Nine Months

Nine months. I've been here for nine months. I want to scoff at...well, nobody really. Just the statement itself, I suppose. It sounds ridiculous. Nine months usually feels like a lot of time, but this go-round, it hasn't at all.

When I look back on everything that's gone on since I've been here, ok yeah, it makes sense. Logically. All of that stuff couldn't have happened in a smaller amount of time. And all the holidays we've been through while living here certainly tell the tale. Everything but Christmas, New Year's, and Valentines Day, all which are coming soon enough.

But it doesn't feel like nine months have gone by. When the days run together, they start to blur and few take up significant room in my memory storage. I can remember clear as day the 'official' day of my move. It was a terrifying and uncomfortable day, but I knew if I could push through it, it wouldn't be long before my husband was at my side again.

Nine months also means how long he's been home, and it's the longest consecutive length of time I've had him with me. If not for his injury, it might not have been long before he was shipped back overseas. Now there is no more chance of that, and I am one grateful wife. I don't have to sleep alone while he would go to train in the field for weeks at a time, or hear the news that is never fun to hear: "I got my orders. We're deploying on such and such date for such and such time," and have to figure out what to do with myself with him gone (besides pray and worry). Never again for us.

This will also be our first Christmas (and New Year's) together as a married couple. We were married during those holidays last year, but he wasn't home to celebrate them with me. Having him here for them now is much more than many couples will get this year, so I consider myself blessed.

Nine months of healing.

Nine months of pain.

Nine months of learning.

Nine months of anxiety.

Nine months of hope and positivity.

Nine months of planning for better things.

Nine months of wishing I was home, and nine months I'm grateful I wasn't.

Nine months have I been out on my own, and nine months of experience that I wouldn't trade for anything.

Nine months of fear.

And nine months of faith.