I was asked recently what was the scariest thing I’ve experienced and what my advice would be to avoid it. This was a really tough question for me to answer. I am the strong one, the rock, the organized, always on time, the party planning, check book balancing to the penny, nothing can rattle her cage kind of girl. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized there are many scary experiences in this crazy life we lead:
As a Mom that split second you lose sight of you child in a store and your heart comes to a screeching halt, you gasp but no air fills you lungs and you begin to frantically call your child’s name at the same volume you would use if you were at a rock concert right in front of the speakers, only to see your little one bent down to pick something up off the floor on the other side of the shopping cart.
As a kid’s taxi driver the time between seeing someone about to ram into your car right where your child is sitting and what feels like an eternity later when your vehicle actually comes to a stop. Meanwhile your white-knuckled grip leaves permanent hand marks in the steering wheel cover and your calf muscle is cramped so tight you can’t even feel your foot from pushing that brake pedal with the force of a bulldozer.
As a military spouse every time you have to face the world in that first two weeks of deployment. With a phony smile on your façade of steel, because you’ve done this so many times before and you don’t want anyone to see that you still fall completely apart when you get home alone.
As a granddaughter living half a world away getting that phone call that your grandparent has taken a turn for the worse and knowing even if the Concorde was still in service and leaving the next minute you would not make it there on time.
As a professional having to go in and tell your boss your husband got PCS orders after getting your dream promotion making what you did three years ago when you left the last duty station.
Have you been through this? Our life is full of scary experiences equally terrorizing, driving you to the brink madness at times. I don’t enjoy them and wouldn’t wish them on even my worst enemy ; however, without them I wouldn’t be living. You can’t avoid the scary times, you can only embrace them, survive them the best you can, give them an inappropriate hand gesture and laugh about them one day over a glass of something bubbly during the retirement party. What are you going to laugh about? I need to know how much bubbly to buy!
Oh those first two weeks, they are the worst. I have a hard time keeping a smile and upbeat smile when I am in the car with my kids driving away from my husband. Oh this life we live
As bad as the first two weeks is to face the world when he leaves, I really feel the first two weeks he comes home is harder. The readjustment period is the worst of it all! Learning to re-live with someone after that amount of time is so very difficult. Non-military friends think I am crazy but then again, they have a hard enough time imagining living without your spouse for so many months, it’s nearly impossible for them to imagine the effects of that.