Crawling Deployment

So I continue to cry about this deployment on here like it's no one else's business .. But more stuff has developed since the last time that I want to put on paper.

Andrew is an artilery man. He shoots off artilery on Lejeune for a job and trains harder than grunts. (Grunts are infantry, 0311's.) But for this deployment, he is going over not as an 0811, but as an 0311. He will have had a little over two months of grunt training before he deploys to the Heldman Province of Afghanistan for between 10 and 14 months. We've been having a lot of scuffles lately about him wasting my time and how he might not come home. I don't know if you've ever had someone tell you that they think they're going to deploy to die, but it's very hard to swallow. He has trained in artliery, infantry, and he is also doing the job of a corpsman. (A corpsman is a navy doctor.)

His family is coming down for the weekend and I can't even explain how nervous of a time that's going to be. I'm finally going to meet his sisters and his mom, three of the most influential people in his life. We're going up to Charlotte either Friday or Saturday and I can't wait. It's sort of a big step to meet the parents that live in New York 17 hours away.

All I know is that I'm going to stay here and faithful for the entire deployment. I have assessed the risks and am ready for the challenges. I want to make this last forever. I've finally found someone that I think I could spend the rest of my life with and I'm not going to let this deployment change anything.

If anyone knows anything about true love, it's never fair. There are points and parts that make it worth it, but it's never fair .. Especially in the military. Our spouses and significant others are taken away from us at a moments notice and there is always a chance that they might not come home.

Regardless, when it's your time to go, it's your time to go. I'm going to pray daily that he is safe and that his commanders know what they're doing enough to get him safe and back home in a few months. No time or distance can seperate me from something I love.

-LD