Supporting yourself during deployment

I recently posted my top 10 ways to help a military spouse through deployment in my blog post "Supporting military spouses through deployment." It can be really hard to know exactly what to do to help a friend or neighbor or whoever the military spouse in your life is when they are navigating the deployment of their spouse.

But how can you, as the military spouse, help yourself through a deployment? Help comes in various ways and sometimes the help you need is abundant and everywhere you look and sometimes you can't catch a break and feel completely on your own. So what are things that you can do to make your life just a liiiiitle bit easier?

1. Deployment pre-planning
To quote Monty Python, "No one expects the Spanish Inquisition." Before deployment, before you are navigating the emergency situation on your own, make a list of every phone number you could possibly need. It sounds ludicrous, but when you start making this list and you struggle through the research, you will figure out pretty quickly why you won't want to be sorting through plumbers at 1 am as the toilet gushes water from the upstairs and your 5 young children sob, "What are we going to do?!" Who should you put on this list? EVERYONE. Who is everyone? EVERYONE.

• If your car breaks down, what tow company will you use? What mechanic? How much are you willing to pay to fix your vehicle before you buy a new one? What new one would you buy? From where? What if you need a rental car? What's a cab company you would use?
• If you needed an ambulance in the middle of the night, what neighbor would you call to watch your kids? What neighbor would you want the paramedics to ask to watch your kids?
• What plumber would you use? Contractor?
• If you were unable to take care of your house, who would you use for yard maintenance? Lawn maintenance? Where can you get groceries delivered? House supplies delivered? Food delivered?
• If you needed to leave town, what airport would you use? How would you get there? Where would you park your car? Who would watch your house?
• If you needed a hotel in town, where would you stay?
• If you had a family emergency, how much could you spend on it before you needed other financial help? Where would you find the money?

These questions all seem silly, but emergencies do happen. And in the midst of an emergency-- small or large-- it can be hard to know what to do or who to call. It can be overwhelming under the best of circumstances to find a contractor you trust, let alone if you actually need it. Help yourself out and plan on every contingency. What if you had a car accident and couldn't mow your lawn? What if you and your children all come down with a cold and you want groceries delivered? What if you or your child breaks a bone and you want your house cleaned? What if your downstairs floods and you need a hotel room while it is cleaned? What if a relative passes away and you have to fly home for a funeral? What if your dog gets sick and you have to pay vet bills? Talk to your deploying spouse and find the answers to all these questions. Know the answers and write them down somewhere if you need to.

2. When help isn't helpful: say no

This one is hard. Sometimes people really want to help and so they volunteer all sorts of things that really aren't helpful. It is hard to figure out how to politely navigate those types of situations. Maybe someone volunteered to child swap with you, but their kids are sick and you would really like to not catch their colds right now. Maybe they offered to make you dinner, but they have a strict time they could drop it off that doesn't work for you. Maybe they are offering to watch only some of your kids and want you to pick up your kids while your other kids are napping. Whatever it is... saying no can save your sanity. If your schedule and your sanity can support letting it slide, then politely accepting the "help" is good. People like feeling helpful, especially if they are offering. But if you are at the end of your rope, don't feel bad about politely declining.

3. When you are overscheduled: say no

I know that I am not the only military spouse with this problem: I'M GOING TO STAY BUSY TO STAY SANE. So you sign each of your kids up for swim lessons and gymnastics and sign yourself up for a yoga class and get your toddlers in this neat preschool program and then you volunteer for e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g. You volunteer to make meals, to baby-sit for friends, to host dinner parties, to be on this board and that board and at your kids' schools and, seriously, if there is a sign up sheet then count.me.in. {Speaking from experience.} This isn't a lesson someone can teach you. It is one you have to learn yourself, but think about how you normally live your life. Do you normally sign up for everything? Are you normally struggling with ways to fill your time? Because if the answer is no, chances are, you won't have those struggles during deployment. There will be quiet moments and there won't be someone sharing the load with you, but, chances are, your kids will need you more. You will need you more. Your house will need you more. All the little things that your deployed spouse did will fall on you... and, I know, your spouse was never home before deployment so what will change?!?! Trust me. It changes. Even if all your spouse did was pull the trash cans out before he went to work at 3 am. Those small things now fall on you.

