Skip to main content

Packing

Image
By
As a wife, especially as a military wife, you do hard things.  It's the way it goes.  Today I have decided what one of the hardest of those things might be, helping your husband pack.  I'm not talking packing for a trip to the car races for the weekend or a weekend backpacking expedition.  I'm talking about the kind when you know you aren't going to be with him again for a very, very, long time.  That is the packing I dread.  There are a few different aspects to this that make it so difficult and press me to put it on the list of things I hate.

First, the pressure.  This is the case for any trip, is everything washed?  Is everything found?  Socks matched?  But for a soldier it is much worse.  There is SO much that they have to have, "according to regulation."  You can't really fudge anything.  You also feel like you are sending them out for an indefinite amount of time and you want them to be comfortable, be prepared, be safe.  Have you done everything as a wife to ensure that is the case?  Luckily right now I am sending him to a school in Georgia, not a war zone.  Deployments are much worse.

Second, the mental separation.  There it is, the moment you have been dreading.  You have spent as much of every moment as you possibly can together, sleeping together, snuggling, lazing about, exercising together, eating out, playing with the kids, playing games, talking, but then... His mind has to go elsewhere, he is now in work mode, and he is preparing for an assignment that will have nothing to do with you.  He is kind, but focused on what he is doing, and you are superfluous at the moment. You want to be helpful, but really, you are just a body in the room, sometimes in his way.  He'll be back with you in just a few hours, but for now the time apart begins.

The last part is the heavy feeling in your heart, the lump in your throat, the stinging in your eyes, as you attempt to not show how this whole process is making you hurt.  When Janie was a little girl I had to waitress a few nights a week to help make ends meet.  Mike assured me that she always had a great time when I was gone.  The problem was that, when I left the house, she was almost always in tears.  That is the image I would carry with me the entire night and it would make my heart hurt.  Finally she was old enough for me to explain that concept to her.  From then on each night when it was time for me to leave she would take me to the door and give me a huge smile, sometimes it wavered, but she was so brave.  I have heard my Janie explain that concept to Sadie, it has stuck with her through all these years.  I think our entire family has that mentality, don't make daddy leave you looking sad and teary.

So tomorrow we'll say goodbye again.  October has been magical.  In some ways it has flown by, in other ways I am amazed at everything we have done.  Christmas break is 6 weeks away.  We will do our best to get back into the routine until husband and father is home again.  Vacation will be amazing, but I will still dread the packing.

Comments

Darla said…
Oh Brookie. This is so sweet. And sad. And brave. You amaze me. You all do.
November 2, 2011 at 10:06 PM
Tracey said…
I don't think the rest of the world will ever even begin to understand the sacrifices made by military families. I don't pretend to know but I have now seen it so intimately with my close friends that I know we can never say thank you enough. The way you handle things with so much courage and strength is amazing. We will be praying for you and Mike and hope the time goes quickly. We aren't that far away anymore and are more than willing to help with anything you need! Thank you for inspiring me with your awesomeness!!
November 4, 2011 at 10:31 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

2018 and Another Go!

By
For almost three years I have been thinking how very sad it is that I hadn't continued to keep a journal of our family activities.  No more deployment letters and emails to Mike, no more family blog to keep grandparents and aunts and uncles connected to our family.  Nothing but printed off monthly calendars saved in a file somewhere.  I guess our family blog died a slow death when we lived in Washington and we were seeing everyone all of the time.  It just was not important to keep everyone informed.  They were right there with us.  I did not stop, in all the chaos, to think how very important the blog might be to me, or to my children.  I have often thought of the cute pictures and quotes we had saved on our family blog.  I thought of the interviews I did with the kiddos, and how grateful I was that, somewhere, on a dusty webpage, those beautiful faces, those funny antics, still existed.  I have checked to make sure the blog still existed fr...
Post a Comment
Read more

MICHAEL IS COMING HOME TOMORROW!!

By
My Michael is coming home . You can't just say it. You have to SING it. Tomorrow my tall, strong, gorgeous, husband will be here and it will be beautiful. He will nestle into the life of our family and we will have him with us, here, in our house, in our family . He'll help put on jammies and read stories, and tutor Jane in math. He'll take me on dates and wrestle at least one child during sacrament meeting. He'll snuggle me in bed at night and nuzzle my neck while I'm doing dishes. We'll go for walks and play games and watch movies and do fun family Saturday stuff. He'll help carry a kid down to the car and then he'll drive while I put on my makeup ! We love him, we know how much he loves us. We can't wait! Don't worry, I won't work him to death. I won't make him cook dinner every night for the next 10 months or hand over the kids and take off to the spa for the weekend (tempting, but... no). We just want him HERE. I kee...
9 comments
Read more
By
November 7, 2020, My Beautiful and Wise Daughter, Jane. I can breathe again. I won't be going to bed with my stomach in knots and my whole body feeling tight. I won’t be listening to a President who gains momentum by tearing others down. I won’t be going to sleep worrying that my children won’t have clean water to drink or clean air to breathe. I won’t be going to sleep thinking about the horrific experiences of children being torn from their mother’s and father’s arms because they were seeking refuge. I won’t be living in fear of the rapidly-growing racist attitudes and prejudice—that someday harm would come upon my baby that I have now and my future children. That my sister and my cousin and others that I love won’t be stripped of their rights and feel like they are any less of a human being than the rest of us. If this election wasn’t going to change anything for you and if you didn’t see the harm that Trump was causing, that is great and I’m sincerely glad that you have that p...
Post a Comment
Read more