Ten

Ten.
Ten days.
Ten days until he is gone.

Man how the time has flown by.
This time last month I was counting down the days until pre-deployment leave and our trip to CO to see the fam.
It's all craziness!!
The last week of his leave was really just a smorgasbord of random things that were needing to be done prior to him leaving.
The beginning of his last week of leave he got a stomach bug that had been going around which made him out of commission for the first half of his last week of leave.
Along with buying guns, selling cars, etc. we also managed to go to a gun range again, and yes, I shot the revolver.
It was just as loud as I remember and I tell ya, it hurt my arm to shoot it!
According to John, the "kick" isn't bad at all.
In other words, I am a weak person.
I'm ok with that.
The first time I pulled the gun up, pointed at my target, and shot it, it scared me so bad I immediately dropped it back down on the table and jumped back from it like a hot potato.
The burning smell was gross and there was black residue all over my hands.
EW.
After the first shot sensation wore off, I was able to finish shooting all the rounds, unload the brass (I feel smart when I type all this), reload six rounds and fire them as well.
After that, I was spent.
At least I did it!!
I thought about having J take a picture of me shooting or of the target, but once I started shooting that was the last thing on my mind.

On Saturday, the 20th, I went to spin class.

I went to spin that day angry and needing to let some aggression out.

I've been holding in a lot of emotion about this deployment coming up because getting worked up over it won't solve anything.

I have been extremely inconsistent this month with spin and I feel horribly guilty inside.
I'm averaging about once a week right now which is BAD.
I have great excuses, like my husband was on leave, that's our version of vacation.
My husband is deploying for a year, I want to hang out with him, etc.
Really 45 minutes of being going won't kill me, I've just not made the best decisions.

While at spin, about 3-4 songs/15 minutes into it, I got really light headed all of the sudden.
Jumped off the bike and booked it to the locker room where I threw up.
Not cool.
I hadn't eating anything that day yet ( I know, I know) so really it was just water and spit, but I felt HORRIBLE.
I had a feeling I had caught the stomach bug J had the week before, so I just sat there on the cold tile floor in the locker room and had a little pity party.
While sitting on that floor I just cried.
I REALLY needed it, believe it or not.
It only lasted about 2 minutes.
I stood up, dusted myself off and went back into the spin room and finished the class, another thing that I think might not have been the greatest idea ever, but "A" for effort.

That afternoon is when we went to the range, then we ran home so I could get ready to go to Jeanette's Bridal/House Warming Shower I was helping host along with her mom and her two aunts.
I was still feeling REALLY blah, so I was pretty quiet during the whole thing.
Probably came across snotty, but I didn't feel good!
Even though I had thrown up earlier that day, the sushi her aunt made was calling me so I had to indulge.
The next day I felt much better. We ran errands and did some stuff around the house since this was now his last weekend of leave. By the time we went to bed that Sunday night, I felt so sick.
I felt like I had a billion butterflies in my stomach.
I woke up about 11 pm and it was on.
I was running to the bathroom about every half hour or so from 11pm until about 4am just throwing up anything and everything.
I can honestly say that I don't think I ever got this sick in college, so it's HAD to be a LONG time since it was this bad.
Like, high school!
I stayed home from work on Monday and can honestly say with no embarrassment what-so-ever that I laid on the couch and watched TV ALL day.
I wasn't throwing up anymore but had the part where you have chills but your sweating, your entire body hurts to the touch, etc.
Took a scalding hot shower and had goosebumps the entire time.
Went to bed before 9pm Monday night and woke up at 5am in attempts to go into work that morning. Didn't work.
Went back to bed for another 5 hours, giving me about 15 hours of sleep in a row.
Glorious.
From that point on, I've felt so much better.

The McNew's are coming today! They were our neighbors that moved to AZ several months ago. They are coming for a mini vaca and to see some old friends off before they deploy. They get in tonight sometime so it'll be a fun weekend for all of us.
It's also John's last weekend home, so it'll be bittersweet, but FUN!

Next Tuesday will be John's and my 2 year anniversary!
Fun times.
Don't have plans as of right now, and honestly I don't think we will since we'll be going out with friends a lot this weekend.

