Day 3: Erbil, Iraq What We Should Know, But Don't

Today I got to fly into Erbil, Iraq and spend a lot of time
getting to know what deployment is like with our female soldiers
there. Seeing deployment living conditions for them was quite eye
opening. Not that they were poor, in fact our service members are
well taken care of, but there are so many things we are told that
they try to describe to us that can’t convey it accurately.
Honestly, it has been a challenge to figure out how I could
convey them to you in a new way. There are some things that you
can only understand when you see them, but there is still a lot
to learn. For example, I remember begging Matt to send me photos
of where he was living. I appreciated what he sent so I could
visualize him sleeping and eating there. The problem with photos
is that it is only within a frame. You don’t get a panoramic view
of the scope of the land or layout. I have done my best to try to
capture pictures of things that stood out to me and surprised me
instead of things you may have already seen a lot. So Erbil’s
living conditions are a more rough than I expected. Honestly
though I didn’t have an expectation to begin with. I am embracing
my overall ignorance of a lot of things. Being one military
spouse in the Army community, I am continuously reminded with how
much I don’t know. Our spouses and families need to be a whole
lot more educated! It’s like we need a good history lesson and
monthly briefing on what is happening in the world. I am more
appreciative than ever of our press that come along on these
trips that ask the right questions, think it through, and then
form it all into words for our culture’s short attention span to
absorb in 30 seconds or less. For heaven’s sake, we are training
and sending our service members out to dealwith the evil in the
world, we owe it to ourselves to learn about it. I’m especially
glad my husband gave me a briefing on Syria a couple months ago,
cause I still feel naive. That being said, I was honored to be
grouped up with the Secretary’s wife Stephanie Carter and her
staff to see a lot of how our soldiers live and spend their down
time. We saw their barracks that were tents filled with bunked
cots. I can’t imagine sleeping in tight quarters there for 9
months, even though they are nice. The cots were lower to the
ground than I expected and you have to roll out of bottom bunk.
Going off of yesterday’s conversation, the care package issue of
family sending trinkets for their living space made complete
sense now. They literally owned a bunk. One woman was thrilled to
get a bathmat though where she could at least put her feet on
carpet in the morning. When we walked in, it smelled like
peppermint. Not because it was a female tent, though, but because
it keeps mice away. Snakes are another issue for them getting
into the tent. Showers and latrines were interesting with only a
curtain separating them from the next stall. When I went to the
restroom in the main building the wall didn’t go to the ceiling
and I could hear the men on their side talking. The USO was a
small tent with a TV getting a poor reception of the Today Show,
a barber shop chair and Star Wars playing on another TV. It was
filled with books and DVDs, understandably the most comfy place
there. The mail room was a friendly as you would think it would
be. A truly happy place with Christmas lights, goodies from care
packages, and smiling faces when you walked in the door! The gym
was also nicer than I thought, though walled with fun house
mirrors that were not glass- just in case anyone might want to
use broken glass for weapons. I was not expecting that. I
honestly didn’t think they would have mirrors, but plastic warped
mirrors at least made it look like a gym. Otherwise, gravel,
gravel, gravel, gravel. I understand now the appreciation of
carpet and bare feet. I saw service member trying to run on the
gravel, several of the girls wth me who wore flats struggled
slightly through the walk. Even in the room where I joined the
press again where there was carpet, I thought about how no one
was likely to ever take their boots and socks off and walk
around. Hard cold floors, wood platforms, and gravel are about
all you will see. Here are my #PowerofMarriage tips for today: 1.
Service Members: if you are deployed- take videos (if possible)
to give your family a better picture that is more accurate than a
photograph. That may sound obvious with today’s technology, but
families will only be able to picture exactly what they see. 2. I
underestimated the power of “embracing the suck”. Often said by
service members who have to live/exist in rough situations,
embracing the suck is something that surely changes a person.
Perhaps service members get a bad wrap for being cold or brash,
not as compassionate when we might think the situation could use
it. But the amount of grit and perseverance that is built in
one’s character in situations like these can lead a family
through the toughest of times. Lean on them during seasons of
difficulty. Service members can typically lean on their spouse
when an assessment check on the relationships in the home are
needed. 3. You are serving and loving your spouse by knowing
enough about the world’s events that effect his/her job. You may
get weary of hearing what they do over an over, but it is part of
a bigger puzzle and plays an important part in the system.
Understand as much as you can what is happening in the world so
that they don’t have to keep explaining it over and over again.
(Sorry, hun) I’ll have more for you tomorrow! Stick around, you
never know where I’ll end up next!