Keeping Your Relationship Strong While Apart

Some days, being without your deployed “someone” is harder than others. Valentine’s Day is one of those days. But with a little effort and planning, you can keep your relationship strong every day and use the time apart to pave the way for an even coser connection when he/she comes home.

Lindsey’s husband, a 1st Lieutenant in the Army, missed their first wedding anniversary. But because he has internet access overseas, he was able to go online and order his bride a gift certificate for a massage. Since he never got to see their wedding photos, she made him a scrapbook of pictures from their relationship, including the wedding shots. The newlyweds try to focus on the good times. We spend a lot of time talking about what we’re going to do when he gets home,” says Lindsey, “not what’s happening now.”

Joseph, a Private First Class in the Army National Guard, always has something in his pocket to remind him of his wife. She sent him off with a souvenir imprinted penny the two had made when she visited him at the base where he did his pre-deployment training.

Though most deployed troops have access to phones and emails, Joanna, who is married to a Lieutenant Commander in the Navy, still prefers old fashioned letter writing. “I still have all my old deployment letters,” she says, “and I can pass them down as mementos for our kids. I wonder how many people keep their deployment emails?

Some couples find that reading a book together gives them something to talk about other than the deplyment. Others write their feelings down in journals that they can exchange when they are reunited. Regular phone calls and emails can give a spouse at home something to look forward to, and nothing makes a soldier feel loved and missed like care packages from home. “I made sure every package contaned a letter,” says Lindsey, “and a picture of us.”