THe Harting Family

THe Harting Family

Friday, April 16, 2010

Freedom Friday HOMECOMINGS

I am going to talk about something that has been on my mind a lot lately. Something I have only experienced as an "outsider", a "friend", a "Marine Family Member" and that is losing your spouse while deployed. My husband has many deployments under his belt and probably one or two still left in our near future. As spouses when we send our husbands (I will refer to husbands since that is my frame of reference) we do so with the wonderful anticipation of the "homecoming". We think about it from the moment our eyes can no longer see one another as they leave on the plane, bus, car or however that moment comes. It is as much a part of us as breathing those months/year waiting for them to come home. It is such an emotional time that unless you have experienced it you could never really understand how many layers of emotions are involved. During the deployments when your husbands Battalion takes casulties you feel like a member of your family has died and you worry, you worry everyday and you think of the homecoming because it gets you through every memorial service you attend while they are gone. When you sit there in your chair crying hysterically for the lose of one of your own, but not really "your" own, you mind tells you how easily it could have been your husband, how the pain you feel is deep but can't touch how it must really feel. Everytime the news reports a death of a Marine/Soldier you stop in your tracks to hear the "who,what when and where" because we all know the media finds out before we do. And again, we start thinking about the homecoming.
Here is what I dwell on when my husband is deployed. I try not to go to this place often because it is dark and scary but inevitable. "If I lost him while he was over there, would I continue to wait for the homecoming?" Would it be a perpetual feeling of waiting? I have heard other spouses explain it like that, and to me that is the worse kind of way to have to grieve. I know our lives are so unigue and we deal with things most never do. But still we wait...and still we hope, that we all get our "Happy Homecoming"
Special thanks to Nadine for posting a great video today on her blog about homecomings to remind me of how lucky I have been to always have a happy ending.

7 comments:

Renee said...

I just came across your blog - I'm following you now. (not in a stalker, creepy way, either!)

Great Blog!

USMCWIFE said...

Thanks Renee..no worries, I didn't think you meant in a creepy stalker way!
Thanks for the nice comment.

prettyinink0402 said...

I too, try not to think about these things. The day before my husband fell asleep at the wheel, we were talking the night before with one of his Marines that was over & they were talking about a Marine from 3/1 that had passed after only being in country 1 day! (MAY HE REST IN PEACE ALWAYS) I always try to tell myself that when it's his time to go that he will be taken home no matter where he is...& my husband said the night before his accident..."You never know you could die in a car accident tomorrow..." when he called me & told me what had happened...I lost it! I started balling...I was so glad he was okay but I couldn't understand what God was trying to show me by this. Paul, my husband told me if he had went off the road 10 feet further ahead he would have been in a ravine filled with water...my heart dropped! We have to hold onto to hope...I think I've been dwelling on the "what if's" so much with this upcoming deployment that I'm not focusing on what really matters...which is our time that we have right now. It definitely was a wake up call for us both. I hugged him so tightly when he came home that day & will continue to do so everyday! :o)))

Julie Danielle said...

During our first deployment, we lost a lot of men. It was heartbreaking. I went to 2 memorials and 3 friends lost their husbands. It is all too real sometimes.

USMCWIFE said...

Yes, it is hard and heartbreaking. My heart breaks a little more with each one. I take it personal, each and every one.

USMCWIFE said...

Tiffanie,
I learned this past deployment that no matter how much I had prepared myself for something to happen I honestly hadn't. When I answered that phone and it was headquarters Marine Corps it was an out of body experience. Luckily my hubs was ok and was intact and I am so thankful for that but it was a dose of reality. I don't dwell on it but I sometimes slip too it..for a short period. I am glad you have such a great attitude about how to handle it, and I think I do for the most part but I would be a liar if I said I hadn't put myself in others shoes that haven't been so lucky as I. Keep your upbeat attitude it will serve you well in this life. I was born a bit of a pessimist so I have to work a bit harder on the sunny side of things but I am getting better :)
Thanks for the nice comment and I am so happy your hubs was able to come home to you that day.

TheAlbrechtSquad said...

Great post! Sadly, I have been too close to friends who have experienced a very different homecoming.

Thank you for reminding us about those other homecomings.