My husband and I have been apart for approx. 6 weeks now and although I thought it would get easier to deal with the separation, as the time has gone by it has gotten more difficult. I am tired of having weekends alone, tired of hearing him on the phone and not in person and tired of pushing through my obstacles on my own without him physically at my side. It is, however, still helpful to get advice from friends, tweeps & bloggers who have been in similar situations on how to handle this period of my life….so I decided to share the knowledge…..
This week’s guest post is from June who blogs over at Simply Junebug. This is the story she had to tell…
I have a friend whose husband is a private jet pilot for a large corporation. He flies the CEOs around the world. With his schedule, he could be in China for up to three weeks then home for a week then off to London for a couple weeks. I asked her how she felt about her husband being home only every couple of weeks.
“I love it!” she told me.
I pressed her for more information because I thought it was kind of odd.
What she loved was being able to deal with only her schedule; when she cleaned it stayed clean and best of all it was like being a kept woman since the money still showed up in the bank.
I have to admit at that point I was almost jealous.
I’m not sure I was ever completely convinced it was the next best thing since sliced bread but a couple of years later my husband accepted a position in our home state of KS.
I needed to stay in GA until the house sold. It was either that or move in with his mom like he was doing and I hadn’t yet seen pigs flying. So the single life it was.
For a few moments at the beginning, I felt the void his disappearance caused, but soon I was beginning to understand my friend’s optimistic outlook on the situation. Since the house was being shown, I had to keep it perfectly clean and it was much easier without a hubby to pick up after. If I wanted to drive across town to have coffee with a friend, I did it because I didn’t have to worry about his schedule. We got to talk every day and if he had a laptop we could’ve Skyped.
The only thing missing was the physical touch of his hugs and kisses.
I rememberedthat I was a strong independent woman and that being married hadn’t taken these aspects of my personality away from me. I constantly worried about losing him (to death – not other women – he is an engineer and women frighten him) but this was a good reminder I could survive on my own.
The best part was, when we were able to finally be back together, it had strengthened our relationship. He was appreciative of all the things I did for him. He hadn’t noticed when we were together because I simply did them, but when he had to live on his own again it was an eye opening experience for him.
I realized he loved me for who I was. I didn’t have to try to be the perfect wife or be Martha Stewart.
He just wanted me.
Ironically, as I write this, we are in another separation.
We adopted a baby girl over the weekend in a neighboring state. When you adopt in another state you have to stay in that state with the baby at a hotel annoying all the other hotel guests until you get the all clear call to return home.
Hubby is in the middle of a big project at work with mandatory overtime. He got us settled into the hotel but had to return home. I’m spending the next two weeks without him.
But it is ok.
I’m a strong, independent woman who can handle a new baby in a hotel room for two weeks by herself.
I’m loving the bonding time with my new daughter.
Besides…how many times do you think I can play this card in the future to get him to do diaper changes?