Breathing....

This blog hit my radar yesterday http://jennpineo.wordpress.com/2012/04/28/letter-from-a-military-wife/

I thought this blog entry was very well written. She is so right, all we military wives do it wait to breathe all the time. But for me I am holding my breathe for a different reason now. I am now waiting to move on with our new normal. There are so many days I wish I could go back and things be the old normal. The chaos of "that's the Army" has been become the BS of "that's the VA" and "that's the Army."

The weight of this journey fell on me again Saturday. It was horrible timing. We were having everyone over for Ryann's birthday party. Since we'll be in Maryland for her actual birthday we decided we'd have a little party for her here with her friends. At one point I was so distracted, I cut my thumb. It was really bad, deep cut. I probably needed a stitch or two, but I just want to stay our of hospitals and I did get it to stop bleeding. My mom was of course not very thrilled with my stubbornness and I believe was ready to smack me because I wrapped it up and kept on doing stuff for the party. Somethings will never change. My stubbornness is one of them.

The worst part of Saturday was that I was very short with Chaz all day Saturday. He was just on my very last nerve. Now to my defense, he was annoying the girls and making them scream off and on all day. I swear some days he really is my oldest child. So some of my behavior was justified, but definitely not all of it. He did not deserve me taking my frustration out on him, but we are each other's place to fall. One thing is for sure he always catches me and gets me up and back moving in the right direction.

I apologized to him Sunday because I realized yesterday morning exactly what I had done. I was taking everything out on him. Which was totally unfair to him, but only proves I am only human. All of that frustration has to go somewhere. It doesn't make it right, but it is reality, we all do it at some point to someone we love.

It is so hard to go from a full blown partnership where you can have them help you with everything to what seems like a totally uneven, unfair shift in balance. We are like so many other wounded warrior families, we are still working through all of our dynamics. Chaz has always been a great dad and awesome hubby, but now because of his injuries, he has limits. He has a lot of physical limits and this damn house likes to show them to me on a daily basis.

In addition to all the restraints this house puts on Chaz, it is now up to me to be Mr Fix-it and things along that nature. Which I have to say thanks to several deployments for teaching me those skills. But this is in addition to everything else. The days of hey honey can you climb up there and fix that shingle are long gone. Once again this adds more weight to my shoulders again. Oh and let me add in the fact I have a very hard time asking for help for others, which doesn't help me at all.

I know I create my own recipe for disaster, but we all do. But I know I cannot take my stress out on my family. Luckily I was able to shrug it off and focus on what I was doing, I'll thank the cut on my thumb for that. As the blood poured out, I realized what I was doing and tried to get my head back in the game. I shook my head and then went back to focusing on our cuties' special day.

After reading that blog last night, I realized some days I still hold my breathe because some days I feel like I am drowning. Sometimes I feel like I am out in the middle of the ocean treading water and someone has pushed me under. Then I get up for air and someone does it again. But when I have those moments, like I had Saturday, I need to go breathe rather than lash out at my loved ones and give my self a new scar.

Taking care of a wounded warrior is so incredibly hard. You have the medical part, then come all the accessories; there's the emotional, physical, the family, the Army, the VA, society and the list goes on and on. You've got some enormous weights for one person to carry. And we have to carry it all because our warriors are just not strong enough to do it yet. So we inhale and hold our breathe and get those weights back up there and move forward. It's what we do in sickness and in health, til death do us part.