4. Be there for your family

Deployment is confusing for kids. The deployment dates can shift. Maybe they don't know the exact dates their military parent is deploying. Maybe they don't know the exact date their military parent is returning from deployment. {Because: OPSEC.} One thing they do know: things have changed at home. Regardless of how it affects you, it does affect you. And they feel it. When you walk in the door in the evening, and all your kids pounce on you, you are also thinking about every task that has to get done in the evening-- all on you. And the next day-- all on you. And they are wondering, "When will Daddy come back? Where did Daddy go? Why is Mommy upset?" They are stressed, just like you are. And sometimes, yes, busy is good for them. Getting them out of the house for something fun. But cut yourself some slack and cut them slack and say no sometimes.

5. Be there for you

This ties in with the other 2 points: SAY NO. I find that during deployment I often feel over stimulated. The car breaks down when the baby is sick. I have to get to the pediatrician. And back in time for school pick up. And after school, one of my boys is really upset because something happened at school, but my other boys are being silly and wild. So I have sick kids, pouting kids, and wild kids. And dinner to make. A car dealership to call. A house to tidy up. Kids to bathe. Laundry to do, because we have to have school clothes. It's like it all swirls around me. Then someone calls and says, "Can you watch my daughter tomorrow?" or my phone reminder goes off and I'm supposed to be making meals for someone. Then the kids all remember tonight was a swim lesson night and they are all sobbing because I promised to take them and tonight is the night they take a swim test... It's all me, me, me, me. I have to be there for them. I have to solve the problem. I have to be steady. I have to be calm. I have to make the choices. I have to be everything for everyone at all times. I can never drop the ball. I can never say, "No, today is a pajama day and I'm taking a nap."

Military spouses: you don't have to be there for everyone. Sometimes you have to say no. Sometimes you have to say, "We aren't doing swim lessons this session." Sometimes you have to say, "We aren't going to all the class birthday parties this deployment." Sometimes bath time doesn't happen and it is quick showers all around before going to bed and maybe-- gasp-- watching Netflix instead of storytime, just so you can wash the dinner dishes real quick. You will be MORE PRESENT and a BETTER PARENT if you can make those tough calls. If you make yourself a priority. If you say, "I need a minute to sort this out." If you guard and protect your calendar as closely as you guard and protect your children's emotional well-being.

6. Cut corners

Following the emotional well-being of yourself and your children, find those things that will make your life easier. Instead of going to the grocery store, see if you can find grocery delivery. A lot of cities have grocery delivery for free or for very small fees or "buy 5 of these items and have delivery for free." Check it out before you write it off. Find drive-through pharmacies and get a good relationship with your pediatrician so you can have appointments over the phone or swing in for nurse visits or just to go by the lab. Find a local urgent care that makes appointments instead of waiting at the ER or spending the whole day waiting at the UC with all your kids. Make meal times easier with make ahead meals, freezer meals, delivery meals, take-out meals, meal planning, or meal prep. Go basic with appetizers for meals-- kids love finger foods and dipping. If you struggle with the bedtime routine and the dinner routine, have the kids get ready for bed before they sit down for dinner. That way everyone is in pajamas and there is less to do after dinner, when emotions are high and time is short. As Tim Gunn says, "This is a make it work moment." You don't have to be traditional. You have to make it work.

7. Hire help

Even when you say no and cut corners, life can still catch up to you at various times for various reasons during deployment. During those times, sometimes you need to hire help. Evaluate the places in your life that help would be most useful {or most affordable to free up time for other areas}. If the yard is too much for you to handle during deployment, find a way to have it taken care of-- get a yard person. If the yard person costs too much, see how much it would be to have them cut the grass or take care of the weeding or trimming. Or price to see how much it would cost for them to come in every other month or once a month and you maintain in between times. If doing bedtime with the kids every night is hard, set up a standing baby-sitter once a week or get a parent's helper to come in and be a second set of hands during those times. Plan your doctor's appointments, hair appointments, dental appointments, etc, when you have childcare. Coordinate with your childcare person before you schedule so you can be sure you are covered. Not every person struggles with the same areas during deployment and not every deployment is the same. Sometimes it changes with the ages and stages of your children and sometimes with your own needs-- emotionally and physically. Each deployment is different and what was a problem one deployment, might not be the next. So don't beat yourself up when you have to throw up the white flag and call in reinforcements.

