General Suspicious Of Normal ...

[Basinah]

I want to start this by apologizing to anyone who finds references to "my soldier" offensive, but I don't really know what else to call him, and he does not object to the term himself, so that's what I am going to use.

He is hours away from heading to the base he will deploy from, and days from heading back into an active theater of war for 10-12 months. And he is the calmest, most polite he has been in about 5 months.

While the base hospital agrees his PTSD is flaring up, they have decided, it seems, that it is not "bad enough" to pull him from this deployment.

I had a really great 2 hour MSN conversation with my soldier last night. We are not in the same province, and most of our communication right now is phone or MSN.

Our conversation was normal. We joked about stuff, made small talk, debated things ... there was no anger, no shutting down, no pushing away, no snapping.

And I feel like a horrible person because I am second guessing the "normal", waiting for the other shoe to drop, or wondering if he is trying to manipulate me into telling the SW that did his screening that he is "fine".

I feel like I should just accept this at face value, but I can't. I know this doesn't mean "everything is all better now".

Why can't I just take this and be happy?

 

[Nicolette]

Welcome to the forum.

It is normal to be apprehensive of behaviour that is out of the ordinary...in your case it being normal behaviour of your solider. It is a natural instinct to pull away from someone who hurts us and even though all is well you know how it can be and that is something your mind will hang on to as a protective mechanism. That is why when people have had bad/abusive relationships or affairs etc they often struggle to come back from it even if both make the effort as the past is ingrained in the subconscious and is often brought to the forefront of our minds.

 

[ISupportHer]

Thank you for sharing.

All I feel I can add is that I, too, wonder when the other shoe will drop when things are seemingly stable. My situation is different but I wanted you to know I understand, I feel, what you say.