Man this is all coming up so freaking fast.
I'm hoping that this means that the next year will go by fast too.
I plan on working a lot.
Working out a lot.
Making several trips to keep myself occupied.
The ones planned so far is a trip to DC with my dearest, Kristen. :)
Then my cousin, Aaron's, college graduation from SNU in OKC.
More trips home for sure (that's for you all you CO people I miss so much!).
And of course Kristen and I are still contemplating a trip to the UK to visit Dana. :)

Some of you have voiced about coming to see ME and just so you know, that would be so amazing.
No words can describe how much it would mean to me for any of you to visit me out here!!
There's not much to do out here, but the beach is always close by and shoot, I live in a Army town.
There's always some type of trouble to get into. :)

The next time I write will probably be after John has left and this blog will finally be my venting station for which it was originally intended.....craziness....!!

More Changes

Well since I last wrote, we have experienced even more changes around here.

1. We DID end up selling our car, but not to the co-worker I referenced to earlier.
2. The buyer paid CASH so our car lien is paid, title got here in the mail today, and we are now a 1 car payment couple!!
3. We have a savings plan set up to buy car #2 when John gets home.
4. We are in our final days of John's predeployment leave as opposed to the early days.
5. The time has gone by fast.
6. There actually IS a queen size guest bed in our guest bedroom which had not been seen in months thanks to the explosion of military gear in that extra room as well as the original box our 56" LCD HDTV came in!

What else is going on......

I am training my second employee at work.
As much as I take on this task as a form of flattery, it came at rough timing.
On Monday, our office manager, counted that I was one of five people left in our department of about 25 that hadn't gotten the flu or some type of cold/bronchitis bug going around...
Thanks Yvonne.
I woke up that next morning with my throat so swollen I could barely swollow and my head was SO congested.
So far I've doubled up on the vitamins, been sleeping propped up on two pillows, and have been drinking TONS of tea and water.
The new girl at work, Kat, probably thinks I have bladder control issues because I seriously have to pee every half hour or so from drinking water so much....
Def won't hurt me that's for sure!!

We bought a GUN!!!
I don't know what kind it is and I don't know anything about it, all I know is it's a black revolver.
It's not the type of gun John pictured for his first gun buy, but it was something mainly meant for me while he is gone, God forbid.
We all know how my last experience went at the gun range, so we are going to try to find an outdoor range this weekend, and I'm just going to have to "soldier up."   :)
Will def let you all know how THAT goes.

Our dear friends the McNews are coming to town!!
They used to be our next door neighbors until a several months ago when they got PCS'd to Arizona.
They were in the 108th MP Co. with John and all his friends and deployed with them last time.
They are coming for a slight mini vaca and also to see their friends off for this deployment.
Even though we'll all be working for some of the days they will be here, we are hoping for some fun memories and def some hibachi and sushi!!

These final days are also becoming very surreal to me.
The closer it gets the more I choose to ignore what's looming ahead of me.
He's scheduled to leave the first week or two of April.
Our 2 year anniversary is on the 30th of March.
So many things happening...!!
Some things good, some things bad.
Well, not BAD, but not really good.

We have a lot of goals for ourselves during this trivial time coming up.
Mostly financial goals, such as getting rid of about 3/4 of our debt, saving up to pay cash for our second car, we both have IRA's set up as well as my 401K we plan on vesting a good chunk of change into, we plan on taking advantage of the military savings program to make our money work for us for once!

I still have my personal goals as far as my health/weight.
Since the beginning of blogging where I listed out my weight, measurements, etc., I know I have lost roughly 10-15 pounds. I haven't gotten remeasured, but I notice a difference for sure, esp in my waist.
My jeans are a bit looser and my shirts aren't as tighter as they once were. :)
I am still aiming to lose about 20 pounds and I think that weight will allow me to keep my curves yet still be a healthier weight. It's not exactly my wedding weight, it's about 10 lbs over, but I'm ok with that. If I lose more, cool, if not, that's ok!

I'll admit I am worried how my mentality will be once he's gone and I finally realize he's not coming back any time soon. Last deployment I had a REALLY hard time with it.
I think part of it was a lot of other changes that were going on at the time.
I graduated college the same week as he left.
I moved home with my parents like every college grad DREAMS of (sarcasm).
I was engaged and needing to plan a wedding without any involvement of John.

I HATED it when people asked me "how I was doing."

Yes, John is deployed.
Yes, it sucks.
No, I DON'T want to talk about it.
When I do, I'll come to YOU.

Needless to say I went and saw the doc and after some tests I was told I had mild depression.
I have never been on to take pills for anything.
I hate going to the doctor.
I feel like I am a big girl and I can deal with big girl issues.
What I didn't realize is that this experience was way over my head, and I had NO control.
That was REALLY hard for me.
With some reluctance I got on some anti depressant meds and it made a WORLD of difference.
I hated that those pills is what it took, but I won't lie, they helped a ton.

