Kept In My Heart

It isn't that I feel lonely, which I do feel. It isn't that I miss him, even though I really do. The worst part of this is the girls. They don't know what to think, how to feel, how to act. Rhayn has been miserable. She misses him so much it is making her act out a bit. I want to fold her into my arms and tell her it is alright to miss him. I want to reassure her that he will be home, and he is keeping her in his heart as closely as she is keeping him in hers. I wish I could make her feel better, to make her understand that this is a short time apart, he will be home soon and it will be better.

Only I don't feel that. I feel like he is gone forever, it is hard to imagine him coming home, for a few days only to leave us again. To come home again, only knowing that in a very short time he will be leaving for the long hard part. How do I make Rhayn feel better, when I don't even know how I am making it day to day. If it were only the few months of training that we had to deal with- maybe I would be alright. I would see a light at the end of this tunnel. It is the deployment, away for a year (plus) that is making the concept so dark and hard to grasp. The girls don't understand how long he will be gone. Gwen has no idea. She thinks he is at work on an "ehwpwane" because we dropped him off at the airport. How will she react when he does come home for good? Rhayn will be so happy, she will be eight by then. Gwen will be nearly four by then, and will have spent almost half of her life without him here. What will that be like for them? For me? For him?

How do other people do this? How do they survive with a spouse, a parent, a child overseas? How am I going to do this...

Oh, Yeah.
Breathe. Take it one moment at a time, and try to concentrate on other things, and breathe again.
And again.
And again.