Where's my ribbon?

I had an absolutely lovely four-hour lunch (you read that right) with a dear friend this week.  We set the goal of lunching monthly (which cuts our lunches down to only two hours), but it just didn't happen last month. So this month, we had even more to say. 

Her husband is retired. I am looking forward to disposing of all that Army stuff we have accumulated over the last too-many years. It's nice to have someone ahead of you on the road you are travelling. We discussed our husbands' jobs and kids and so forth. We discussed our own (lack of) careers and the roadblocks placed in the path to most careers just because you are Mrs. Soldier.

My friend is an amazing woman. She is a military brat AND a military wife.  She moved every 24-36 months until she was 40. WOW. Talk about a tough transition when her husband hung up the uniform.  She truly NEVER knew another way to live. I can look back on my childhood, and while we moved around NYC a little bit and had a few school changes, it was nothing like the experiences of a military kid.  She's my hero. She joked about waiting for a plaque recognizing the 40 years she gave the military.

But she's right. She served. Just like I serve.

I serve by waiting. I serve by living in a place without becoming part of it, because I already have my eye on the next move.  I serve by fighting with the transportation office, armed only with my POA and a NY accent that erupts when I'm ticked off, to set up a move so he doesn't have to.  I serve by mailing him an endless stream of boxes, so much so that the post office people know me. I serve by trying to be both parents, even though I know it is a futile effort.

I serve by sending MY husband, while most of America stays home. 

And my kids.... Hell, at least I chose this. This is their inheritance. Duty, Honor, Country, and a helping of Selfless Service on the side.

So, tonight, I lift my late-night glass of fabulous Italian wine to my compatriots-  my fellow spouses and our kids.  We get no retirements, no ribbons, no titles. We sacrifice our education, jobs, friends, homes and sanity.

Cheers to you. You are pillars of the nation, keeping it strong. Like the supports on a bridge, taken for granted that we will hold and always be there.  But I know your sacrifice. Maybe one day, all of America will. 

Insomnia- it adds more hours to my day

There are more PhDs than things to study.  That's just my theory.  But somewhere, there is a PhD studying deployments and how it affects soldiers, families, communities, and so on. (Actually, I know one of them.) All this studying to tell us what any military wife with 2+ deployments could already tell you.  And I bet she'll work cheaper than the PhD.  I am being a bit facetious, as I recognize that "they" are looking for patterns across a fairly sizeable military.  But reading the reports, I always wonder how much it cost to confirm what we all know.

At least this research, theoretically, will improve things for military families.  My favorite PhD story of all is from a conference my husband attended where someone gave a briefing on their long, in-depth study of the declining size of alligator penises in FL.  Seriously.  Even funnier than the topic were the two General Officers who were joking about the topic in the row in front of my husband- mostly about how one might go about trying to measure said alligator parts, and how it was no surprise that the gators ran from the researchers, they were embarrassed by their diminutive organs.  

But back to my original thought

Someone named stages of deployment, including anger, denial, grief and acceptance.  But they left out insomnia.

I am sure it is stress-related, not that knowing the cause helps a whole lot.  It also just makes the deployment longer because I get to consciously experience even more hours of everyday.  Which makes me cranky, and then makes the kids cranky, and then raises my stress level, leading to (that's right!) insomnia. 

So I will break out the home remedies- chamomile tea, soft lights, dull movies, benedryl. Let's just hope I can end the streak before it really gets going.

Another milestone whizzes by

Tonight was our Cub Scout Pack's Blue and Gold banquet.  It was raucous and fun, as it should be.  They brought in someone to do cool chemistry experiments as entertainment- the boys loved it! For those of you that do not speak Cub Scout, Blue and Gold is a HUGE yearly pack event to mark the anniversary of scouting.  It is also the time when the most senior scouts, most of whom have earned the Arrow of Light (highest award in Cub Scouting), are ceremoniously shown the door.  They "bridge" to Boy Scouts. 

Our pack had a small indoor (Thank you!) bridge, and the Boy Scout troops came up to the front of the room and called their new scouts across the bridge.  It is always a very cool ceremony, and it makes me smile.  The newest Boy Scouts are all excited, and the parents are taking pics.  But in the midst of it, I couldn't help but think of my husband, who missed #1 crossing to Boy Scouts also.

Look in the rearview mirror, folks, because that little piece of life is gone.

The irony, which is good for the soul, is that scouting was my husband's thing.  He was a scout and loved it.  I grew up in NYC and didn't even know any boy scouts.  Somehow I ended up helping the kids do their achievement things, and then helping plan his den schedule and activities. It all culminated with us moving to TX, me starting off on the pack committee, and ending up as Cubmaster (true confession: I loved doing it- it was a total blast!).  But that was supposed to be him.  All that stuff I ended up doing with my boys (which I really enjoyed) was supposed to be for him to do with them.  The lost father-son opportunities make me sad.

