The day we have simultaneously been dreading and looking forward to…. D-day... Deployment Day / Departure Day / Damn the military Day etc.
Me on D-Day after Man left:
New season of Grace & Frankie? Check.
Partial nudity/old granny panties? Check (hey, it’s bloody 40 degrees here, a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do).
Tub of refined sugar-free salted caramel ice-cream? Check (at least it’s sorta healthy, right?).
Happy puppy sleeping on my feet? Check. Cold glass of wine? Double check (I mean, it’s definitely a double serving’s worth).
Fast forward: it’s been a couple weeks since Man left on his first real deployment. My little countdown app tells me he’s coming home in a number of days that’s still in triple digits. But we are taking it one day at a time, because we have to. And I am definitely seeing the glass half full this time around: I have decided to live in these months as Jim Carry in ‘Yes Man’. And I am LOVING LIFE as a Yes Woman! So far I have said yes to going out on a school night, twice (how wild!), the open air cinema, picnics, weekend getaways in the ‘valhalla of vino’, an overnighter in a luxury house with a pool, brunch with mimosas and to an epic marathon of Sabrina the Teenage Witch s3, with my gorgeous friends. I even said yes to an erotic temple dance course (and left my granny panties at home). Oh and of course, there is my full time job in between all of that. The first week I was almost too busy to miss the love of my life. But why is it so much more doable this time around?
Perhaps it is because by now I am used to being a Mipa. Perhaps it is because we have already survived a year apart before. Perhaps it is because I have my dream job, dream house, dream friends and hobbies, and that feels like a pretty damn good compensation for the hardship that military life brings. Or perhaps it is simply because we worked very, very hard to prepare for this deployment mentally, physically, emotionally, logistically and financially. We discussed wills, set-up auto payments for bills, fixed up things around the houses, had many long late night conversations, many cuddles, foot massages, many laughs, many Netflix marathons, many delicious meals, many morning workout sessions, many tears and, unfortunately, even many arguments... Now I am not saying that Man and I are the perfect couple - we are as perfectly imperfect as it gets. But quarreling is just not our style. We tend to be very constructive and compassionate communicators. In the last few weeks pre deployment however, there was a fair bit of finger pointing and getting unnecessarily wound-up over unimportant things. Unimportant in hindsight that is. During the argument itself they seemed like life or death matters.
I couldn’t understand why we were wasting such precious time, our last moments together for a long time, bickering like an old married couple. Then I learned the one and only useful thing I ever learned from another dramatised, old-fashioned American military wives book: Man and I were playing the ‘’I’d rather be mad than sad’’ game. Apparently this game is commonly played in the last few weeks pre D-Day, and the players don’t even realise they’ve entered the game. Our subconscious is convinced it will be easier for us to say goodbye and to be separated from our significant other, if we are annoyed at them. Mad at them even. Of course though, that is never the case. The separation becomes even harder as it is covered in a blanket of guilt and shame, and coated with a thick layer of regret.
I also learned (shit, this means I actually learned 2 things from an American Mipa book - I’ll be darned!) that the ‘rather-be-mad-than-sad-game’ is often preceded or followed by the ‘Siamese twin' game. The objective of this game is to tightly hold onto your partner at all times, only letting them go for a toilet break (though diehard players allegedly follow their loved one even into the toilet, and use the opportunity to brush their teeth and keep chatting at the same time). FOMO is the motivation for the couple executing every activity whilst being joint at the hip. Fear of missing out on a single precious minute with your loved one, because there will be many months where you won’t be able to clasp onto their arm as desperately lovingly as you are doing now. But this game is as successful as Donald Trump trying to compose an intelligent Tweet. It just doesn’t work.
What does work, is designing a new game. A game where we use intelligent problem-solving to navigate level 1: the Minefield of Arguments. In level 2 we must keep afloat whilst crossing the Lake of Sadness. Level 3 requires endurance whilst swinging through the Jungle of Temptation (and again: leave those granny panties out... or off ;) ). In level 4 we must employ courage in the Cave of Fear, where one only survives by shining a torch over difficult emotions. Last but not least: level 5 is the The Grand Finale where…. *drum roll*….. you must take a stroll down the street with the dog, have a whisky and a cuddle, cook dinner and get your 8 hours of sleep - minimum 5 consecutive days. Doing this restores any health damage you incurred in previous levels and adds bonus points for ‘wellbeing, happiness and stamina’. But don’t be fooled. This deceivingly simple level is the most difficult challenge to navigate. It’s the advanced level of the game, not for the fainthearted. Because only the strongest, the bravest, the smartest can carry on normally under the abnormal circumstances of an upcoming D-Day.
Ready, player one?