Just Got The News

[disneylovinfamily]

We knew it was coming but it doesn't make it any easier. DH found out last night that he is being deployed. He is in the MD National Guard. He starts state orders the day we return from Disney and will be on those orders for a couple of weeks before being sent to Texas to train until the end of the year when he will be sent over. He has been home for 3 years now (last deployed to Afgan.) so we knew it would be anytime but I am still in shock.

I am a SAHM with DS1 and DD4. Roseanna will be 5 in November and we are terrified to tell her. She is a true daddy's girl and I can't even imagine how to deal with this. please if anyone has any helpful advice let me know. She was 6 mos old last time so there was no explaining but I have no idea where to begin and my husband is a wreck about it. Russell is 16 months---does anyone have any idea if he will have memory of daddy after a year?

I have all this on top of already knowing that my little brother (marines) is being sent in March---so I will have 2 f them over there and I am scared to death!

 

[Mickeyistheman]

I just read your post and I am so sorry to hear the news. That is what scares me the most about my brother is that once he is finished with bootcamp, they will send him over there.

I pray for every single solider that is over there, and wish them to come home as quickly and safely as they can.

 

[greeneyedchic75]

Hi Melissa, I posted this reply to you on your other post on the military community board

Hi Melissa, sorry to hear about the deployment. My dh is currently in Iraq and his year tour was extended to 15 months. My 5 year old dd took that part the worse. Last summer we had told her daddy would be home the next summer so it was hard to explain to her that he wasnt coming home after all . The first time he deployed to Iraq she was a year old and she was 2 when he came home so I didnt have to explain it to her. This time she is old enough to have to talk to her about it. One thing we did was one of those build a bear things. Her and daddy did it together and he recorded a message to her and put it inside it so everytime she hugs it she can hear him. He recorded himself reading books so I can play it for her and she look at the book while daddy is reading it. We are also doing the traveling Mickey and my dd looks foward to the pics that daddy sends us. She is real involved with helping me pick out things for his carepackages and she loves to draw him pictures and make crafts for him. We take lots of pictures for him and email and print them out and send and he emails us pictures.
I have had some problems with her behavior due to missing daddy. She has times where she is angry and times when she is sad about it. Theres some days she cant even talk about daddy because its to hard for her to deal with the sadness she feels when she thinks about it. Luckily thats not everyday.
Ok I know I rambled on enough... I wish your family the best of luck and pray for your dh safe return!

 

[disneylovinfamily]

Cara---hi! My name is Nikki (not Melissa ) but that's ok--that's my cousin's name. Thank you so much for your post. It really helps me to prepare for what I am going to go through. i didn't know you could record a voice on the build a bear. How long can the message be? This will be great to buy for both the kids. I will keep your husband in my prayers and can't wait to hear that he is home safe. I have the same fear about extension so I am hesitant to tell her after next x-mas which is what it would be now but last time he was extended as well. The military is never a sure thing and stuff changes all the time.

 

[greeneyedchic75]

yikes sorry I had your name wrong. I dont know where I got the Melissa from lol As for the bear, we didnt do it at buildabear it was a place like it our mall has. I think u can also get a voice recorder at build a bear too. Our mall has a kiosk that sells everythng and makes the bear there too. If u cant find it, i can always let u know what ours has and u can tell me what u would like and u can just send me the money and i will get it for u. the voice recorder u can do at home and it has intructions how to put it in the bear. My dd actually picked out a purple unicorn and they picked out an outfit for it too. Sometimes when I am real lonely and miss him I hug it to listen to his voice. I should have made him make me one lol he did suprise me and leave a taped message on one of those handheld recorders for me. I was suprised when I found it and I love listening to it..

 

[lovemygoofy]

Hi there, I'm Tina. My husband will be going on his 3rd tour to Iraq later this year. We don't have children but have seen lots of military families get through this.

If your child is in school, I would alert the teacher and counselor in case of upsetting topics or outbursts at school.

There is a video from Elmo and Seaseme Street about family deployments that seems to be very popular.

I know that others have made chains to unhook everyday or take an m&m/skittle/whatever candy out everyday until time for daddy to get home but because of extensions or whatever that could be risky. One friend of mine made a calendar for each of her children that had pictures of their daddy and the family for each month. Every morning part of the routine was a big show of marking one more day closer to "daddy coming home."

Videotaping/audio recording your husband reading stories is a wonderful treat. Also having the children tell stories onto a mini tape recorder and then sending the tape to the dad(who also has a mini tapr recorder is fun) and the dad can send letters on tape to each child.

Another family bought voice recorded picture frames for each child. The picture was of daddy and the individual child and daddy telling them goodnight and I love you.

Of course build a bear is wonderful activity for the family.

