Chitty Chats with Stacy

reflection 6 military spouses
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[00:00:00] Good morning friends. I'm on another adventure. Full disclosure, I did not record a reflection last week while I was driving. Uh, there was too much happening. There was a lot of weather and my life got a little chaotic. And I, I thought this week I'm going to chat it up with my, my military friends, because part of what was happening last week is, as many of you know, I am in the military, I'm in the National Guard, uh, but I'm also a military spouse and my husband has been gone for the last few weeks.

with the military and so life just gets sort of chaotic and it becomes [00:01:00] this animal where I think mostly we're navigating it pretty well, uh, but sometimes things just happen and you kind of go, you know, I'm just going to do the best I can today. And so this is a shout out. to all of my military spouse friends.

So let me give you a little, a little backstory. my first husband still alive, by the way. Um, whenever I say that people are like, did he die? No, we got divorced. Uh, he was active duty military and his last year of his contract was my last year of college and so I did what I call went on sabbatical. Uh, other people interpreted that as dropped out.

Again, I think how we frame things makes a difference. Uh, I went on sabbatical for the last year of my college degree, uh, my four year college degree so that he could finish his last year of college. [00:02:00] And then once he was done in the military, we moved back and I finished school. And so, after that, I was like, I never want to be a military spouse again.

It's hard, it's complicated, nothing ever goes as planned. Fast forward 20 some years later, here I am, another military spouse. A spouse again. to another military man. And so it's just this adventure where I just want to shout out to all of the military spouses a few things. One, you can never predict what's going to happen when your spouse is gone.

So my current husband and I have been together, uh, during deployment, during schools, during all these different things. And I've, we, we do a great job. Great job of communication. we have, are very committed to making the time. Uh, one point in our [00:03:00] relationship, we would do phone calls at 4. 30 in the morning because that was the only time we could really connect and not have any interruptions.

Uh, we've done video calls. Those are a game changer if you're not doing video calls with your spouse. I highly recommend that. Uh, and what I would say is it becomes this interesting adventure where you can plan for all the things that you want to plan for. You could be as predictive, try to be as predictable as possible and inevitably something will happen.

Something will happen that's unpredictable. And so it becomes this exercise in flexibility. And I think that the reason I'm doing this reflection today is because last week was just a whole series of events, that we hadn't predicted. we had to be flexible about, which was fine. you know, things like [00:04:00] my car had an alert come up and I had to figure out a different situation.

And then I went to take my car in and there was a huge snowstorm and I had to be flexible about it. that. And we purchased a home and we had to do that all online. Highly recommend by the way, if you have an opportunity to do an online notary, it's a game changer. Uh, and you know, the whole P, the whole part's about, Oh, if you don't show up at your time, you're gonna, you won't be able to close and just purchasing a home as its own animal.

But I just want to give a shout out to the power of flexibility because you can prepare. You can try to predict all the things that could happen and inevitably every military spouse that I know knows that flexibility is a huge component of being married and [00:05:00] also of parenting, right? I think we use this skill in all areas of life.

I just see it the most with our military members because, and the spouses, and they are the unsung heroes. So, you know, if you get the opportunity to hang out with military families, ask the spouse, they will just, just inquire about their experience. They will tell you about their spouse's job. They will tell you about their spouse's training.

They will tell you about their spouse's education. They will tell you about their spouse's deployment. They know everything there is to know about their spouse who serves in the military. And then flip the switch and ask the military. Remember about the military spouse and they will inevitably say things like, I don't know how they do it.

I don't know how she does it. I don't know how he does it. They just make it all happen. And they are deeply gracious [00:06:00] for their spouse or their partner and not as detailed typically about what is happening at home. not because they don't care, but because their mental capacity that they need. to do their jobs, uh, is a lot and inevitably military spouses just hold everything together.

And so, huge shout out, huge, huge shout out to military spouses today. I see you, I love you, I hear you, you can plan a family vacation and your, your spouse will get called up. You can, and they're on call, right, so a lot of military members are just on call. So it's not uncommon for a military member to be hanging out with their family and something happens and they have to take a phone call or they have to leave or all these things.

And military spouses just keep trucking along. They just make things happen and they're [00:07:00] exhausted and they're unseen. And I just want to give you a shout out that this is hard. This is a very hard road. It's a challenge to be the person who's holding everything together and coordinating. And I appreciate your flexibility.

I appreciate what you do, and who you are. I appreciate how you show up and you're positive and you're supportive and you're available and you're knowledgeable and you care. And I just think it's important that I tell you, I feel you, I see you, and a huge, huge, huge shout out to military spouses today.

Whew! Hang in there, friends. . . .