Well That Sucked

And then there were 3....again.

Nick left this morning to head to OCS (for 10 weeks), just like he has every summer since coming here to Boston.

Except this time, he's going as a candidate and not a Sgt Instructor.

Talk about the roles being reversed, huh?

One last photo...

Dannika is no stranger to separation and deployments.

She's been dealing with it in some way shape and form every single year of her short (almost) 5 years of life.

But today was way different than every other time Nick has left....even different than when he left for 8 weeks at the beginning of just this year (this past January).

This past week, she's been really attached to Nick, and careful to not let him out of her sight.

She's had moments where she will be carrying about her day, and all of a sudden she freaks out asking for daddy and where he's at.

He went outside to check the mail one day last week, and she came running into the kitchen in panic wondering where daddy went.

It's like she had an irrational fear all week that he would leave without saying goodbye to her.

She's been waking up in the middle of the night all week, and has made her way into our bed next to Nick (something she rarely ever does).

 I've always thought Dannika was SO good at separations, because they never seemed to phase her.

She's always been so resilient, and if anything, I thought she handled it better than me.

But today, I realized that these separations just get harder as she gets older, and I experienced it firsthand for the first time.

This morning, she cried over silly little things that she would normally never cry about.

I knew it was her way of acting out how she was feeling.

Watching her communicate to us that way was the most heartbreaking thing for this mama bear's heart to handle.

I just keep telling myself to breathe, relax....

This is (hopefully) the last summer for at least the next few years that we will have to spend apart.

So the countdown has begun...

68 days as of today until we see Nick again...

Doesn't it feel like a lot of pressure on the last day before your spouse leaves for deployment or training to make the day special?

I always try and make Nick's last day home about him and the kids, and no matter how hard I try to make it "meaningful", in my mind, I always feel like I didn't do enough. (#milspoprobs)

I always cook whatever Nick wants for his last "home cooked meal".

Most of the time, he wants Texas style chili, and Texas style chili is what I made him.

After putting Mattis to bed, we all went out on our back patio to roast marshmallows over a fire pit and make s'mores!

Normally, Nick and I have "just the two of us" coffee date every morning before he goes to work.

Today, we invited Dannika, and let her have a chocolate milk with us.

She felt pretty important to be able to join mama and daddy for "coffee".

 

I've had moments to jump on the computer to post a few blogs, but this last week was spent enjoying time together as a family.

I'm so behind on my "daily reading".

So now that Nick is gone, I plan on spending some time today when the kids are napping/gainfully employed to catch up!