Finding Your Deployment Groove
It took about one minute after saying goodbye to my husband for it to feel like my entire world was turned upside down.
Living just the two of us and our dog in our tiny condo, I had grown accustomed to having him almost within an arm’s reach the majority of the time. We spent almost all of our time together, and once he left, I found myself doing our usual routine but becoming overwhelmingly saddened by his absence at every point during my day.
As the deployment days went by, slowly but surely I found my groove. I developed a new routine. I didn’t like that I had to create a routine without him in it, but once I did, I realized it was a lot easier to live in this new (temporary) world rather than try to continue the routine we had before, because it was a constant reminder of his absence.
For me, I dove into exercise and focusing on my nutrition. I’ve always loved to take care of my body and see what it is capable of. I enjoy trying new workouts or new ways of eating and seeing what happens. It took a few months before I realized this was the perfect time to see how far these interests could take me. The year my husband was deployed became a lot easier once I created a new routine that included things that I was excited to do, each and every day.
I started working with a nutritionist, and I joined several gyms that each had unique workouts. The pandemic threw a bit of a wrench in that, but I bought an online workout video streaming service and tried multiple new workout programs that way. I loved the socialization it brought me, the time that flew by while I was at the gym, and being physically tired helped me sleep at night.
I also spent hours planning out my meals and meal prepping. I spent time reading about different recipe ideas or experimenting with my own. I was determined to find a way to make a healthy satisfying dessert that fit into my eating plan.
Spoiler alert: it took ten months, but I finally did it!
As time went by, I grew to love my new routine. I loved my new workouts and eating plans. I loved how time-consuming it was. And I loved how it made me feel. I never stopped missing my husband or our old routine together, because nothing could replace that. But finding this new groove of doing things that I enjoyed helped the days go by and made me feel better.
It wasn’t easy to accept that I had to develop a new routine, my own routine. I definitely fought it for a little while. But I now realize why finding your groove during a deployment is so necessary. It allows you to live without the constant sadness of their absence in everything you’re used to doing.
Find what makes you happy and what you are passionate about and dive right in.
