I've been inspired...

I've been inspired to write again.

I am beating myself up on the inside for not writing throughout tour and even in the first few months after tour. It all feels cloudy. I am afraid that I will never be able to help someone that is going through things similar to what I went through. Its all a blur. All of the color that was lacking in my entry entitled "White" has been compressed into the mesh of confusing colors that I am trying to sort out. I failed at helping the people and their families living through war when my fiancee returned safely in my arms.

The lack of help that I provided was not because of the following reasons:

- photography
- business
- clients
- working
- adjusting to moving
- spending lots of time with other people

I did not help because I did not know how to help. The "end" of tour is not what you expect it to be if you are looking at tour from the outside... or even from within tour. I wrongfully assumed that I would be able to be a strong "survivor" and be able to help my friends who were about to go through tour after me. What happens behind closed doors after tour is complicated and it makes me feel extremely guilty for expecting help from those who have gone through this in the past. Everyone just assumes that if tour is over... "the war is over". The war on the battlefield and its aftermath are far from over.

Let me be honest, I am afraid to post this entry. I am afraid of judgment. I worry that people will be like "well why didn't you call me", "you could have told me", and "I am here for you". My version of going through this changed the way I function on the inside and the reasoning of thinking of who to call, what to talk about and the ability to reach out for help just didn't and on some days doesn't exist. I also didn't want to admit outloud to any other military families that life on the other end of tour isn't a walk in the park. Five months ago I believed that life would be all glitter the day that tour "ended".

Think about it... can anyone involved really walk "away" from war... ever? It is unpredictable and we are all human... in our own way.

Life.Army.LOVE

Then and now..

I completely forgot about this blog. I stumbled across my own blog today and it took me way back. I just read my Oct. 14th, 2009 posted and I was close to tears. There was some point in tour that I changed significantly. A point when tears and ice cream could no longer soothe me. A point when I no longer cried. I have always been the girl that cries at the drop of a hat. That isn't me anymore.


I am saddened that I did not write down my feelings throughout tour. I am saddened by the fact that I was not emotionally strong enough at the time to handle criticism. I am thankful that I now have more strength. Its almost as if tour never happened.

Things are calm now, an odd type of calm.

Whatever it is I will take it.

White

I feel like I may just laugh out loud in a hysterical movie way at any moment. It snowed last night and painted my world white. I find that everytime I begin to get strength and things get easier there are more obstacles in my way. I know that thats life and people are going to suck it up but I really don't care. I am anxious and almost sick about my road test that is tomorrow because I really don't want to do the test a fifth time. Adding snow into an already stressful situation irritates me to no end. I was already dreading the lack of fun that is coming my way today but this just really "burns my biscuits". I just want the color back in my world.

Honest and open

Today I am not in a fog. I am actually sleepy from not sleeping well but not in a fog. Does it sound weird to say it feels like my chest is vibrating? Its not a pain... but it is uncomfortable. I will be honest. I am so sad. Living a life without him right here next to me is excrutiating. I know it will end. I know that this will pass but I just feel wide open. Exposed.

Regardless of it all I feel loved. And my love for him and those that support us gets stronger and more durable each day.

Life.army.LOVE

Bateries not included

The writer's block that I thought that I had from time to time in university is nothing compared to the dry spell that I just went through with my blog. I thought about writing in my blog almost daily but I just could not come to terms either with what I was feeling or my perception of what I thought that people would think of what I say. I have reached a whole new level of change. I have started to come to terms with how I feel and I have decided that I will continue to purge my emotions online. I have no idea why I became so paranoid about what people around me were thinking of me, how I am dealing or not dealing with things and with all of the emotions that come along with tour.

I don't understand why I was trying to shelter and protect the exact emotions that I need to get out. I feel like I have never lived or experienced anything in life before this tour began. My life is forever changed. The only thing that I was right about in terms of tour was that it would be tough. If my life were a vinaigrette than my day to day busyness would be the oil and tour would be the vinegar. I knew that the two parts of my life would seemingly mix together but I never thought that they would be as inseparable as water and food coloring. There is no separating the two. I could write forever and not be able to explain or get the point of my analogy across.

