by Melissa Avery

Created on: May 22, 2009

In 2003 my husband received orders to Fort Carson, Colorado and in March we packed up the house, the daughter and the dog and headed out. At the time, I was 8 months pregnant with my son and, needless to say, that was a very miserable trip; but the Army waits for no baby when it's time to report in. Not to mention I had to leave friends and family to give birth in a completely unfamiliar place. We stayed at a friends by - the- week hotel while my husband in - processed as the Battalion Medic for the 10th Special Forces Group. My initiation into "real" military life, and the sacrifices that go with it, had begun.

Previous to this duty, my husband had been part of the Military Free - Fall School in Yuma, Arizona. That is where I had met him, through civilian employment on the post. The lifestyle there was pretty relaxed. There wasn't a whole lot of saluting or segregation between ranks, except for "Upper" and "Lower" housing. The Free-Fall uniform consisted of shorts, or sweats and t - shirts. Not much different than I was used to in other relationships, except that he was on call 24 hours a day and when he wanted to retire he couldn't because there was a stop-loss in effect to prevent losing soldiers from the service.

When we arrived in Colorado, it was a whole different story. Up and out early, home late and in uniform every day. The first time I saw someone salute my husband I looked behind us to see who was there. I was as big as an elephant and going from one of the lowest points in the U.S. to one of the highest really did me in. About two weeks after we arrived I was admitted to the hospital in order to induce labor. The move had contributed to Preeclampsia and my blood pressure shot through the roof. My ankles were so swollen I couldn't bend them and I had taken to wearing my husbands bedroom slippers. My husband was on post and I had our then 5 year old daughter with us at the hospital. He finally got my message and showed up. He was there for the birth and even helped deliver our son, but was in and out a lot during our recovery period. When we went "home" 5 days later, my son was on oxygen and would remain on oxygen for 6 months.

Over the next 3 years, I spent more time without him than with him. In 2003 he was sent for approximately 9 weeks EMT training in San Antonio. On January 18th, 2004 he came home from duty and said "Honey, I'm going to Iraq". On January 20, 2004 I saw him off for the first deployment to Iraq that

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