Setting Our Spouses Up For Success
Service members, I'm begging you, please set your spouses up for success before you leave in whatever way you can. We all know that a happy spouse can create a happy house. Our spouse's stress can quickly become our stress. In the case of our household, stress has certainly been ever-present during the past few weeks.
We are heading into a busy few months between PCSing, vacations and birthday parties. Over the past few weeks, my house has been a disaster zone of boxes, packing paper, and random items that need to be sold or donated. It became very overwhelming to look at, and the reality that I would not be where I wanted to be hit last week. We need to have our house ready for photos to list by the end of October. After the stager came through our house, she shared everything that needed to be done before that should happen. It was both more and less work than I was expecting.
My husband left on a TDY Sunday and gets back tomorrow (at least as of my writing this since we all know how things change). I'm heading out to a conference on Thursday and won't get back until Monday. That means four days of solo parenting before heading off on a work trip with my super mobile 10-month-old. He's definitely a lot more work and a lot more fun now that he's crawling and pulling up by himself. When I get back from my work trip, we will have a little less than a week before family comes into town, and we hold an early first birthday party for my son. Over the next two weeks, we leave town for my brother-in-law's wedding, take photos, list the house and head off to Ireland. Like I said, it's going to be a busy month.
My to-do list was getting very long, and I've already shared how I internalize the stress before snapping at everyone around me. On top of everything I needed to do, I would also be solo parenting. This TDY had very poor timing. I mean, they almost always do. But my husband didn't leave me hanging. He was heading off for a very high-stress, long day's week of work, and he made sure I was in the best position possible before he left. He does this every time.
For this trip, that meant clearing all the boxes out of the house and into the garage so that our house actually looked like a house again. He took care of all the laundry, emptied the compost bin, and ensured the days before he left were fun to lower my stress levels. He also scheduled friends to come over and watch our son for a bit because he knows I'll need a break but will struggle to ask for it. Since he'll beat me back home, he'll take care of cleaning the house for the party so that all I have to worry about is food and decorations, which I am very excited to do.
Setting me up for success looks different every time. My husband recognizes how hard it can be to care for the house, our son and myself while he goes out to chase his dream. With this TDY especially, he volunteered for it a few months back because it would be such a great opportunity, and he wanted to be part of it.
I understand that the role of a military spouse often boils down to keeping the home fires burning so that our spouses can go serve. And while much of that may still be true today, it is an old model of thinking. As the spouses who stay behind, we must keep the house running, the children fed, and ourselves sane, but those who go out don't get to take all responsibility. They are getting to chase their dream, and with that comes certain responsibilities to protect the ones they love.
We all love our spouses, we love our children and we love our life. We love our ability to chase dreams. We love being able to pursue what inspires us and makes a difference in the world. Being able to do that and love all those people and things means we have responsibilities. So, I'm asking us to do our best to maintain those responsibilities when we are gone because our family and dreams deserve it.