The Final Stretch

The deployment is ALMOST over.  Yes Danny, now is when the word almost is appropriate :) haha I was getting annoyed that he kept saying we were almost done when we were about 2/3 of the way and had about 3 months left. My deployment chain had links with each month written on them and i'm pleased to report that it is no longer even a chain! Just one lonely link that says October.  I hope Danny doesn't mind I admit on here that these 9 months apart (and will be 10 when he gets here to take us back) have taken their toll on us!  Man! We can both see how relationship sometimes crumble under the pressure of deployment. And we've been spoiled with pretty easy communication and two visits.  I think one of the biggest things that's challenged us as a couple aside from being separated was having a baby in the middle of it.  We haven't been able to re-establish ourselves as a couple yet in parenthood. Danny has been so good at always making the effort to communicate with me from where he is... even when I haven't been so good at it. :( Sometimes it's just easier to put the other person and the back burner and live your life instead of being sad all the time that they're gone. For me here I've just had to live my life and move full speed ahead into mommy roll and parent x2.  I'm surrounded by friends and family and have Rowan and i've learned how to live without my sweetheart.  I do what I want when and how I want to. Danny and I had a good conversation about this a few days ago.  It was kind of scary to admit we had grown a little bit apart but it was also good for us to admit that things had changed and to commit to working towards becoming "us" and "we" again when he gets back. I'm so blessed to have such a good husband. I've given him too much crapp and too many times that he could have just said "Seriously? You are ridiculous forget it."  I haven't supported him as well as I should have during this final stretch.  I also think that I have had some minor post-partum  catch up to me lately.  Just my overall feelings towards him were a big sign of that... when I finally looked up the symptoms I realized I had all of them.  Just knowing that helped a lot though. Knowing that things were hard because something was actually off.  I hope you can all appreciate my honesty and not judge us... experiencing deployment and having a baby apart are both unusual strains on a relationship- and even if you have gone through one or both of these things at the same time as we have, we are our own people and cope with things in our own way. Another thing is that when he left we were still in the newlywed phase. Things evolve and change, we just have to make sure it's in a positive way.  I was dreading moving back to GA and being separated from my support system here and Idaho mountains, but I think we are both so ready to find out what it's like to be a family again, to start fresh and live our lives with a lot less drama for a while! Geeze! lol  It seems so bizarre that you can be so in love and then struggle so much. I love my hunny, he's a wonderful husband and amazing father and I can't wait to start family life together. :)