On being an Army wife

I have a whole sum total of four Army wife friends (Sandra Duran [soon to be Sandra Hicks], Amanda Blackiston, Hallie Bruce, and Janai Deitt). Of those four, i really only consistently with two of them. John isn't even in the real Army yet (he graduates from his training on December 9th) and i already feel so out of place. Being an Army wife means supporting your soldier regardless of what is going on in the world and regardless of what you think of his job or the government. Your soldier can't even really talk badly about the government in public. Since he has to show support, so must you.

Sometimes i feel like, even though he has one of the safest jobs in the Army (if there even is such a thing) he has the worst (for me). I know that, down the line especially if and when he decides to try for PsyOps, there will be days that he's gone and i won't know where. I know that, once he deploys, there will be times i won't hear from him for a month or more.

It sucks. Bad.

I'm not worrying about him now because i know where he's at all hours of the day (pt in the morning, then back to the barracks to shower and get ready for class, class until 4:15, then formation, then remedial pt, then dinner, then back to the barracks, then errands if he decides to run any). Right now it's simple. It sucks, because he's forever away, but it's simple. I can live with it because i can talk to him every night. But i don't know how i'm going to handle deployment.

I wasn't meant to be an Army wife. But now i find myself in the position that i have been made one, and i have to step up to the plate and become one.

I love my husband. He is everything to me, and i've told him repeatedly how proud i am of him that he is doing this. It hurts a lot for him that he can't be here. He wants nothing more than that. But he's set aside his own feelings, his own wants and desires, to do what is, first and foremost, right for his family. And i'm finding that as he does that, i'm finding strength to do that as well. First and foremost is our family. We each have two different roles to play. He's the provider, the protector. I am the caregiver. They are two very very different roles, but they weave into each other like a single piece of elven rope, inseparable and indestructible.

My job as an Army wife is just as important as his job as a soldier. While he's taking care of things on the front lines, i'm taking care of things here on the home front.

Now i just have to remember that during the times i can't talk to him. No one said this was going to be easy, but it's a challenge that i can and will overcome. And be all the better for it. :)