Don’t write about yourself, your family or friends or dating problems or problems in relationships, like men not doing enough housework. Stay focused on this story alone. You are not supposed to relate your life experiences to the soldier’s war experiences. You don’t have to compare men’s lives to women’s and conclude that giving birth was worse than anything any men can go through, so they should just shut up and quit complaining so much. This isn’t a battle of the sexes. There are 4 questions after the last paragraph of the text. You don’t have to answer any or all of them. Just read them to get your brain going. Ask yourself what is this story about? Who are the main characters? War seems to be a tool of earth that transforms men’s lives right before their eyes. It doesn’t matter that they don’t want to change or were happy the way they were. Change is forced on them in a way no one who hasn’t gone to war can truly understand.
Just write about what impresses you the most. I realize it is pages long, and you may have to read it over two reading sessions. I wouldn’t not plan to read it and write the essay quickly. It takes time to read. It is deep. I would read it and sleep on it. Then I would start writing. It stays in your brain and runs through your thinking.