If at possible, you might try to schedule some time for daddy to call and just talk with the daughter. For example "every Thursday he could call and talk to the daughter but make sure she understands that the call could go dead at any moment and I wouldn't let her know that he would try to call every Thursday just in case he can't make it.

I think you'll do just fine. The people I know that have children through deployments say that consistency is the key. Don't change up the routine too much after he leaves. Good luck and I hope time speeds quickly for you.

 

[kc10family]

We do the following things

- Build a bear w/ voice message
- video him reading different stories
- video different messages for the different times of the year
- he makes short notes, postcards and draws pictures (I hand them out or they come in the "mail" every week or when they are needed)
- I have the kids draw picture etc and I stuff them in his bags just before he leaves. He fines notes inside his socks, boots, pants, etc.

Best of luck

 

[jmskinner]

Hi Nikki. I had posted on the military thread last night. Told you everyone out here would have great ideas. I wish I had known about these before my DH left. I didn't find these until after he was on the downhill for coming home. Now that he is back I have all of these great ideas. At least I can help pass them on to others.

Cara, I'm Melissa. Nikki and I were posting back and forth last night, so now you know where the name came from. You were probably like me, should have been heading for bed, but up posting on the boards instead.

 

[greeneyedchic75]

Hi Nikki. I had posted on the military thread last night. Told you everyone out here would have great ideas. I wish I had known about these before my DH left. I didn't find these until after he was on the downhill for coming home. Now that he is back I have all of these great ideas. At least I can help pass them on to others.

Cara, I'm Melissa. Nikki and I were posting back and forth last night, so now you know where the name came from. You were probably like me, should have been heading for bed, but up posting on the boards instead.

lol Melissa, you are right I was up late last night too on here and that is prob where I got the Melissa from...

 

[Longsx3]

Sorry to hear about your DH deploying! My daughter was 9 when DH deployed, it was the first time in 12yrs he had been deployed so this was new territory for her. She did amazingly well...the main thing I did was kept everything consistent at home. Our expectations of her remained the same regarding behavior and school work. Did she have a few melt downs? Sure, but they were at home and we worked through them.
Two things that helped DD was that we were fortunate to have frequent communication with DH tand he other thing was her Daddy Pillow...DH had a pillowcase made for DD ...it had his picture on it and said Hug Me! He then put one of his small travel pillows in it...DD still sleeps with that pillow, it probably has 10,000 FF miles.

 

[disneylovinfamily]

Thanks for everyone's support! I showed DH this thread and he loves all the ideas---maybe now he can see why I am obssessed with this board, you meet sure caring people. We are probably going to take all the suggestions. We loved the bear idea and taking pics of mickey around Iraq---but he says it will have to be a Stitch. Then I got an idea. Do ya think I could buy one of the bear recorders and have DD record something and "open" stitch up and place it in there as a special surprise? Will it work in Stitch?

I also just signed DD up for a grief class but it is geared toward kids with life changes like divorce, seperation, ect---not death. It is a year program and actually starts the day DH's training starts. It is called confident kids. Have any of you heard of this? It is a program in churches around the country. We will meet once a week and have dinner as a group and then the parent goes with the parents and the children go together and you learn basics on coping ect. The parents learn the smae as the kids but in gron up form. I thought it sounded like it was a great fit.

I am also going to try to team up with the family support group and maybe head it up or at least be on the "board". I was extremely unhappy with how it was run last time. I don't know how other NG family support groups are but ours was horrible. We me 1 time a month for like an hour and focused on something like healthcare ect. Hardly any people came because it was boring and hard for the kids. I had the idea that at every meeting there should be time dedicated for the kids with an activity or craft and making things for the soldiers. The problem is I butt heads with the lady that currently runs family support for our unit and am not sure how she will wellcome my ideas. I just think we nee to do something to get more people to attend the meetings so we can support each other. That is the whole point. Do any of you ladies have ideas that I could suggest for meeting content?

 

[lovemygoofy]

Thanks for everyone's support! I showed DH this thread and he loves all the ideas---maybe now he can see why I am obssessed with this board, you meet sure caring people. We are probably going to take all the suggestions. We loved the bear idea and taking pics of mickey around Iraq---but he says it will have to be a Stitch. Then I got an idea. Do ya think I could buy one of the bear recorders and have DD record something and "open" stitch up and place it in there as a special surprise? Will it work in Stitch?

I also just signed DD up for a grief class but it is geared toward kids with life changes like divorce, seperation, ect---not death. It is a year program and actually starts the day DH's training starts. It is called confident kids. Have any of you heard of this? It is a program in churches around the country. We will meet once a week and have dinner as a group and then the parent goes with the parents and the children go together and you learn basics on coping ect. The parents learn the smae as the kids but in gron up form. I thought it sounded like it was a great fit.