8. Give yourself grace

And speaking of calling in reinforcements, guess what! It's not a competition. You aren't being graded. You aren't succeeding or failing or doing great or doing horribly. You aren't being a bad parent or a horrible spouse or a failure of a human being... or whatever else you are telling yourself. Getting help, saying no, making time for yourself, for your children, for your responsibilities, and even for fun is good. That is Adulting 101. Deployment is not pass/fail. It feels that way sometimes when people are calling you because you are late or forgot an appointment or you didn't do something you promised or you have to say no to something. It feels like, "Why can't I handle this?" No, friend. The question instead is why should you handle this? Why should you have to take on more than you can handle? Why should you push yourself in those areas? So, when you feel like you are failing. Or you feel like you should do better. Give yourself grace. You can't be everything to everyone at all times. Don't put that on yourself.

9. Ask for help

I don't know why this is so hard for military spouses, but it is. We feel like we need to help, to be there for the people who rely on us. We think of deployments that have been harder, times that have been worse, friends who went through more, that family from that last boat that had that one thing happen... whatever it is, we think, "I have to have it together. I can't fall apart." We make it a pass/fail situation. We make it so asking for help is failing. And when we do ask for help, we need it more than anything. Why? No, military spouses. We need to stop that. We need to ask for help when it would be nice and not just crucial. We need to reach out. We need to offer ourselves the type of support that we try to give others. We give everyone else around us grace, except ourselves. We hold ourselves up to a standard that we don't need to and no one expects us to be at. Reach out and connect, friends, because your fellow military spouses care. They would love to go to the school play with you so you aren't cheering on your babies alone. They would love to meet you for dinner to celebrate an awesome test score. They would love to childcare swap with you so you can wander Target with a latte without getting hosed down by a Horizon chocolate milk.

10. Rely on your community

Community is hard and, for a lot of military spouses, a sensitive subject. We've all had the disappointing duty station. We've all been burned. We've all felt like we didn't fit in or that we weren't liked or whatever it is. We've all lived next door to our best friend and then she PCS'd and you PCS'd and you don't think you will ever be happy again. We've all dreamed of the perfect duty station and gone somewhere we swore we wouldn't go. We've all made do in climates that don't suit us, at duty stations that don't suit us, with schedules that don't suit us. And for those reasons we pull inward. We feel alone. We feel like we can't trust our communities. Will this community be like my last one? Will I get burned again? Moving forward can be hard. Where do I go from here? It can be very hard to connect. In those times, don't structure community in your mind like how you had it at "that one duty station" in the past. Focus on the community you do have. Do you have nice neighbors? Do you like your gym? Your kids' school? Do you have a restaurant you enjoy going to or a coffee shop or even a bookstore? Make room in your day for those things. Look forward to your once a week book run. Or school pick up. Those connections may be small, but let them grow. Give them the time and the space to fully blossom-- which they may or may not do. Some duty stations don't click which is hard, but okay. The duty station will end. You will go forward and your next duty station will be better. In the meantime, enjoy those little things. It sounds strange, but you will miss them.

Other duty stations offer amazing community. Those times, it is really easy to rely on your community. It comes almost as a second nature. Your military community feels part of your family. Everything effortlessly falls into place and your calendar is full of good events and your relationships are easy. Or maybe it is the civilian community that lifts you up. They might not understand everything about the military aspect of your life, but they step in when you need it. Those times are great and you can have duty station after duty station like that. It can always be like that. When you are in those times, you don't always realize it until you leave, but I think that is life. But hold on, spouses, wherever you are-- with great community or without-- because every duty station is different, every PCS is different, things always change in the military community and our hope is what brings up each duty station. We know things are always getting better! And we are willing to role up our sleeves and do the work to make sure each duty station is the best it can be.

What are your tips and tricks during deployment? How do you make it all work?