Jessica Scott

In the last two days, I’ve had two people say that I expect other people to raise my kids for me because I’m in the military. Those words hurt and they offended me deeply.

But they are also somewhat true, to an extent. In my family, as many families with both parents working, there is no one to pick up the slack. One family member commented on how wrong I was to say that my kids stressed me out and stressed out my husband. But said family member has never had to deploy away from his kids for a year and then come home and actually stick around for the rebuilding process.

Yesterday also marked the 6 month mark since my husband and I came home from Iraq. Maybe it was fitting that these comments were made. Maybe they were the harsh truth that I was supposed to hear.

I’m a military mom and like all military moms, whether single, divorced, married to another service member or married to a civilian, I need help. I have my best friend here who can pick up the kids if there’s an issue and she knows she can count on me. What life would she have if she were not in the military, working to give her kids a better life? What life would I have if I wasn’t here, working to give my kids a better life than I had. I don’t want someone else to raise my kids, but I do need help, just like every working mom needs help.

There are milestones I’ve missed and moments I will never get back. But the thing that I got back today was a sense of enjoyment of my kids when I watched my kindergartener walk across the stage and graduate. Now it was only a kindergarten graduation but regardless of what you making a big deal out of every milestone, this was a big deal for my husband and I. We sat and watched out little girl who we’ve seen grow up via webcam sing on the stage and wave shyly at us from the crowd.

Today was a big deal because we struggled through a rough 6 months, learning to be a family again. And today marked a huge milestone because we were there for her finish kindergarten, even if we weren’t there for her first day of school.

There have been days over the last few months where I wished I didn’t have housework and dishes and crying kids to deal with. There were days when I could honestly admit that my kids caused me more stress than pleasure.

But today, when I hugged my little girl and felt the pride in her that she struggled through to be reading above her grade level, that she struggled through making new friends in a big school with new teachers to actually enjoy going to school every day, today, everything was ok.

Today, we were a family and we were together for a milestone.

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So things have been a little insane around my house lately. My kids are starting to settle in with being home and more importantly, being comfortable being home. Part of that comfort is trusting us to be there when they wake up in the morning.

When my hubby and I left, both for R&R and for the original deployment, we delayed talking about leaving until it was time to go. It was important to us because we wanted to enjoy our time together. But inevitably, it came time to tell the kids we were going to be gone. We never said we have to go to work. We said we had to go away for a while and we told them we were not going to be there in the morning. It sucked every night while my kids cried, telling me they did not want me to go.

They still don’t understand that work is every day and that we’ll be home in the evening. Every time there is a break in our new routine, they get upset. And I’m talking sitting on my lap with red faces, tears streaking down their faces, crying ‘Mommy, I don’t want you to go.’
It’s not easy to turn it off and deal with it rationally. It’s hard, because I know they’re hurting. I know there is an ache inside them that they don’t have the words to explain and I know that I am responsible for the insecurity in their lives.

It’s hard to find the words to comfort them because they don’t understand but I have to keep trying. I have to find a way to tell them that mommy isn’t leaving again, any time soon and convince them that it is true. I’ve wrecked their trust, even though it was unintentional and it’s going to take time to rebuild that.

It’s hard and it hurts but it is getting better. Things are starting to slip into routine. My oldest is starting to enjoy school again. My youngest is still not a fan of the daycare but she’s no longer screaming mommy don’t leave me when I drop her off.

They’re doing okay and with a lot of prayer and plenty of vitamin b, I’m doing okay, too. But that, my friends, is another post.

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Three weeks ago, I became a mom again. I walked into my mother’s foyer, greeted to cries of ‘mommy, mommy’ and hugged my daughters close for the first time in over six months.

In that moment, I was mom again. I know that sounds off. Just because I deployed didn’t mean I wasn’t a mom, I was just gone. In my heart and soul, I still worried about my kids, I still missed them. But I didn’t have the day to day things that make me mom in my kids’ world.

When my husband deployed both times before this tour, each time, he came home to little strangers. Our oldest was three months old the first time he came home. She didn’t know him but she adjusted easily. Our youngest, though, was a year old before he came home the second time and their relationship has never been quite the same as his relationship with our oldest.

My husband has never had to sit back and watch his child crawl toward another woman, saying ‘mama,mama’. They might not have known him but they’d never replaced him in their hearts.

I have. When I left for officer candidate school, my youngest was just shy of seven months old. I was in Fort Benning, GA, my kids were in Maine and my husband was in Iraq. It was my first taste of what life in the army as a mom was truly like but I had no idea how hard it was going to be to deploy and come home again. I knew my mom was taking great care of my kids. I was not prepared for my baby to crawl after her, calling her mama. In that moment, I had a taste of the true heart break that military moms go through.