I am also going to try to team up with the family support group and maybe head it up or at least be on the "board". I was extremely unhappy with how it was run last time. I don't know how other NG family support groups are but ours was horrible. We me 1 time a month for like an hour and focused on something like healthcare ect. Hardly any people came because it was boring and hard for the kids. I had the idea that at every meeting there should be time dedicated for the kids with an activity or craft and making things for the soldiers. The problem is I butt heads with the lady that currently runs family support for our unit and am not sure how she will wellcome my ideas. I just think we nee to do something to get more people to attend the meetings so we can support each other. That is the whole point. Do any of you ladies have ideas that I could suggest for meeting content?

I don't know anything about NG family readiness groups but I know all about active army groups. I've led several FRGs during deployments and up to a few months ago taught FRG leader classes. The first thing I will tell you that if you aren't prepared to handle a wide variety of drama then you better not step up to the plate.

The next thing I will say is that people will come to the meetings if they want to and if they are looking for support. You could have the most fun, exciting meetings ever and sometimes you will have 5 people there. Those 5 people though are looking for friendship and support so don't discount them just because the participation isn't high.

For some people leading the FRG is an obligation because of the spouse's position and for some it's a power trip because they normally, or at least in the AD army, are in the know about everything regarding the units families. If the person leading now is one of these people, I wouldn't challenge her. Try to do what you can to make it better and more welcoming. Sometimes it involves blowing smoke up the leaders butt, to be honest, for things to happen.

I have tons of ideas for meetings and topics and activities so if you decide you need some just let me know. Good luck, sounds like you have a good attitude about thing.

 

[greeneyedchic75]

Thanks for everyone's support! I showed DH this thread and he loves all the ideas---maybe now he can see why I am obssessed with this board, you meet sure caring people. We are probably going to take all the suggestions. We loved the bear idea and taking pics of mickey around Iraq---but he says it will have to be a Stitch. Then I got an idea. Do ya think I could buy one of the bear recorders and have DD record something and "open" stitch up and place it in there as a special surprise? Will it work in Stitch?

I also just signed DD up for a grief class but it is geared toward kids with life changes like divorce, seperation, ect---not death. It is a year program and actually starts the day DH's training starts. It is called confident kids. Have any of you heard of this? It is a program in churches around the country. We will meet once a week and have dinner as a group and then the parent goes with the parents and the children go together and you learn basics on coping ect. The parents learn the smae as the kids but in gron up form. I thought it sounded like it was a great fit.

I am also going to try to team up with the family support group and maybe head it up or at least be on the "board". I was extremely unhappy with how it was run last time. I don't know how other NG family support groups are but ours was horrible. We me 1 time a month for like an hour and focused on something like healthcare ect. Hardly any people came because it was boring and hard for the kids. I had the idea that at every meeting there should be time dedicated for the kids with an activity or craft and making things for the soldiers. The problem is I butt heads with the lady that currently runs family support for our unit and am not sure how she will wellcome my ideas. I just think we nee to do something to get more people to attend the meetings so we can support each other. That is the whole point. Do any of you ladies have ideas that I could suggest for meeting content?

Glad that you found some ideas that will work for your family. I think stitch is a great idea and I am sure u can put the voice recorder inside him, u would just have to sew him back up.
The class you signed your dd up for sounds great and it will hopefully help her get through the deployment. I havent heard of that program where I am , but it would be nice to have here.
As for the FRG , I am only familiar with Active Duty cause thats all we have ever been. You should let your frg leader know that u want to volunteer for the frg. Theres all kinds of positions you can take that can help improve your frg.Some examples being you could be the meals on wheels coordinator. Thats something I do for ours. I have a list of ladies that are willing to make meals and take to a family when we have a death, baby being born, illness/surgery etc We take a minimum of 3 meals and longer if needed. I made a spread sheet and listed all the ladies names that are willing to volunteer, i have their preferences listed on it like which day works best for them and which part of town is easier for them to drive to. We also have a child craft coordinator who plans crafts for the children and we send the crafts over to Iraq to decorate the company area for the guys. The kids enjoy making the crafts and the Dads get to enjoy seeing what the kids made. Another position is the key caller which is also what I do. In my frg I am assigned my dh platoon. I pass all information on to them and they come to with their concerns . I then work as a liason between them and the rear d and our FRG leader. That way the frg leader is not bombarded with everything. When we have bad events that happen in Iraq we call each wife to notify after official notification has happened. Our company has also included single soldiers family so I also email and call all the single soldiers family in my dh platoon and keep them involved. I have found it very rewarding to work with our single soldiers families and they have played big parts in our frg and donating to our frg. We also come up with projects that we can all do and send over there. We had a professional banner done up to send to the guys last Thanksgiving. We had a message on it how we are thankful for them and each one of us submitted a picture to be put on the banner. The banner was beautiful. Each person who submitted a pic was asked to donate 5 dollars towards the purchase price so we were able to pay for the banner and it was very nice. We used the extra money from the banner project and other fundraising we did to purchase stuff for their common room. We purchased xbox and games, poker table dartboards and whatever else. So you could have someone incharge of morale welfare items and ideas for the guys. I have plenty more suggestions if you are interested lol My husband has been deployed many times in the past 12 years and I am always involved with the frg and love finding ways to make the frg better and help fellow wives.