Once John got home I went back to the doc and started weining myself off the medicine.
The withdrawls were HORRIBLE.
Danielle McNew can attest to that!!
We'd be grocery shopping and randomly it felt like my brain had a power surge and shorted or something, cause I'd suddenly not remember what I was doing, where I was, or what I was saying.
I had the chills, but was so hot.
Horrible headaches.
Cranky!

Took about two months to get completely off of it, and what a relief it was.
At one time I considered getting back on them.
After moving to NC and settling in a bit, I grabbed the first job that would give me a consistant paycheck.
I struggled with it in so many ways.
I started getting REALLY low self esteem and would come home almost everyday in tears cause I hated it so much.
I actually attribute that experience to my weight gain in some ways.
The only thing that made me happy was hanging out with my pets and my husband.
The hubs and I entertained ourselves the most by not only eating out, but splurging on really unhealthy foods because, as lame as it sounds, I felt entitled to it.
I felt like I had put up with a real crappy week, therefore I am entitled to this queso dip, dinner, and the cheesecake afterwards.
Plus, I have always been a horrible snacker.

Looking back on it now, I'm not only glad I don't have that job anymore, but I'm glad I never got back on those pills.

I know that I'm headed for a long year and I know that it's going to have so many inconsistant ups and downs.

I think I have mentioned before that this deployment has a couple firsts for me.

Last deployment I was in my hometown so I was surrounded by my amazing family and friends to keep me sane.

I have made some great friends here, but it's not home. If that makes any sense!

I was planning a wedding to marry my best friend so I obsessed over this wedding which occupied a lot of my time in multiple ways.

I had my princess Bella to great me at the door everyday when I came home from work.

Now I have Hurley running to the door to greet me, running over Bella AND Jax in the process!! :)

I those furry kids of mine.

Sadly, they are some of the best entertainment money has ever bought for me! US!!

I know there are more, but I can't think of them right now. If I remember I'll post them next time....

Well, here's to the next year and to the survival of the fittest.
This is to all my other Army wives of the 108th MP Co that are going to be surviving with me.
We can do this because we've done it before.

Here's to hoping that the time goes by quickly!!!

My motto from last deployment that I think still pertains to me for this one:

"Distance isn't for the fearful, it is for the bold. It is for those who are willing to spend a lot of time alone in exchange for a little time with the one they love. It is for those who know a good thing when they see it, even if they don't get to see it nearly enough."

Change

Well this time last week I was frantically packing for a quick getaway to CO with the hubs attempting to not tempt myself to stay up late to watch LOST knowing we had a 6 AM flight the next morning.
Needless to say we avoided temptation and went to bed early.
We boarded Hurley at our vet's and took off EARLY in the morning for Raleigh.
Unfortunately for us we didn't take into account that the "snow" storm coming in that night would actually accumulate to anything, so we entered our terminals with only half an hour to spare til take off.
Yes, I said terminals.
Plural.
When I bought these tickets I thought I was being an awesome planner by buying them seperately.
I planned on only staying in CO through the weekend where John was going to stay one full week.
Both leaving from Raleigh on the same day, just coming home on different days.
Naively I assumed since we were leaving on the same day from Raleigh that we'd still be on the same flight.
Def wrong.
Both our planes left at the same time, but he was flown to Detriot then Denver where I was flown to Dallas/FW to Denver.
Of course a delay in Raleigh for de-icing our planes made John almost miss his Detriot-Denver connection but he still managed to get there about an hour and a half before me. How that all worked I don't know.
When having to explain our seperate flight story, we've just told people that we don't play well in tight spaces, so we flew seperately. ;)

My dad picked us up at DIA and immediately hit up Chipotle.
John is hopeless.
Since my dad had to run to a meeting John had to eat in the car, that hopefully gives you a clue how obsessed he is with those stinkin burritos.
Dad dropped us off at my mom and dad's house where I patiently ate my burrito on a table as opposed to my lap.

We walked across the street to visit GG (my grandma!) and see her new house.
We ended up staying at her house for several hours just talking about everything.
I absolutely adore this lady. Luckily John is an awesome sport and she thinks he's great, so it was fun!
She's an 84 year old ball of spunk and although she's convinced that she's deteriorating, I think she's awesome and I hope I have her spirit at that age.
We then trekked to the other end of town to see John's mom whom he hasn't seen since our wedding TWO years ago.
It was great and you could tell that she was just thrilled.