I’ve always been an emotional parent. But this week when I took my oldest daughter to her first day at school, she clung to me, sobbing that she didn’t want me to leave her. It was only school but in her world, it might as well have been another year. She cried. I cried. And I looked at her teacher, a woman who just met me the day before, and admitted through my tears that I did not know what to do.

It’s a hard confession to make. What kind of parent doesn’t know what to do when their child is upset and crying? Me. The mom who just got back from Iraq doesn’t know how to deal with her child’s separation anxiety. The mom who just got back from Iraq was prepared to hear I don’t love you or I want Grammy when her kids got mad at her. The mom who just got back was not prepared to hear “I don’t think you love me” at a rest stop in New Jersey.

What kind of mom doesn’t know what her kid’s favorite food is or what to do when they’re acting out? The guilt I feel for leaving my kids is coloring my decisions on how to interact with them and I know there will be consequences down the road.

When most dad’s come home, mom has been there holding things down. There’s a transition period but life has only been missing a single piece, instead of being uprooted entirely. In my kids’ case, we not only left them with my mom, we took away their home and their pets, their daycare and all the reminders of what their daily life was with us. Our animals, too, had to move in with relatives for the duration of the year, so they even lost their pets.

Coming home this time around is not as simple as picking Daddy up on the First Cavalry Division’s parade field. Coming home this time involves figuring out what it means to be a parent again. A mom who has uprooted their children’s lives once more and left them with an aching insecurity that mommy and daddy are going to leave again.

I’m not saying that dad’s who deploy don’t have transitions to make when they come home. But when both Mommy and Daddy are gone, the impact is different. It’s harder on me emotionally in some ways because I’ve been the stability in our children’s lives for the last two deployments. I always know what to do with them.

But now, I’ve stood in the hallway, surrounded by seventy five year olds and cried, because I didn’t know what to do.

For thousands of moms who are coming home from Iraq and Afghanistan, they will feel the pain of their infant children calling someone else mommy because they were babies when their mom’s left. They will feel the helplessness of not knowing how to handle a tantrum and the awkwardness of not knowing what their child likes to eat. And, if they choose to remain in the army, they will feel the fear of the next deployment, knowing that as soon as they figure out what normal is, their families will be uprooted once more.

I know what it feels like now to become a mom again. And I know the fear of deploying again. Of taking my children from their home and uprooting their lives once more. It’s the life I lead, the life I chose. The life of a mom, who is also a soldier.

My choice, however, does not make today’s pain any easier to bear.

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When you get home from deployment, the army sends you through all this reintegration training. Some of it is worthwhile, a lot of it is a waste of time and even more is a check the block exercise. I understand the intent behind it, but frankly, I didn’t need or want most of it. There was, however, one class that I really got a lot out of and it was taught by the chaplains. They discussed reintegrating with your families and I paid attention because honestly, I’ve been worried about reuniting with my kids.

They talked about expectations and reactions and how you and they are different now than when you left home. I knew all this but still I paid attention. There was a lot of anticipation within me about seeing the kids and getting my family back together.

I thought I was prepared.

So when we’re in the middle of a busy rest stop in New Jersey last night and my youngest starts crying out of the blue, I wasn’t prepared to hear why she was upset. She had real, painful tears, the kind of crying that sounded like her little heart hurt. When I asked her what was wrong, she sobbed “I don’t think you love me.”

It was not a fake cry. It wasn’t a cry for attention. And I had no idea how to react. Instantly, I started crying. In the middle of a rest stop, with people wondering what the heck was going on, I was trying to get my oldest’s coat on her while trying to get my youngest to understand that I did love her and I did miss her.

My husband freaked out when he walked up and saw me and our youngest both in tears. My oldest rested her head on my shoulder and told me she knew I loved her. But none of that helped until I could make my youngest understand.

It was a brutal episode and one I did not expect. They tell you about the babies not knowing you or your grade school kids wanting to talk incessantly but nothing prepared me for my 3 year old’s confusion and true heartache.

It’s better today. She’s back to normal and so am I but the pain from last night lingers. So today, I’m hugging both of them more and telling them I love them. I’d already been doing that but apparently, it wasn’t enough to make up for a year of no hugs and no up close I love yous. The web cam was good but it wasn’t enough.

I don’t know if I can ever make up  for being gone to either of them. I don’t know what else is coming.

And I don’t know that I’m prepared to deal with it.

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