On Surviving.

March 6, 2013

"Dave and I were supposed to be on our way home from AFG today"

I opened my fb newsfeed on Thursday and saw the picture Philip had taken of the last time Dana would lay beside her husband.  Philip had given me advance warning that she had posted the picture (he was unsure whether he should take it at the time). 

I LOST IT.  In the fall-apart-for-approx.-3.76-minutes-and-rally-my-defenses-shore-myself-together-again-fix-my-makeup-and-walk-out-of-the-office-to-meet-with-a-patient-for-60-minutes fashion that I have had to come to master this year.

But seriously.  This is truly one of the most horrific images I've seen in my life.

For the first 36 hours after seeing it for the first time I started to cry every time I even started THINKING about it.

Horrendous.

The last couple of weeks have been emotional.  For a host of reasons.  But I've been painfully aware that while Philip's return to the US was drawing near, so was the day that Dave & Dana were supposed to be coming home.  And it's amazingly complicated simultaneously holding the joy of the former with the grief of the latter.  

A lot has been written and studied about survivor's guilt among veterans who have survived combat situations while brothers and sisters on their right and their left did not.  It's a powerful beast. But no one talks about what it is like being the spouse of someone who gets to run into the arms of her husband the moment he clears customs at the airport following an excruciating separation when you have to hold onto the reality that not everyone gets a homecoming.  Some wives receive a knock on their door from a commanding officer and a chaplain.

They're left with the sharp edges of the broken pieces. 

At the end of the week I get to melt into my husband's arms.  I get to hear his heart beat again.  Small things that most people take for granted.  But when you have had the experience of reconciling the reality "that may be the last time I ever see my husband alive" multiple times in your life these things are anything but ordinary, everyday, rote, or routine.  Trust me.

And I am elated about the reunion that awaits.  Believe me.

But it's complicated.

My excitement is tempered because this March not everyone gets to come home.

Sometimes the story doesn't end the way you envisioned.

And while that certainly doesn't detract from or mean that I am not allowed to be filled with joy, the reality looms painfully close to the surface.