The Life of an Army Wife

I found one of my friends blogs yesterday. She's a fellow army wife lives just down the street from me. So I was reading through her past blogs, and I came across one that talks about how hard a deployment is on the families of the soldiers. And I realized, I talk about my kids, my pets, how my father in law drives me insane, but I never really talk about what it's like to be the wife of a United States Army Soldier. So thanks for todays post inspiration.

The number one hardest thing on any military family is deployments. But I'm not here to talk about how hard it is on other military families, just mine. When Tom first joined the army, we were still living in North Carolina. He had basic training for 9 weeks, then he had AIT for four months. When he first joined, he was only reserves. After A.I.T, he came home and started to look for a job. Was very difficult when after only a month home, they decided to send him away for a month for something, I forgot what it was. When he came back, he still couldnt find a job, so I BEGGED him to go active duty full time. My brother in law was a recruiter so he was able to help us. After Tom signed the papers, he was stationed in Ft. Drum, NY. So he went first, the plan was for us to follow a few weeks later. But that fell through and I ended up staying with my parents for 2 or 3 months.

That time apart wasn't too bad, I had my parents there to help me. When I finally got to NY to reunite with my husband, I felt "well that was easy, I can handle a year long deployment." HA! I was wrong. About a year after we got here, he was deployed to Iraq. On our 6th wedding anniversary, Lana's 5th birthday was the day after. That was hard enough but I thought I was prepared after all that time apart. I was in for the shock of my life.

My marriage was never extremly strong, so I wasn't prepared for how much I actually missed him. The first month he was gone, I'd cry myself to sleep at night, wake up in the morning with tear stained eyes. All the while trying not to let the kids see me fall apart because they missed they're daddy too. I'd hear our wedding song and fall apart, and forget about Toby Keith's "American Soldier". The first line of that song still brings tears to my eyes. "I'm just tryin to be a father, raise a daughter and a son. Be a lover to their mother, everything to everyone." I felt like Toby Keith was in my head when he wrote that. I remember one day calling my mother hysterical in tears "Mom, I can't do this I need him here." My mother was absolutly amazing during that time. She'd laugh with me, cry with me. And I can't imagine it was very easy for her. Having her only daughter, her baby, so far away in so much pain. And of course, as I mentioned in a previous blog, I completly shut down.

I didn't even celebrate Christmas that year, I just didn't have it in me. I didn't get a tree, didn't decorate. Christmas dinner for me and my kids was at a local diner. The food sucked but it was the only place open that day. I was jealous of all the families that had they're spouses home that year. I was very angry. Luckily, with Tom's job I was able to talk to him every day, but it didn't help much. With the time difference he had to go to bed much earlier than me.

But, he came home. And when he did, just as my friend said, I felt like I had the life breathed back into me. Which at the time, I didn't understand. See, a couple weeks before he came home, he told me he wanted a divorce. We had been fighting for a while, and the Dss thing didn't help matters at all. I guess he felt he just didn't have it in him to fight anymore. At the time he told me I'll never forget his words "I'm emotionally detached, in my mind I'm single". Thank god for my mom and one of my best friends Sue during that time. I can remember one night, sitting on the floor, hystericall, unable to pick myself up, calling Sue on Skype and rambling incoherently.

The day he came home, it was August so Lana was home from school. We had decided not to tell the kids yet until we knew for sure what we were doing. I remember opening the door, and seeing him there in his black button down shirt, and black jeans and thinking "wow, i love this man". And Lana's face lit up as she jumped into his arms. It was Connor's first day of preschool, so Tom decided to ride with us to go pick him up. The kids had NO idea he was coming home.

We got to the school, and we were told the kids were outside playing. So we went out back to the playground. Connor was playing on the slide and didn't see us right away. So Tom started to walk toward the slide. Connor then turned around and saw him. At first, he just stood there, cocking his head to one side, then the other, until he decided to come get a closer look. So he got off the slide and started walking. The closer he got to Tom, I noticed his lower lip start to quiver. About half way over to him he just lifted his arms up, lower lip still quivering. Tom then picked him up and Connor wrapped his little arms so tight around his neck and held on so tight that I thought he was going to choke him. There wasn't a dry eye on that playground that day. And that is one memory that I will take to my grave with me as one of my favorite memories of all time. Everytime I think about it I still get a lump in my throat.

Now, we're on the verge of doing it all over again. Tom leaves in July for Georgia for 4 more months of training, then after he gets back, we're told he's going to Kuwait for a year. I'm dreading it. An Army wife once told me that the first deployment is always the easiest to get through. If that's true, and I was so bad last time, what's it gonna be like this time? We have a plan this time though. I'm going to take the kids and move back to our hometown where I have 90% of my family and almost ALL of my friends that I grew up with. We think it'll help me better having a big support system closeby to help me through the rough times. But damn, Tom and I are finally in a good place. Losing him again is going to about kill me. But, that's all part of life in the military. You have to deal with not seeing your spouse, or loved one for days, weeks sometimes even months or years at a time. That's probably why they say military wives are the strongest women out there. Speaking for myeself, everyone kept telling me how strong I was, but at the time I didn't feel it. I felt weak, like I didn't know how I was going to go on. That year he was gone proved to me how much I loved him and how no problem is too small to fight for if you truly feel you've found a once in a lifetime opportunity.