My experience of tour is that it is all consuming. I do not even function in the same way as I once did. I know that I have my own goals and aspirations but they don't feel urgent right now. I just focus on making it out of the house clean and somewhat pulled together. That's what I aim to do. I wish I knew how to explain the difference in thought patterns or the lack thereof. I never really realized how noisy my own internal transcript was until it got shut off by the numbness of this experience. I have dramatically changed mentally in the past month and a half. I know that I am and will be OK. I just feel terrible that I am not there for all of my friends to lean on with all of the things that they have going on in their lives. I wonder if people around me know that I am not stable enough to help them out as I can barely help myself out. I am somewhat afraid of the fact that I will never be the same person as I was before this experience began. I have changed on lower less intense levels in the past but I truly believe that this has actually altered things deeply. I will not be the same person at the end of tour that I was when this started, this may sound obvious but you have no idea how not simple this is when you live it. I do not expect to go back to my normal way of living when tour is over as that way of living is gone now. The end of tour will hopefully mark a new beginning of a simple life that is guided by the drastic lessons that both him and I have learned in the year before tour ended.

I am purely exhausted and unable to either edit or continue this entry at the moment. I have decided to post it as is and not fuss about my grammar, lack of continuity, wordiness and sentence fragments. Military life does not come in a perfect package so why would I force my blog to be structured and confined? Lets be honest here all things in life do not have batteries included. Steps, stages, learning, pride, chaos, waiting, struggles, pain, confusion, worry and honesty included.

life.ARMY.LOVE

Mad

I have never felt this distruptive or angry in my whole fucking life. I just don't give a shit about anything right now. I just want to scream and beat the shit out of something. Never a person because then I have to deal with that shit later. I fucking failed my road test for the third time and all because I made too many bad judgement calls. Went when maybe I should have or didn't go when I should have. Then on the way home I came across so many bad drivers who made worst mistakes than I did. It enrages me.

Some days I have no fucking clue how the hell I keep it together. People all around me just eat it up every fucking day that I am doing fine. I feel like screaming to the world and telling them to stop being so trusting.

LIFE.army.love

Reality is setting in

I don't even know that I can put my true emotions out in the open. So please forgive me if I put a wall of sugared cement around my feelings and give you the version of my emotions that I think people can handle to hear.

A few key people in my life are holding me up. These people are using chopsticks and supporting my wobbly being. I stumble a little and then they silently work together to pick up a little more weight with each chop stick. Weird analogy I know but this is a weird situation.

I am reevaluating every molecule of my being right now. What matters and what doesn't matter. I thought that I knew that family, love and true friends are important but now I feel this racing through me. Its the only thing in my life that is racing right now. Everything is in an odd and uncomfortable slow motion that is somehow still on fast forward. It does not make sense but I need to get all of this out. I don't want to talk to anyone about this because I don't know how I would ever get all of these emotions out in sentences. My life is disorganized in every sense. Figuring out the smallest thing good or bad seams impossible. I fear for him when he comes back. I feel the need to leech onto him and just absorb everything that is him. I want to spend the rest of my life with him. I want to make amazing memories and take away all of his pain.

Why is it that they have to go through this and we have to sit back and watch? This is excruciating. The blanks in our conversations are huge and I try not to fill them in. We both know that we want to keep the blanks there to make the conversations as light and loving as possible but the blanks are so loud. I don't want him to go through this. I would do anything to go through this with him. I would give anything to stand by his side forever. I wish I could be there for every bad thing that he does or does not experience. At least then I can just hug him and say that I know what he is going through because I feel it to. Instead I am here on his safe pedestal trying to act "normal" while the blanks have crashed my world around me. Even my passions are numbed right now. I feel that when I get the strength to do what I am supposed to do I will do it with so much passion and less hesitation. Family and love are so important.

My heart aches for him. Work and the "normal" demand my attention right now.

Life.Army.LOVE