You signed up for this…
What makes me tick? Military spouse Chantal Labrie had an answer that question. “Being told I signed up for my husband missing the birth of our first and only child due to a last minute change of orders and deployment,” she said. Technically speaking…sure, we did sign up for this. But that doesn’t mean our feelings of loneliness, sadness, jealousy or pain aren’t valid. When a person falls in love, does he or she really think of all of the sacrifices that may lie ahead? Even if one does, is there really a scale that can tell us whether the pain that could lie ahead will be worth the joy we have when we are with our significant other? Just like any relationship, there’s a gamble. You would never say this to a civilian spouse with a husband who works long hours. Just for the sake of argument, say you have a friend married to a police officer. Your friend is pregnant and goes into labor while his or her spouse is on the job and can’t get to the hospital in time…you wouldn’t say, “Well, you signed up for this.” Of course not! Or if you live in a city known for traffic (i.e. the Capital) and said friend goes into labor while the freeway is at a standstill, thus she has the baby on the side of the road…would you say, “You signed up for this. You should have known not to live somewhere where the roads are so congested.” Absolutely not! And people shouldn’t say that to us either. Sure, we know our spouses will miss some of life’s greatest joys…but we can still feel sad about that.
