Actually, It Doesn't Sound Crazy at All ....

I was reading through the comments on other posts this morning and found this comment from "New to the Army":

I am having a real hard time with the emotional roller coaster of deployments.  Our first deployment was 18 months long.  My husband was scheduled to deploy again after our recent PCS.  Plans changed 4 days before he was supposed to catch a plane to Iraq and now he is at home.  Don't get me wrong I would much rather him be here than over there.  I spent 6 weeks getting emotionally prepared for him to leave.  I became that independant mom again.  I guess I am having a hard time reconnecting with him because of another deployment around the corner.  Is there anyone out there that can relate or am I just plain crazy????  I need help with my perspective. 

Someone else takes a ride on the emotional roller-coaster....

Nah, you're not "plain crazy." Sarah touched on this very point not too long ago. It often seems that the one thing we can count on in military life is uncertainty. Departures and arrivals constantly shift, and so do emotions. You prepare for the good-bye and then it's postponed, or moved up. A new reality to contend with.

It's tough and we all deal with this situation differently, but what New to the Army is going through is perfectly normal, and happens all too often.

Comments

[Semper Fi Wife]

I was trying to pull thoughts together and email you, New to the Army. but Andi did a much better job of it. You're absolutely not crazy at all. If you are, you belong to the biggest darned crazy club on Earth.:)

[LAW]

Crazy.... that's our song, folks! No, you aren't nuts, crazy or even slightly deranged. Your mind was all prepared, all matters tucked into their tidy little compartments, adrenaline pumping.. and then.. oh well, never mind. the brain doesn't like to be messed with like that, which is why you will occassionally hear from a milspouse " oh LEAVE already!" doesn't mean we don't love our spouses, it's that... well, there's a saying "poop, or get off the pot". sums it up for me!

LAW

[retired navy wife]

By the way....after 26 years as a naval wife...you NEVER get used to it. You just do what you have to do. And each case is different from the first.

The main thing...open communication. Be sure to talk with your husband about your feelings and work TOGETHER through this.

[Lori]

This was me last week. My husband was put on the alternate list to deploy a couple of months ago. So I prepared myself for him to deploy. Then our shirt had to leave and he took her spot for the new commander's arrival and was told he would not be deploying. Just 2 weeks later, short notice PCS orders came out and sure enough, there were about 8 people from the deployment list on it, including a guy same rank as my hubby. So he was back on again.

We went through a week of ok, prepare for Dad/husband to go and then the PCS orders got cancelled! So we were told, ok, original guy is back on again. Then the original guy was so upset he was considering dropping paperwork, so my husband was back on alert again. At that point, every single day, if not every couple of hours, it was a different story, he's on, he's off. I literally said, "JUST GO ALREADY!!!"

Long story short, he's now off the list (but still an alternate) and I have finally told family members "When the plane takes off, we'll know if he's going by whether he's on it or not!"

It's never easy to deal with changes in plans that can affect so many things in our lives!