I’m re-posting a wonderful entry from a woman living through deployment and musing about marrying her soldier. You can see her blog here. I don’t know any military spouses who haven’t had moments of ‘I can’t do this,’ or worse still, ‘I don’t want to do this.’ Certaintly I felt that way plenty during Paul’s […]

Deployments aren’t easy, whether it is to a combat zone or to another country, but with the information age in full swing communications with your deployed service member is easier than ever.  The Internet has brought us communication tools such as e-mail, instant messaging, Skype, and Facebook, and with these tools the amount, type, and […]

  Last month I was chatting with a few other families while waiting oh so patiently to see my husband’s unit get home.  Two sets of parents, both whose sons were returning from their first deployments, asked me if deployments ever get easier.  I smiled a bit and responded “unfortunately no”.      It never gets easier […]

Attention Oregon National Guard Spouses & Friends: Lane Community College offers new Deployment classes!   Holding Down the Homefront: A Guide for Spouses   Based on the Army’s Battlemind training for spouses and her own work with military families as a Certified Professional Life Coach, Katie Dyer – National Guard wife and Founder of Heroes […]

Dear Deployment, You won. I tried to fight you; but in the end you were more powerful than me. More powerful than him. More powerful than us. You changed him. After knowing you, he is not a man I recognize. I loved him the best I knew how, but I could not understand the secrets […]

This is a powerful post from a soldier serving in Afghanistan. See the orignal story here. On Friday our patrol got hit. An insurgent threw a grenade into one of our patrol vehicles. I helped the rest of my guys carry my roommate to the CSH (Combat Support Hospital) here in Mosul in a black […]

This is a great idea! Pillowcases for kids with pictures of their deployed parents on them. Admittedly, I made Paul a pillowcase with a picture of me sleeping on it when he deployed. (Yes, so we could still sleep together. Sigh.) But I never thought of doing it the other way around! See the original […]

This is a great Op-Ed piece from the New York Times. The original article can be found here. One Husband, Two Kids, Three Deployments by Melissa Seligman Fort Riley, Kan. Five years ago, my new husband, David, swallowed his tears as he tried to find a way to say goodbye. He held our baby girl […]

I was interviewed for Memorial Day on the website Betty Confidential about what it’s like to have a deployed spouse. Check out the article here!

Deployments are full of ups and downs but one constant is laughter. Nervous laughter, sarcastic laughter, belly aching laughter and even sorrowful laughter are all experienced while deployed. I strongly encourage everyone to embrace humor and share smiles whenever possible. Often, when you get into country you will find yourself with a new group of […]