The Last Hundred Miles
By: Lin Clements
Tags: Deployment, Navy, Military, Military Spouse, Overseas

The Last Hundred Miles

Author’s Note: I wrote this more than a month ago now, and am publishing it here as my first post on Medium. It feels like an accurate representation of who I am and what I’m about as a military spouse and aspiring social worker. It’s okay not to be okay, and I am one of many spouses who are here for you.

Image Description: A Japan skyline at sunset. There are apartments and other buildings in the foreground, with mountain ranges and Mt. Fuji in the background. The sky is orange along the horizon, lightening to a very pale eggshell blue with cirrus clouds along the upper portion of the photo.

Last night, while chatting with my husband, he asked if I was okay. And I told him that I was; just in a funk. And that I wasn’t really sure why. I didn’t have much to complain about. I added the qualifier that I certainly have not been working like he has been. Not under the conditions he has.

And in those few keystrokes and simple words, I unequivocally invalidated all my struggles over this deployment. Why on earth do we do that? (I thank therapy and meds for my self-awareness to have recognized this so quickly.) Further conversations with fellow spouses show the same. Normally, we have this tendency to minimize our daily struggles during deployment. This year it is perhaps even more critical to not minimize our struggles or our accomplishments, and yet here we are. We have shared woes and trials and held up minor accomplishments as though they are hard won, triumphant victories.

My kid wore their underwear the right way today!

We made it to nap time without tantrums!

I put on pants today!

I went to the commissary!

I interacted with people!

I did not cry!

It seems silly from the outside, doesn’t it? But these seemingly small, mundane accomplishments are victories in the middle of what has felt like a multitude of tiny failures cascading down around us since the first Shelter in Place Order came out.

We are closing in on homecoming. We can practically taste it. Visions of running into my husband’s arms keep dancing through my head. It helps that there are a number of scenarios under which he could come home: perhaps one daydream is pierside, another at a bus stop. Will I remember to remove my mask when I kiss him? Will I be too caught up? I hope I don’t shove the kids out of the way.

But before homecoming, we have to make it through the Last Hundred Miles. It should, realistically, only be a sprint or short run — maybe a 5k? listen, I’m not a runner — to the finish. One last big push. But it is dragging by. It has slowed to the kind of pace only found in nightmares; when you are running away from something and you‘re trying to move your legs, screaming at them to move, but you’re not going anywhere.

We’re all questioning ourselves. Are we crazy? Why is this so difficult? We’ve done this so many times before. We’re all criticizing ourselves. I should know better. I should be doing better. Why am I not meeting my usual bare minimum?

Because COVID. Because, literally, no amount of prior life experience can prepare you for surviving deployment in the ever changing world of a pandemic. Because the States are an absolute wreck and even if we wanted to go home we couldn’t. Who has time for a month of quarantine?

We have been managing ourselves, our children, our pets, work, life, trying to figure out some semblance of social activity, time for ourselves, personal development, professional development, all the development…

And we have only just recently been allowed outside of a tiny restricted area.

We have watched as people Stateside do whatever they please, perhaps wandering around as if there is no pandemic. And we are here, overseas, with restrictions aplenty, ever changing guidelines, never knowing what’s next. Supports have been minimal and, trust me, I have tried so hard. Nobody wants to risk anybody’s health and while I understand that I have cried over the helplessness I have felt. We have sent our spouses off while each and every one of our supports has been stripped away in the name of health and safety, with no concern for the mental health cost, and the maxim of, “Abide by these rules or we’ll kick you off base.”

That anxiety in the back of your brain, as if you’re waiting for a boot to drop and the gates to slam closed again? That’s normal.

The exhaustion you are feeling from managing everything? That’s normal.

The depression you are just barely warding off, armed with a plastic spoon you found under your couch? That’s normal.

And I need to tell you that I don’t know how to fix it. I love to write these missives with some sort of solution at the end. A science-based suggestion coupled with personal experience to help you relate and find hope. But I don’t have that right now. I don’t have an answer.

The truth is that none of us has an answer.

We live a lifestyle where we are told from the beginning that everything else comes first. Fleet first. Family… well, we weren’t issued with the seabag.

You will look toward the end of deployment right now and while you will tell yourself it is close, your body will go limp with exhaustion. You will likely find yourself welling up with tears because must it really be that much longer? Why, when I say it, it sounds short, but when it comes to living it, it feels like forever?

I don’t have the answers. I do have the wordsmithing ability to put it down as a Thing That Exists. I do have the ability and the education to tell you that your feelings are completely valid. They are real, they exist and I feel you. I am in the trench with you, dear friend.

And I will personally see to it that we cross this finish line if I have to. This year, this pandemic, this deployment has exhausted us and asked more of us than ever before, while consistently stripping away supports.

But I see you.

I love you.

I will walk beside you.

And when you can’t walk, I will carry you if need be. I will fight when you cannot.

And I promise you, sweet strong friend of mine, you are going to make this.