Saying Good-bye

Right now I’m sitting in a house full of boxes, and it’s feeling bittersweet. I’m excited to move into our house in Florida (though I’ll be more excited when we’re done at Walter Reed and can actually live there full time), but I’m sad to leave the life we built here in Georgia. We made some good memories in this house, in this town. I had to say good-bye to some dear people at our church not knowing when I would see them again now that we won’t have a house here. I played in the orchestra one last time before the move. Tonight will be the last night I sleep in my bed in this house. If I sleep here any more nights, it will be on an air mattress. Even though we haven’t really lived here over the past year, I felt like this chapter of our lives was still open because we still had roots here. It took me about 10 months to change over our Tricare to the north region partially because doing so would be giving up part of our ties to Ft. Stewart…at least that’s how it felt in my mind. As a military family, moving is something that happens often, and we learn to adjust. The orders come down and we learn what we can about the new duty station. We hold garage sales to trim down the household goods weight limit. The military movers come and pack up all of our belongings and send them on their way to the new station. For overseas moves, we clean the car and make sure everything is working properly before bringing it to the shipping place. We say our tearful good-byes to the people who have become like family to us, then we brace ourselves for being the new family in town. At least that’s what normally happens to some extent. With a situation like ours, everything is different.

Life was going along as normal…well, as normal as being on this side of a deployment can be anyway. My pantry and fridge were stocked with food. Corey was playing his first season of t-ball. Corey and I had just finished out the Awana year and were looking forward to doing some fun summer things. I had plans to hit the beach and spend time with family down in Florida. Then Justin called and told me he was injured. Suddenly and without any advance notice, spending time at the beach turned into spending time in a hospital. I had no chance to clean out my fridge and to give away food that might expire, and honestly, I didn’t realize that I should. I thought I would just be gone a short time while they stabilized Justin and then we would all come home and he would do rehab at Ft. Stewart. Nobody ever discussed in pre-deployment meetings what happens for serious injury. I was clueless. As Justin’s Granny and I were packing up boxes and throwing things away, it was depressing to see how much food had gone to waste (especially depressing was having to throw away chocolate) during my absence over the past year. Due to circumstances, we haven’t had a chance to do anything with our stuff until now, so we’ve been renting a house and paying utilities for a house that sat unoccupied. I managed a house long-distance because we didn’t like the other options. I’m thankful that our landlord/realtor were willing to work with us.

Nothing about our move to Maryland was normal, and really, very little about our life now could be considered “normal”. We live in an apartment building located on a hospital complex where someone in every apartment has something wrong with them. I’ve seen more people with missing limbs over the past year than I had seen in the rest of my life combined. I’ve seen men and women in horrible pain who struggle to regain the ability to do even the simplest of tasks. I had to explain to my (then) 3 year old son that I was crying because his daddy was hurt very bad. I could go on and on about the painful and difficult parts of what I’ve seen and experienced, but that would only tell a small part of the story.

I’ve seen miracles. My husband is one of them. I’ve heard the story from his medic on what happened on that mountain in Afghanistan on June 9^th. Justin barely made it. The fact that he’s alive is a miracle. I’ve seen hope. When Justin was still inpatient, they took us down to the area with the amputees do their physical and occupational therapy. I looked around and saw them walking on new legs and knew that one day, Justin would be one of them. That gave me hope that even though we were in a dark place, there was a light ahead. I see guys in much worse shape than Justin well enough to leave Walter Reed, and I see hope that we’ll leave one day. I see people who give of themselves to try to make our lives easier at Walter Reed…organizations that truly help our injured men and women. I’ve seen communities of strangers welcome us with open arms. Some of these people have become like our extended family and have given us a priceless gift of a place to go to get away from the craziness of Walter Reed. I’ve seen our own community pull together in support of our family and through the idea that started with helping us, it has expanded and will be helping others as well. I’ve seen various members of my family and Justin’s family step up and help us when we needed it the most. I’ve been encouraged by friends and strangers in more ways than I could possibly list. I’ve seen which friends truly care about me and my family, and let me tell you, I have some awesome friends and I’ve made many new ones over the past year. I am blessed beyond what I deserve, and I thank God for all the ways He worked to help us make it through the last 13 months since Justin was injured. If I could go back in time, I would tell Justin to find a different spot on the mountain to check out, but since I can’t, I’ll just have to work alongside with Justin to find our “new normal”…and that “new normal” is getting closer every day.

Military families say a lot of good-byes, but we know that the Army community is small and you never know when your paths will cross down the road. The Christian life is similar. I’ve had to say good-bye to many friends over the years not knowing if I’d ever see them again here on earth. I’ve had to say good-bye to family members and friends who have passed away, but it isn’t really a good-bye. It’s more of a “see you later”. To my dear friends who life has set us on different paths, I hope our paths cross someday, and if they don’t, I look forward to a reunion in Heaven. And to my friends who don’t know if they’re going to Heaven, I would love to show you in the Bible about how to get there.