the two times i almost passed out.
a few of you gave me some encouragement to write a little more about being a military wife & i decided this might be the perfect time to tell you about the two times it almost made me pass out:
time #1: when ryan & i were engaged, i started spending a lot more time in pensacola. it also happened to be summer & as many of you know, summer on the gulf coast is H-OT. ryan also was at a critical point of his flight training and had to memorize an absurd number of emergency procedures word for word. so, one saturday, we were en route to the beach, driving on this gorgeous, winding road & i was quizzing him. this involved me reading along while he rattled off that particular emergency procedure. many of them were harmless enough, a warning light, etc. then we got to the doozies. engine failure. engine fire. and he started saying things like "point the aircraft towards an unpopulated area..." & "bail out..." after one, i guess i had gotten particularly quiet. he looks over to see me as white as a ghost & about ready to lose my lunch. here's the thing: i'm a REALLY empathetic person. i pass out most times i walk in a hospital. & i think i was picturing him in every one of these scenarios & was so focused on helping him learn, i didn't realize i was getting really light headed. (side note - ryan also got a big kick out of how many times i could tell him "good job!!!" during one emergency procedure -- let's say it was a tad bit different than how his instructors responded). so, ryan pulled over, got me some water & we decided to not do those particular procedures for a while. especially while driving in 100 degree weather on winding roads.
time #2: ryan got back from some pretty intense survival training this weekend. we needed to have some follow up conversations about things i needed to know if we had to go through some worst case scenarios. so, bless his heart, he decides to do this while we're sitting at california pizza kitchen having a late lunch. i'm playing it cool at first, listening, asking questions & then something clicked. my ghost face came back & i just looked at him and said, "do you want the whole pizza that badly?!" we laughed and tabled that conversation for non-meal times.
so, i had this little internal monologue going as i was typing these two stories. it was saying things like "gosh, you're a wuss. there are military wives that have had it LOTS tougher -- like how about 12 month deployments?!" or "i bet most wives don't even blink at these things," but then another voice said, "write it anyway. even if it only means something to one reader, it's worth it."
and here's why: people say to me all the time they "don't know how i do it" or "could never be a military wife" & it always makes me smile. i didn't have a life plan to marry someone in the military. i didn't wake up one morning and say, "you know what, I'm tough enough, let's go find a navy pilot to marry." i did what everyone else does, i met someone and couldn't imagine my life without them. i knew he was EXACTLY who i wanted to go through life with. and, he happened to have committed a lot of years to the navy. he's been active duty military the whole time i've known him. some of you have married people who are doctors or nurses or pastors or firemen or graduate students -- and all of those have consequences. whether it's student loans or a call schedule you can't control or never really being "off duty." i didn't get some special super power when i married ryan & there are LOTS of days when i don't feel tough enough or strong enough, but i believe we're given the strength we need & that this is exactly where i'm supposed to be.
so, for those of you who are thinking you might be a military spouse soon or who already are & doubt, on a regular basis, you're tough enough, i know exactly what you mean. that said, so far it's only made me almost pass out twice & the joys have FAR outweighed the trials.
military wife & life Tuesday, April 26, 2011 at 10:25AM
Reader Comments (9)
I love your candor :)
Thank you, thank you, thank you!
I may be a military girlfriend and not a wife, but I can certainly relate to many things you wrote. When we got word of his first deployment I immediately burst into tears. And of course, whenever those things happen I think, "Get it together, you wimp." I'm getting my MBA and work full-time, and most people don't understand how we've been long distance for so long. I finally started telling them the same thing you did -- that you don't control who you fall in love with. It's nice to know I'm not alone.
I totally agree! You can't decide who you fall in love with, the life they have is amazing and it's tough. I'm so glad I'm not alone in feeling slightly overwhelmed sometimes. It always seems to happen when it hits me how much he means to me, or when we talk about the specifics of his career. The rest of the world just doesn't understand how amazing our lives are with our military counterparts.
I loved this post! I'm an EP study buddy too and have felt the exact same way... too easy to visualize all the possibilities. And you described military relationships so well, including the fact that every relationship takes a lot of work and certain sacrifices, military or not. Nonetheless, it's so nice to know that I'm not the only one to sometimes wonder how I will ever learn to handle all this stuff. Thanks Mary!
These are my favorite kinds of posts, Mary. Thanks for writing!
I just discovered your blog... and all i can say is that I LOVE IT and truly enjoy reading your posts!! :)
After one of Rob's first few flights in pcola he encountered a real life EP. It turned out to just be a light that came on with no actual physical emergency with the plane. When he got home he happened to make the mistake of telling me he had a "helmet fire" in the cockpit. Very scary to hear... that is, until he explained that it just meant his brain was swirling trying to do all those relatively-new-to-him EPs when it really matters.
hey, so i don't remember how exactly i found your blog, but i've crept all the way back to april, and i've enjoyed every single one of your posts. they're funny and witty and real.
i'm an Air Force girlfriend, and my man's deployed right now and it's nice to find other military lovers, and nice to hear you talk about the real side of it. i was dating mine when he signed in, but i still wasn't fully expecting everything that it'd involve. quizzing him on all these fancy acronyms and stuff like that has certainly been a part of it :) and now you're going to have a cute little Navy baby. congratulations:)