Next day we met up with John's mom, his bro, Jerrod, as well as Karen, our sis in law, and our now 4 year old niece, Audrey, for breakfast at IHOP.

FOUR years old!

I couldn't believe it. He also hadn't seen here since our wedding, so this was probably the last mental picture he had in his mind. :)

She ran up to him just laughing away and gave him the biggest hug I have ever seen from a little one.
Once she let go she kept laughing and stated, "You're cute."
Oh geez.
It's begun at the young age of four.
It was a great breakfast and it was so awesome to see John in such a state of awe.
Audrey was just talking away about anything and everything and he couldn't do anything but sit and smile for the most part.
Last time he saw her she was hardly speaking whole words, so this was an awesome transition to see. :)

After this we went up to Golden Bell in Divide, CO where my dad is now working.
Let me tell ya, being away from CO for two years has kicked my BUTT altitude wise.
OMG.
I got winded getting out of the CAR.
Sadly, no joke.
Anyways, after eating out in Woodland Park, we went back into COS and picked up Audrey from her babysitters and went to spoil her at the toy store.
Dangerous for an uncle that hasn't seen her in a while
DANGEROUS!
One Barbie, pink tiara, and dress up mermaid outfit later, we actually had to hit up the Cingular store where we witnessed another shameless bout of flirting from this little bundle of joy.
My phone literally died while at the toy store and before the trip we found out I was up for a free upgrade, so figured let's go ahead and do this.
We had a sit down with Audrey and told her that if she behaved for a little bit while we got this business done we'd take her to the McDonald's play place and let her play.
Well after a while she got restless and that's where it all began.
She walked up to the salesman (whom J and I went to high school with by the way) and said with batting eyelashes, "I like your shirt."
He laughed and offered to get her a balloon.
"Ok, but it has to be pink," she responds.
Oh really. WOW.
So he came back out with a PINK balloon and handed it to her.
"What do you say Audrey?" I asked.
"Thanks guy," she says.
"Audrey, his name is Steve, say thank you Steve."
"Hi Steve!" She says coily as she WINKS at him.
OMG.
It suddenly occured to me that Steve probably think's his is MY kid.
I told him that she wasn't but he didn't believe me.
Well two hours at the McDonald's play place later, we returned Audrey to her rightful "owners"  and headed out to Scott and Katie Hyskell's home for dinner.

Scott and Katie are our best friends from high school.
True story, Scott and John grew up on the same street along with another kid, Casey, since elementary school.
Well all three of these boys married Katie's.
Go figure.

Scott and Katie had bought their first house within the last year so we were SO excited to see the new digs.
It was so great.
Scott's mom and dad also came over with one of Scott's nieces and nephew.
Mr. & Mrs. Hyskell were like John's second parents, so it was great to see them see each other again.
We ended up staying at their house until after midnight (past 2 AM east coast time!) just talking, laughing, and reminiscing about old times.

Next morning I went to breakfast with a girlfriend from ELEMENTARY school, Lexi Butler.
Man I love that girl.
We've known each other since 2nd grade and although we haven't always been close ALL these years, we have always managed to pick up where we last left off and have a BLAST just talking and reminiscing about more old times.
We met up at the most awesome "cafe," Montigues which was a fave in high school. Love it.

For the rest of the day I hung out with the amazing Kristen Cook, whom I've known for about 5-6 years now thanks to our wonderful Dana Fraley (my college roommates and Golden Bell counselor with Dana).
We went to Park Meadows where I was reminded of what a REAL mall feels and looks like.
Yes, that was meant to be offensive Fayetteville.
We met up with my mom later and picked up my bro from DIA who was coming home for Spring Break. Kristen is like another sister (whether he likes it or not!) to him so all four of us went out to eat and had a great time just hanging out.
LOTS of laughter and fun times.
Drew, mom, and I checked into a hotel in Denver that night, so I would already be in Denver for my 6 AM flight the next morning.
With a 3:30 wake up call and a shuttle ride to the airport, I was on my way back to NC.

Once I got home that Saturday afternoon I was able to collect my thoughts and look back on my crazy quick trip.
I saw who I wanted, what I wanted, where I wanted.
As much as it all felt the same it also felt so different.
I'll be honest and tell you it was the weirdest thing to get into bed with John in my parents house let alone two doors down from them.
Buildings, restaraunts, landmarks I had always known and seen were gone or being torn down for expanding roads and highways.
As many things were different there were still a lot of the same.
Same friends. Same family. Same stories.
Good times.
Those are the things I'll make more crazy trips back for.

I wouldn't miss it or the shameless four year old flirting for the world.