If you take full advantage of every opportunity, this life can consume you with adventure! You could find yourself traveling around the world, getting to experience places most people only dream of!
You will meet people from all backgrounds and cultures. Becoming quite worldly as you add traditions discovered along your journey and making up new ones with friends that have become family.
It is a lifestyle where pride is continuously beaming from your soul. Where you have become a part of a unique group that has an unexplainable bond. A lifestyle that frames itself to be quite picturesque, like a dream.
But those living it, oftentimes start dreaming of something more.
This military lifestyle is a voyage where you live on a whim, where at the drop of a dime life can be flipped on its head!
A lifestyle that truly keeps you on the tips of your toes.
The kind where you either find yourself brave or in fear so you build up walls, never finding yourself completely settled.
Finally making friends only to say your goodbyes a few months later. It is white walls, that one box that never gets unpacked, and furniture that only seems to fit one way in every rental.
Rapid deployments, late nights, and more months of TDY than you can count on two hands.
The years go by quickly and the experiences missed seem to grow into an astronomical pile of what-ifs.
The expectations of strength and resilience are profound. Almost so great that anything other would be unmentionable.
Our children are labeled as “the great overcomers.” Seven different schools in nine years are pegged as nothing for them.
Yet behind closed doors there are lost educational opportunities and IEPs put in place to get your child caught up to the new schools’ standards.
A heartbreaking battle that ensues with every single move.
Facing a transition, new military spouse face brutal beginnings.
Social media has overpowered the traditional company SFRG, preventing a growing bond with other spouses.
Instead, the first and oftentimes last experience with other military spouses is merely a one-way ticket to misinformation and extreme bullying.
Leaving the spouse alone to navigate with one foot in the civilian world and the other longing to follow suit.
Conquering the world, the seasoned military spouse’s strength is deemed always so admirable.
Yet behind that glowing smile, she contemplates every single thing and often overfills her plate.
Walking the edge of completely falling apart she is usually left to handle it all alone while longing for any type of stability.
The true aspects of military life always seem to dominate. You slowly start to realize you live in a world of dictation, with no real voice.
A world that consumes your life only because of that deep love you have for your service member.
Selfless service is their calling and the sacrifices that come with that are far greater than anyone outside of this life can comprehend.
Peering in from the outside, the civilian lifestyle seems like a fantasy.
A dream that is just out of reach.
One that you could live, but only halfway without the love of your life.
A life where the freedom your service member fights for actually exists.
Where stability is a given, and permission is never needed.
A place that has the release from withering expectations.
Where your spouse is yours and yours alone.
A lifestyle that the foundation is actually based on family first.
Where children attend the same school system, friends actually last a lifetime, and everything you have strived to build stays.
It is a life that is seen from the outside as the ultimate goal. A place that lingers in your thoughts as you map out the future.
A dream that only those that live the military lifestyle will understand.