I woke up early one morning, mid-July, to send my husband off to yet another training exercise in a different European country. I climbed back into bed and opened my social media feeds where the first thing I saw at the top of my Facebook homepage was this photo about military spouses:
I read the article photographed above and thought to myself, “Wow, this is extremely spot on and fitting right now!” I pulled an excerpt from the article and shared it to my own news feed for my friends and family to see.
“The Lord replied, ‘Have you seen the specs on this order? She has to be completely independent, possess the qualities of both father and mother, be a perfect hostess to four or 40 with an hour’s notice, run on black coffee, handle every emergency imaginable without a manual, be able to carry on cheerfully, even if she is pregnant and has the flu, and she must be willing to move to a new location 10 times in 17 years. And oh, yes, she must have six pairs of hands.’
The angel shook her head, ‘Six pairs of hands? No way.’
The Lord continued, ‘Don’t worry, we will make other military wives to help her. And we will give her an unusually strong heart so it can swell with pride in her husband’s achievements, sustain the pain of separation, beat soundly when it is overworked and tired, and be large enough to say ‘I understand,’ when she doesn’t, and say, ‘I love you,’ regardless.”
Throughout the day, the photo I shared continued to get love and comments from friends and family near and far. Some spouses local to me in Vicenza even stopped me in person to tell me how perfectly relevant the article was for them in that exact moment.
The article was on my mind all day long, and I found myself continually giving it thought in my down time. I never knew how big of a job being a military spouse was, yet here I was staying afloat just fine three years into it. I decided the message shared here was one relevant for every military spouse on almost any given day.
On this particular day alone, I kissed my husband goodbye for a few weeks. I simply held my neighbor’s newborn baby so she could prep her house for an upcoming PCS. I loaned another neighbor my hose and borrowed brown sugar from her in return. I attended an FRG meeting where we discussed future training exercises, which translated to more time spent alone, and I wrapped up details for a trip I’d be taking the following week with some fellow milspouses while we’re trying to survive the spouseless days.
I went to bed reflecting on how every military spouse does in fact deserve a cheer. Not just once, but every single day.
We do have six hands. Heck, some of us even have more!
We do have huge hearts that fill with pride and joy, burst with love and sadness, and heal themselves well enough to keep on keepin’ on.
We do store the tools to fix nearly every problem big or small, and we have each fed an Army on at least one occasion.
The good Lord did know exactly what he was doing when he made duplicates of this particular model. We have each other; we need each other. And that’s simply the secret to how we do it.
So cheers to you, military wife. You are doing just fine!
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