So the past few weeks or so I was reading some blogs of several military spouses and was searching to no avail to find a military girlfriend that might be experiencing some of the same emotions/feelings as myself. Unfortunately, I couldn't find many! I've been having a really tough time with the LTs deployment, I only have a few friends who are dating/married to a service member and my "civilian friends" can be a great shoulder to lean on, but they can never really empathize with everything that has changed so quickly in my life. Deployment for the LT and I has been kind of a 'tossed in feet first' mentality, I did not have the chance to go to pre-deployment meetings with him, I was mostly relayed what info he thought I'd need. I appreciated all of it, but I'm still struggling with the day to day. I'm just rolling with everything that is thrown my way and hoping I can be there for him as much as possible.
Some back story on me and my soldier. We are high school sweethearts, our romance started in high school gym class, he was a sophomore, and I was a freshman. I had the BIGGEST crush on him during that year, but never acted on it because one of my friends had already made her intentions well known. A few years passed, I was a junior and he was a senior, and as fate would have it, we were in the same gym class together! Not-so-subtly I asked the substitute teacher if I could be his partner, and because she was a friend of his family, she obliged. Funny how things like that happen, huh? One VERY intense game of raquetball later, I finally had the guts to talk to him outside of class. We were both involved in track and field and Key Club and started talking a lot more. I asked him to Sadie Hawkins and had the most wonderful night, we spent the whole time talking and laughing and even had our first kiss, it was on his cheek as he dropped me off, but apparently I made a good enough of an impression on him. We finally became official, prom ensued and the rest was history. We are going on 5.5 years of being in a LDR, starting with attending different colleges that were about 3 hours apart, and now active duty military life. Even while in college and LT and I never saw each other more than once every 4-8 weeks, so when he commissioned and started military life it was quite the shock to now be going up to 6-8 months without seeing each other. My graduate education is not helping the situation either- the military isn't totally to blame... just mostly ;). My LT is currently serving in Operation Enduring Freedom and has about 4 months finished up, the remaining months need to hurry up! I love him with all my heart, and I am anxiously awaiting the day he returns and I'm done with graduate school so we can finally live in the same state together (fingers crossed).
I'm currently a graduate student pursuing a clinical Doctorate in Audiology (Au.D).... quite the mouthful huh? For those who may not know what that is, it's like an Optometrist, but for your ears. It's the clinical identification and management of hearing and balance disorders, along with the education on hearing protection and preventing hearing loss. I want to specialize in pediatrics and newborn hearing screenings or working in a school for the hearing impaired. I love working with little kids, so much fun and you never know what to expect! So the 4 years of undergrad are finished, just working on the 4 years of graduate school.
So this is going to be a place for me to kvetch and moan about grad school and all the while balancing the needs of my deployed boyfriend. It's hard, but I'm determined to make it all work and happen. It is going to be quite the juggling act, but once I find the balance I know the pieces will all fall into place.
Until next time-
Dani
Dani
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