Called to Duty

Keeping him involved also means making him aware of the emotions you are experiencing and listening to whatever feelings he chooses to express.  This Sometimes requires you to communicate the unpleasant feelings you might have towards your husband.  A lot of wives are scared to be angry with their loved one.  They don’t want to discuss disagreeable feelings in their weekly (if they’re lucky) 10-minute phone call.  The image of that phone call being your last is a haunting reality.  You can’t fight with your husband the last time you speak to him, so you don’t discuss your difficult feelings at all.  All of the “bad stuff” that occurs in real-life relationships is stored away instead of being dealt with.  In addition to your relationship issues, there are other daily problems you must deal with while living alone.  This is something a lot of spouses, including myself are not used to doing.  In the end, wives have to develop a routine that accomplishes daily tasks without their husband’s input.  And so begins the gradual separation of the couple. 

I stopped telling my husband about my little issues because they no longer seemed important in the big picture.  I obsessed over how he was doing.  I wanted to be able to comfort and support him since he was faced with his mortality on a daily basis.  When we spoke on the phone, I was overly happy when I really wanted to cry.  I did cry sometimes, but not often.  I usually asked questions about how he was doing and reassured him that things were okay back home.

A few months into the deployment, I realized that I no longer felt close to my husband.  I suddenly recognized that I acted so fake on the phone in an attempt to distance myself from him.  It really bothered me.  I wasn’t sure how to handle the situation since I was not going to be able to talk with him on the phone any time soon.  I decided the best I could do was write him a letter.  Letters saved our marriage.  I really didn’t want to fight or bring him down over the phone, but I didn’t want to be more disconnected than I had to.

I had to develop a delicate compromise of letters and phone calls.  At this time in your situation, it might be helpful to consult a therapist or a reputable self-help book on conflict resolution.  This will ensure that your 10-minute conversation will not be filled with yelling and hurt feelings.  Honesty is a good way to begin these conversations.  Let him know that you are having a hard time and you want to talk about feelings that could be a little upsetting and difficult to articulate.  Let him know that this conversation is necessary because you don’t want to feel even more separated or distant than you already are.  Let him know what is on your mind.  Keep an eye on the clock, try to end the conversation with enough time to appropriately say goodbye.  Before you hang up, reassure him that you love him and that you are glad that he is there for you.  I was able to do

this on the phone with my husband before he received the first letter that honestly expressed my emotions.  I felt the need to give him some warning of what was coming in the mail.  The fact that he would get the letter soon prevented me from being fake to him on the phone.

I am glad that I sent the letter.  Some people feel good just writing it out, but I was trying to reconnect with my husband.  Sending him the letter was the best way I could think of to let him into my world.  In addition, I found that you can re-write letters and remove anything you don’t mean or anything that would cause unintentional hurt.  Letters allowed me to articulate my feelings without talking and saying something I really didn’t mean in the heat of the moment.  We talked about my letters once and he said he was glad to get them.  He noticed the separation too.  We had a phone conversation before he received the first letter.  I was able to talk to him about the content of the letter that was on its way and, more importantly, I was able to get his input.  He told me he wanted me to be real because that is what kept him connected to home.  I did not realize I was hurting both of us by not being honest. 

Sometimes this lack of honesty is unavoidable.  I thought about the strong military wives in World War I and II, whose spouses would be gone for up to four years or more.  They had no way to contact their husbands – no phones, no e-mail, and no R&R.  There were times when I went months without hearing from my husband and it drove me crazy.  I was determ