 

[disneylovinfamily]

I don't know anything about NG family readiness groups but I know all about active army groups. I've led several FRGs during deployments and up to a few months ago taught FRG leader classes. The first thing I will tell you that if you aren't prepared to handle a wide variety of drama then you better not step up to the plate.

The next thing I will say is that people will come to the meetings if they want to and if they are looking for support. You could have the most fun, exciting meetings ever and sometimes you will have 5 people there. Those 5 people though are looking for friendship and support so don't discount them just because the participation isn't high.

For some people leading the FRG is an obligation because of the spouse's position and for some it's a power trip because they normally, or at least in the AD army, are in the know about everything regarding the units families. If the person leading now is one of these people, I wouldn't challenge her. Try to do what you can to make it better and more welcoming. Sometimes it involves blowing smoke up the leaders butt, to be honest, for things to happen.

I have tons of ideas for meetings and topics and activities so if you decide you need some just let me know. Good luck, sounds like you have a good attitude about thing.

Thanks! Our leader is the previos First Sgt mother so I assume that the NG doesn't go by postition of spouse/family member. I may be contacting you for some ideas in the future.

Glad that you found some ideas that will work for your family. I think stitch is a great idea and I am sure u can put the voice recorder inside him, u would just have to sew him back up.
The class you signed your dd up for sounds great and it will hopefully help her get through the deployment. I havent heard of that program where I am , but it would be nice to have here.
As for the FRG , I am only familiar with Active Duty cause thats all we have ever been. You should let your frg leader know that u want to volunteer for the frg. Theres all kinds of positions you can take that can help improve your frg.Some examples being you could be the meals on wheels coordinator. Thats something I do for ours. I have a list of ladies that are willing to make meals and take to a family when we have a death, baby being born, illness/surgery etc We take a minimum of 3 meals and longer if needed. I made a spread sheet and listed all the ladies names that are willing to volunteer, i have their preferences listed on it like which day works best for them and which part of town is easier for them to drive to. We also have a child craft coordinator who plans crafts for the children and we send the crafts over to Iraq to decorate the company area for the guys. The kids enjoy making the crafts and the Dads get to enjoy seeing what the kids made. Another position is the key caller which is also what I do. In my frg I am assigned my dh platoon. I pass all information on to them and they come to with their concerns . I then work as a liason between them and the rear d and our FRG leader. That way the frg leader is not bombarded with everything. When we have bad events that happen in Iraq we call each wife to notify after official notification has happened. Our company has also included single soldiers family so I also email and call all the single soldiers family in my dh platoon and keep them involved. I have found it very rewarding to work with our single soldiers families and they have played big parts in our frg and donating to our frg. We also come up with projects that we can all do and send over there. We had a professional banner done up to send to the guys last Thanksgiving. We had a message on it how we are thankful for them and each one of us submitted a picture to be put on the banner. The banner was beautiful. Each person who submitted a pic was asked to donate 5 dollars towards the purchase price so we were able to pay for the banner and it was very nice. We used the extra money from the banner project and other fundraising we did to purchase stuff for their common room. We purchased xbox and games, poker table dartboards and whatever else. So you could have someone incharge of morale welfare items and ideas for the guys. I have plenty more suggestions if you are interested lol My husband has been deployed many times in the past 12 years and I am always involved with the frg and love finding ways to make the frg better and help fellow wives.

Thank you so much. You really seem to be highly involved and I will probably send you a pm about more ideas. We didn't have any of what you listed above---no meals on wheels, no kids stuff, we did send a scrapbook over of all the families but that was about it. The wives also adopted an orphanage in Afgan last time and sent stuff to them but I feel like so much more can be done! I plan on calling the group leader later today to see what I can do and ho I can volunteer.

 

[greeneyedchic75]

Your very welcome. Feel free to PM me at anytime. Another idea is to plan a monthly dinner out for everyone who is interested to attend. You will be amazed how much you will look foward to that dinner out with ladies that are in the same position as you. You can also do monthly potlucks get togethers at parks or other kid friendly locations. Yesterday our battalion had a lovely picnic for our wives and children at the park and we had really good time. Theres alot of things an frg can do to help get through the deployment and with many volunteers in the frg that will make it run even better.