One of the top things as an Army Mom that I do now is count days on a calendar. I am always counting down the day til he comes home for a visit. Counting up the days since I last heard his voice on the phone. Counting down the days until he leaves for training or deployment.
Depending on the situation there are tricks to making the counting seem better. For example while at BCT it was much better count down the number of Sundays left. Anything to make the number less when I am counting to see him is a good thing!
I would think that all of us have our "limits" of when the amount of days is too much. One for me is I really get antsy and have to admit a tad irritable when I don't hear his actual voice a little over a week. Texting and Facebook is so awesome for contact, but to a mother there is nothing like really the tone and expression in their voices to get a true idea of how they are doing. Typing "Mom I am fine" is okay, but I want to hear the words to make it believable. The longest stretch between face to face visits for me has been darn near 6 months. I had the pleasure of going to see him at Fort Stewart this past January. We were expecting him home around Mothers Day, then it moved to Fathers Day, but it ended up being during the Fourth of July.
He is gearing up for his first deployment. It is just around the corner it seems. Sounds odd, but I am not counting down for it...with all the counting of days that I have done, I can't seem to wrap my mind around counting that. Perhaps my conscious thinks if I don't count it down the day won't arrive? Wouldn't that be nice if it was that simple :) I haven't decided how I will count those days down once he is there. 280ish days, 45 Sundays, 9 months...hmmm I haven't found one that I like yet.
I can tell you one that I do like though...63 and he will be home to visit!
Sending you, your family and your Soldier lots of love and support,
Faith
That one made me tear up. I can't wait to see Corey before deployment but still can't believe he is deploying and won't let myself think about it. I think that is going to be the toughest 9 months of my life.
ReplyDeleteI agree Kandi. It is one of the reasons why I am so glad to have connected with you before the day arrives. We will get thru this. Every day might not be pretty, but we will get thru it. :)
ReplyDeleteWe have been blessed with an active unit on facebook. I can look at pictures of Ricky's AFPT tests, Ricky working on his bird, or just relaxing. It is nice to know that even while he is deployed he is with a group of soldiers that have each others backs and can laugh at some of lifes most stressful situations. I love my times skyping with him and I try not to cry when we say good night. I don't count, I guess I don't want to jinx anything. I try not to have any expectations of when or how much time I will have to talk to him, I just don't want to be disappointed... I do get the "oh ya by the way, I almost got to go to Germany... I fell and really messed up my knee..." he waits until he's healed to tell me of his "accidents". I try to con myself into thinking he's still in Hawaii, sometimes it works.
ReplyDeleteRekni, I say over and over again that I just can't imagine how much harder it was years ago to be an Army Mom. We are so blessed to have Facebook and so many more ways of communication with our Soldiers. Have you changed the amount of "news" that you watch at all or done anything different since he has been away this time?
ReplyDeleteI try not to watch the news. I have received calls from Ricky and he has sounded down and tells me he loves me and is ready to come home. Shortly after those calls I will hear of some casualties from his brigade. I am so thankful for those calls.
ReplyDelete