I know that I have to enjoy each moment, each memory, each day one at a time. People tell me that all the time. What they don't tell me is how to shut off this time clock in my head of how long I have to enjoy this or that. Will it go away on it's own? Do I have to throw myself against the wall in hope of hitting the off button?
He's home from training. That used to be my time clock. Now it's the next training and then the deployment and then the longest and loudest ticking will begin. He does something that annoys me or something that a normal wife would be all over him about, but in the back of my head I hear the "don't ruin the time you have left" voice. This constant pressure to make sure everything is perfect will lead to my own destruction and I know enough about myself to know this is true, but I don't know how to fix it and I don't have anyone in my life right now that would know. If you know me you know that I am extremely anal and controlling of my environment and everything I do has to be perfect or the earth's rotations will somehow get off kilter and it will be my fault. I grew up knowing that if something was wrong in my house it was because somehow I made it happen. Then I entered a bad marriage to a not so nice man who re-enforced the everything is my fault default option so now that I'm married to a wonderful man who truly would move mountains to protect me he says the smallest thing and my world spins out of control of "see even I've screwed up his life" thoughts. Sometimes I want to scream at the top of my lungs but I just have this vision that if I did that all that would really happen is everyone would stop for a moment, look at me, and say when you're done with that would you (insert task here).
You should know, I'm very happy to have my husband home. It's so good to hear him laughing and to see him goofing around with the kids and to reach over and grab my hand or touch my leg while he's watching tv or reading just to let me know he still needs me there every bit as much as I need him. I enjoy each of those moments and countless others and none of my memories have an expiration date on them.