DH is being deployed !

[Piglet4Ever]

My DH and I just found our yesterday that he was choosen to do a IA (Individual Augmentation) basically a 6 month deployment and he leaves on April 5. I am having a hard time with it , last time he was actually deployed was about 9 yrs ago, and since then the longest he has been away was about 3 wks at one time. We have a mile long list of things to get done before he leaves and not alot of time to do it in. The funny thing is the day before we found out he was leaving, we booked our airplane tickets and reserved our room for our trip to WDW. Luckily the trip is in November and he is supposed to be back at the beginning of Oct, so that works out for us at least. We are really going to need that vacation. This deployment is going to be the first time DH has been on a ship in over 14 yrs Hopefully it won't be too hard for him. He will probably be so busy working he won't even notice. Oh well better get started on that list we have going. Thanks for listening

 

[Tinkerbelle32]

Hang in there and you will be just fine. My hubby is gone at the moment too. Hopefully, he will be home very soon because we leave for Paris in two weeks! Counting down the days keeps the girls and myself going. Take it one day at a time. All will be well.

 

[Piglet4Ever]

Thanks Tinkerbelle!! Glad to hear your DH is coming home soon. I am feeling better since I first found out about DH leaving. We have so many things to do before he leaves that I don't have much time to dwell on it.

 

[SailorsPrincess]

I'm sorry about your DH being picked for IA duty. It's good that you guys made plans to go to WDW when he gets back, it gives you something to look forward too!

 

[Piglet4Ever]

Thanks for the good wishes. Dh finally got his written orders yesterday. He is leaving a week early than we thought, but also getting home early than we thought. so that's cool. Poor baby had to shell out big bucks yesterday for new uniforms for the ship. Today he gets to go and make sure all his shots are up to date. I am glad we have the WDW trip after he gets home, I can keep my mind off missing him by planning all sorts of fun things for us to do!!

 

[skoi]

Hope it will go quickly for both of you.

Dh got IA orders to Afghanistan the day after we got home from China with kiddo #4 and will be gone for a year or so. When he joined the Navy Reserve, we knew he'd be deployed, but we sort of figured it'd be on a ship. Shows what we know.

 

[rparmfamily]

I'm doing a 6-7 month Navy deployment right now. It goes by fairly fast I think, the children keep me busy and don't leave me any time to sit home and be sad! LOL.

Is your DH AD Navy? If so, how did your DH manage to avoid deployments for so long? WOW...we are on our 5th and nothing compared to many LOL!

 

[Piglet4Ever]

It's a long story, but yes my DH is active duty. He joined the Navy after college as enlisted, did training as a Nuke and then decided that wasn't what he wanted so he went to OCS and decided to do Intel. I met him right after he graduated OCS and before his Intel training school. A week after his school was over we got married and his first Intel assignment was with a squadron and he deployed twice with them.

His next assignment was in DC, he worked at the P'GON and ONI, that was shore duty and he went for training and things a week or two at a time so that wasn't bad. Towards the end of that tour he became a TAR, they are in charge of helping the Reserves with their pay and training and duty assignments and things like that. He did that for two tours with only week trips here and there again. Then, the Tars were absorbed back into the regular Navy, and so now DH is back in the regular flow of things. His job now is a shore duty as well but he was chosen to do this IA after no one wanted to volunteer. Whewwww sorry so long. This will hopefully be his only IA he has to do. So we have been lucky overall I can't complain about that. My poor brother is in the Army, and has done two yrs in Iraq and is now just about to finish a yr over in Korea.

 

[rparmfamily]

The whole TAR thing always confused me LOL! I am very sorry to hear he leaves so soon, what a shock!!! At least w/regular deployments we get notice.

Your DH somehow got the reverse of my DH, LOL. Mine has been in 14 yrs and done 11 yrs of seaduty but really none of those deployments have been horrible. He changed paths in his rate so that set him up for back to back to back seaduties. He's done 2 deployments on a ship, 2 w/a squadron (he's naval aircrew) and 1 to Bosnia w/NATO. No IA yet, don't want that either! We've gotten some sweet duty stations out of all that though so I have to say I love our Navy life!

 

[Piglet4Ever]

Yep, the Tar thing always confused me too and Dh was a Tar. I was just happy that he didn't have to be deployed, that was the best part of it. From what Dh tells me, on the AD side, they are starting to add IA's to new duty assignments. As in when you have a chance to pick new orders they will have an IA assigned to them that you would do first then go to your new assignment. But since DH is doing his now durning this tour, he shouldn't have to do another when he gets his next orders. At least that is what he was told. He only has 4 yrs till he can retire and will have 2 1/2 yrs left on this tour when he gets back, so in our hope is that they will let him extend at this current job til retirement. Unless he gets promoted, then he'd probably have to do a different job. We'll see what happens

 

[Piglet4Ever]

Well DH started his IA this past Monday, got to where he would catch his ship safe and sound and his now getting trained up. The count down begins, he should be home around Sept 23. It can't get here fast enough

 

[rparmfamily]

I hope the time goes by quickly for you.

We are on our final countdown, under 30 days now. It has gone by fast but at the same time, very slow.

 

[a_sailor's_wife]

I pray the time goes quickly for you guys! DH is currently reserves (was Active Duty and will be returning to AD). It's not an easy process for either you or him. Thank you for what both of you do! Hang in there!

 

[Piglet4Ever]

Thanks for the good wishes. got to talk via the computer with DH today. He is doing well and it made me feel alot better getting to see him. Hopefully the time is going to fly by

 

[a_sailor's_wife]

YAY!!!!! That you got to talk to him! I can remember how my heart would do a flip when I saw his name in my inbox! It will go by so quickly!