We have one Cub Scout to go. #3 opted to not scout "until Daddy comes home to do it with me." I really hope he can, for all 4 years.  For only four years. And, when you think about it, that's not much time at all.

Mom's taxi is off duty

Why is that the week I am already stressed about #1's exam schedule that the Cub Scouts decide they want to meet THREE times and the Boy Scouts TWICE?  Obviously they don't understand that I am 8 months into a deployment and am pretty much over everything. 

This is the flaw in living in a civilian community during a deployment.  The Pack we belonged to in Texas would NEVER try to do something like that to the moms.  Mostly because the moms would be running the pack because everyone's husband would be gone. And we'd just say no.

But honestly, I feel it is a bit presumptuous of any family's schedule.  Like "Hey, since all you have to do with your evenings is drive this one kid to scout events, we will have THREE this week."  Anyone else have more than one kid? How about homework? Anyone else's kids get homework?

I have 2 kids in scouts, a kid in ballet and a baby that would like to play at home with her toys instead of being forced to sit in my lap at endless other activities.  One kid is also in counseling, which needs to happen every week. Then there are the two kids at home someone needs to watch while I drag my other kids all over God's green earth.  Or they get to come along for the ride. 

When #1 mentions playing sports, I start to feel light-headed. When am I going to cram that into my schedule?  Would it be mean to tell him I just can't handle one more event in the hours between 3 and 8:30pm?  When the heck would we cook/eat dinner?

Touch of irony for you- I am home ALL DAY.  But those hours are relatively calm (considering I have a 3 and a 1 year old home with me).   It makes me think that when I go back to work, I will spend all my non-working hours in my vehicle, ferrying children to all their activities. 

Hopefully we don't have many more weeks like this one. It's insanity, people. And I know I am not the only person who can see it. 

With all this manure, there must be a pony around here somewhere

I think I hate school more than my kids.  Hard to believe, but it's true.

I resent how much work they assign and that most of it requires parental help.  I also wish they would take their "reasonable" amount of homework, multiply it by 3 kids and divide by one parent.  If I wanted to teach my kids myself, I'd go back to homeschooling and would use the tuition savings to take an awesome vacation with my husband. See, I want the TEACHER to teach them now.  Thanks.

I wish I could just hate school and ignore it, like #1. But, because I am an overachiever and a mom, I know it important to have good grades no matter what asinine topics they are covering.  How am I going to explain his transcript to another school?  Between the subjects and his grades, oy vey.

It is exam week for #1 and he is taking 3 tests on Thursday.  He is going into one of them with a 55. Yup. The other two sunjects are passing grades, but far from stellar.  But he wants to go to his scout meeting Wed night because there is a campout this weekend. It was an "Are you JOKING???" moment.  Sometimes I think Catholic school is wasted on him, or at least the academics are. But I think if I put him in public school, he'd make friends with the other kids who don't like school and probably never graduate.

I am reading a book called "Superparenting for ADD." Right there, it confirms my belief that any mere mortal would have a hard time parenting my two oldest kids. (#5 is also a terror, but she three and that's unrelated to this train of thought.)  It is really a good book, informative and amusing.  I have gained a few new insights from it, which is impressive because I read a lot on this topic.

I had a chance to read some more of it today while I was sitting in the driveway in the car while #6 napped in her carseat.  (Yes, if that is what it takes, that is what I will do.) I had already read a fantastic part about the key role of parents and how the "cure" for ADD was love and support. It reminded me that my primary mission in life is to love those kids, not as I want them to be, but as they are.  Sounds obvious, but it is so hard to completely accept a child when you just can't understand what keeps them from acting "appropriately." The underlying urge to improve them is very strong.

Today, I hit a great chapter. It discussed how ADD is always discussed as a negative, but as a parent (with all-accepting love and support) I have to take all that negative feedback and find the positive side.  They called it being a mirror. 

My son is easily distracted.  Or is he exceptionally aware of his surroundings and any change in it?
My son is overly emotional. Or is he sensitive and passionate?
My son doesn't stay on topic.  Or does he make connections to other things that "normal" people don't immediately see?

It really isn't just semantics, because the second set is much more accurate.  Doctors and school administrators don't always have time to know each child, so the child is painted with the broad brushstrokes of the behaviors listed in the DSM. Bothof my sons will both focus (and thrive!) when drawn in by a skilled teacher (or their own interest) and challenged.

The title of the blog was drawn out from that chapter.  With exams stressing me out more than they stress out my son, I have to keep looking for the pony.  He will get grades that tell him he isn't good enough, but I need to convince him he is.  To make it believable, I need to convince myself.