AllMilitary.com

Greetings! My name is Claire and I have been invited to blog here at VAJoe’s on Mondays. I am blogging a little late today because we had a very action packed day. We closed on a house and then we had to hang our American and Blue Star Flags before we could really call it home! So, before the day ends I wanted to come on here and say “hello” and let you know a little bit about myself.

I am a two-blue star mom, and my husband was in the military until late last year. He is currently rehabbing a severe fracture sustained in training at Ft. Benning. When he rejoins he will be an officer in the Army Reserves. We are a “King and Queen of Battle” family. One son is Infantry (Stryker Combat Brigade) and my husband and youngest son both Field Artillery. My husband and I have a total of four kids ranging in age from 23-years to 4-years old.

Yes, we are a whole new brand of crazy!

When my oldest son, Mike, was deployed last year I started a milblog called “Knee Deep in the Hooah!” to cope. He was part of the Troop Surge and was deployed to the Baghdad for the first 6-weeks and then moved to the Diyala Province shortly after Operation Arrowhead Ripper started. My husband was in training at Ft. Benning at the time, and TraDoc is not very warm and fuzzy. I couldn’t just call him when I needed to talk, so I had to reach out to find support. I was not on a military base, so an empathetic shoulder was hard to find. My blog became my tool for pouring out my fear, my pride, and the whole other range of emotions that needed to be spoken. Through writing I wound up meeting other parents of soldiers who felt the same turmoil that I was feeling. I also connected with other military spouses. The fears and struggles of a mother of a deployed soldier and the wife of a deployed soldier are different, but they are similar enough to establish a common ground for support and mutual appreciation.

I met many new friends — both wives and mothers — who could relate to what I was writing. We supported one another through the hardest times — the black outs, the news reports of death and injury, the day I got a call letting me know my son had been hit by shrapnel, and then one week to the day the call that my husband was in surgery getting a metal plate put in his leg. I went through all of that and remained sober. Told you we are a new brand of crazy!

My background as a mental health professional mocks me daily. I didn’t know anything about this kind of stress until I became an Army Wife and Army Mom. I have been through a divorce, single parenthood (with the older kids), demanding job, and I was even in Washinton DC on September 11, 2001. Those were all very stressful things to live through, but dealing with the stress of having a son in combat for the first time was a sucker punch to the gut for me.

I am very proud of my son and his service, and I am equally proud that he loves serving and will probably make it a lifetime career. The difficulty for me came in the form of anticipatory grief. Never in my life have I felt so much fear and pride all entangled together. I was proud of this full grown man who is such a strong and dutiful soldier, and mortified for the child that I raised and nurtured for so many years in my home. I learned a lot about learning to live in peace with situations in which I have not a shred of control over. My husband will attest that I am a high-strung, type-A personality. Letting go of even the most faint glimmer of control has been a hard learned lesson, but one that was learned nonetheless. I am better for it.

So, before I write it all out tonight and then have nothing left to say next week (fat chance of that!) I will stop here. I do plan on blogging on both roles as a mother and a wife. I will blog a lot about the journey, the life lessons along the way, and what has helped. I may even confess all of my short comings and my failures. I plan on sharing a good news thread too. It’s very important that families hear the progress being made in Iraq, and that they hear good news from the front lines.

Oh, and just for the record that stoic personality of mine comes across as a very dry and sarcastic tone at times. I can’t help it. I was almost talked into to positive thinking once, but sarcasm came to the rescue! Hence the name of the blog “Push to test; Release to Detonate.” I have learned to read ahead in the instruction manual before taking action. I am the person who pushes the button before realizing what the next step is.

So, with no further ado, I will post a funny entry I wrote last year and then my good news thread from last week. Have a great rest of the week!

Claire

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