the Navy Exchange, and then the Navy will ship the uniform to them to use during her pregnancy. 

“It’ll come directly to her door. She can wear that uniform as long as she needs it, even into postpartum,” said Gabriel. “Once she finishes, she calls us up, we send her a label and she puts it back in the box and sends it to us.”

Then, the uniform is cleaned and sanitized for the next woman to use.

So far, about 1,100 women have participated in the program, which is the most out of any military service branch.

“Just because you’re having a baby, you shouldn’t be treated any differently,” Gabriel said. 

A modernization of women’s uniforms is also underway.

“The current patterns are based on 1980s body types, so we’ve changed a little bit since then,” Gabriel said. “So our clothing technologists have worked on a program, we’re doing a modernization, so we’re doing an updated fit that is more accurate to female body types today.”

That includes two new overblouses for dress uniforms.

Gabriel said the Navy spoke with female sailors to make sure they got it right.

“We did two fit events, one in Norfolk here and then one in San Diego,” she said.  “Really took into account what the female sailors were saying, what they wanted to see, what their interests were, so this was born out of that. So this is really exciting, they actually got to try on some prototypes and feel the uniforms.”

Gabriel said they’re in the final stages of design and the new updates should be rolled out late summer or early fall next year.

“A female service member serves and she wants to wear her uniform proudly, polished and still be a feminine woman in the uniform,” Gabriel said, “so this is a very exciting change, the ladies are looking forward to it.”

Gabriel also said a modernization for men’s uniforms is also in the works, but probably not for another four or five years.

See below for all of the stories in the On Deck: The Navy Experience series: