Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Praying For His Career- Part 1

Today is the first day of my “new normal”. My four oldest kids are at school. My 2 year old is running around the house. And my husband just left for his first day of his last semester at St Louis University. He’ll graduate with his Masters in May and then he’ll begin the doctorate program in human biology at Logan College of Chiropractic. Yep… my husband, the MP, the soldier, is going to be a doctor. This decision has been a huge adjustment in his life. It’s been a huge adjustment in my life, and in the lives of our kids. Together we talked about it, we’ve prayed about, we’ve researched his options. He’s going to school through the VA’s Voc Rehab program, so we had to look into which courses/programs they would allow him to take. We had to figure out what he would be getting paid during this time. We had to talk about his physical ability to go through these rigorous classes. We had to talk about his long term goals, his short term goals, his goals for our family. We had to talk about how this would affect his standing with the military- when he gets his Masters, would he become an officer? What opportunities are there for him in a medical unit? What about the other opportunities that we had previously discussed? How does this fit in with our goals and dreams for our family? We’ve had to make a lot of decisions lately and not one of them were we willing to make on our own. Not one could we make without discussing it together AND asking God for His guidance. As God has been opening windows of opportunity in my husband’s career, we’ve willingly, obediently followed. We know it’s going to be hard. We know that for Bob it means long hours and school and longer hours studying at home. We know for him it means extreme fatigue, mental exhaustion, an hour drive into the city every morning and an hour drive home every night. For me it means crawling into bed alone while he studies. For me it means being patient with a husband who will more frequently become short tempered, frustrated and tired. For the kids it means less play time with Daddy and less family activities. The decisions he makes affects us all.
“Praying For His Career” is going to be a multi-post entry as we come together as military wives, seeking God’s grace and protection over our husbands. As military wives, our husbands’ careers are more than a 9-5 job that he leaves at the office. Our husbands’ careers are a way of life. His career determines where we will live. His career determines whether or not he will be in harm’s way. His career determines how often we’ll be apart. His career determines how often we’ll get to see how parents or our siblings. His career affects where we can shop. His career affects our daily lives.
When you are married to someone in the military, you are married to the military itself. Sometimes you’re blessed enough to have the opportunity to help in the decision making process like Bob and I are currently are in deciding which path he should take in continuing his education. Sometimes you’re cursed with not having any say in the fact that your husband is going to deploy for the third time, leaving you home and pregnant alone. Whether you have a say in it or not, God’s hand is on it and He is not surprised by any decision that is made. This is why it is so important for us as wives to lift up our husband’s careers.
I encourage you to begin asking God to search your heart in regards to your attitude towards your husband’s career as we come together asking God to bless and keep our warrior husbands.

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