Leaky Souls

Yesterday, my morning erupted with the words, "Hunter's truck hit an IED."

I knew immediately that Hunter would be coming home breathing, but grief hit me with the same force that Stryker had as it was breaking the bones in Hunter's body.  After ten years of watching friends bury husbands, struggling to keep up with the needs of our wounded, and growing accustomed to phone calls broken by rocket attacks, it finally became real for my family.  I sobbed.

I wanted to see that my baby brother wasn't hurting, and that he wasn't scared. I thought of my parents and how scared they must have been.  I wanted to see my sister's pretty face.  My heart ached for every soldier I had welcomed home after being blown up, or shot, or broken in that horrible country.  I thought of their families, their moms, and dads, and sisters, and the anguish that they too had survived.  At once, guilt took over.  I thought of the Jetton babies born without their father present and the Lorenzo family I never met.  I hear about how much she is struggling to raise her boys without her soldier. He was killed in an IED attack barely a year ago. 

I think it was today that yesterday finally ended for me.  It ended early with my final surrender to exhaustion. I spent yesterday making phone calls, jumping to read texts, searching flights off this island, researching the quickest route from New Jersey to Walter Reed, filling out, filing, then correcting and refiling tedious Army paperwork, and wiping tears from the corners of my eyes.

I didn't realize it at the time, but I wasn't really crying, I was leaking.  Ten years of worry and loss were seeping out of the hole that IED blast tore through my soul.  I've mentioned before that I've been called cold because I never cry during deployments.  That has never been true. I've never been cold, just bundled up too tightly to allow any shrapnel in.  I guess, when your baby brother calls from Afghanistan at 5:30 in the morning to ask our Dad, "Hey, whatcha doing?" the barriers fall away pretty quickly.

I didn't wake up on Saturday to just the, "Hunter's hit an IED" bit.  It was preceded by my husband's reassurance, "Hey, Sweetheart.  I've got some great news.  Hunter gets to come home early."  Yes, he is hurt.  Yes, I'm still scared for some reason. Yes, I suddenly feel the need to shoot an insurgent. Yes, he will have a long recovery.  BUT he is coming home.  Every time my chest begins to swell with bitterness, shock, fear, grief, anger, and homicidal tendencies, I am choosing to hear my sweet husband's calm words, "I've got some great news."