The Five Stages of Pre-Deployment

For much of the world, the “war” is winding down. Military budgets are being slashed to make way for more immediately apparent domestic demands. More and more medals are being awarded to heroes for actions taken in a conflict that is quickly fading from public awareness.

Except in my home and the homes of thousands of military families.

In my home, we are living the emotional roller coaster that is the stages of pre-deployment. Not familiar with these stages? In many ways, they mimic the stages of grief.

Here is the process:

First Stage: Denial

We found out there was a deployment on the calendar before we PCS’d to our current duty station, but we were distracted by a rather long TDY. So for several months, we are able to largely ignore the impending separation. We made vague plans with no timetable, referenced potential career impact for my service member, and occasionally talked about things that needed to happen before he left.

For the most part, we pretended that nothing was looming. It was easy—although stateside, he was a thousand miles away, and my son and I were focused on learning about our new community and getting settled without him.

Stage Two: Anxiety

After months of denial, we slowly rolled into a slow acknowledgement of his imminent departure. Much of the world sees the drawdown as a “return to normal” of sorts. For those of us within the military community, it is a time of not quite bearable uncertainty. We live with constant change as it is. But since last summer, we’ve dealt with threats of not getting paid, drastic changes to our health care, closing of programs, and the general circus of watching politicians thank us for our sacrifices at the same time they claim we are spoiled, overcompensated, and overstaffed.

During that same period, we’ve attended memorials for service members who died in service to their country, watched our friends battle with the visible and invisible wounds of war, and tried to march on. Because another deployment is coming down the pipe. During this stage of pre-deployment, we fight a little more but forgive quickly, as there is always the knowledge that he’s leaving.

Stage Three: Planning

To get the anxiety under control, we start to plan. In our house, my service member and I take different paths. I focus on preparing for the deployment—the errands, shopping lists, tasks that need to get done before he leaves. I obsess a bit over car maintenance (I hate handling car issues, which always happen when he’s gone). I create files and binders in an effort to somehow predict and prepare for every possible scenario. It’s my way of telling myself that, yes, I can handle what is coming.

My service member, on the other hand, plans for the deployment itself—in his mind he’s already there. He goes into war mode. He works harder, exercises harder, reads everything he can find about what’s going on over there right now and what analysts are predicting. He creates workout plans (because that’s his stress coping mechanism downrange). All of those other details (that I’m obsessing over) are just details that are in the way of him getting his job done. In a way, he takes the separation harder than I do. So hard, sometimes, that he can’t think about it and simply pushes it away with a single-mindedness that I desperately admire. The dichotomy between our planning creates tension, which slowly frays our nerves.

Stage Four: Get Gone Already!

As the actual departure is measured in weeks and days that fit onto this month’s calendar page, as he brings home a living room full of multi-cam, as the foot lockers in the garage are emptied and ready to be packed, the tension becomes too much. Deployment gets attractive because it means an end to this waiting, to the inevitability of his departure.

If he would just leave then we can get started on dealing with our new reality. I begin to long for the routine that I know we’ll find even while I dread its reality—that he won’t be there to run to Walmart for children’s Tylenol or to run by the store on the way home. But I feel guilty, so I also cook his favorite meals and eat out whenever he seems even slightly inclined to do so. I know he feels the same guilt. He knows he’s more focused on downrange than home, that he’s ready to leave us—because as much as he hates the separation, he firmly believes in living this life of service.

For him, the guilt shows in gifts as he tries to make sure that we have what we need: A new phone, a resturaunt-grade blender, a new set of pots and pans (yeah, he’s not the romantic sort). At this stage, his departure looms over every conversation.

Stage Five: Wallowing

Although we’re not there yet, I know it’s coming. As we get closer and closer, I’ll find myself not moving his things. His dirty clothes will remain on the floor. His coffee mugs will remain on the nightstand and in my car. I’ll have trouble sleeping and refuse to watch anything even vaguely romantic and find myself turning off the radio with suspiciously red eyes (I’ve never been a pretty crier).

Like our previous deployments, I’ll give myself until one week after his plane is wheels up to wallow. I never make it that long. But, for a few days, I’ll live on my stockpile of Ramen and let my 4-year-old eat PB&J for dinner. We won’t go many places, and we’ll watch a bunch of movies. I’ll stay up way too late and check my phone neurotically.

But, like we’ve done before, we’ll make a new normal.

We’ll create a routine.

Until then, we’ll muddle through the five stages of pre-deployment, and we’ll find a way.