Return to the Home Front
At long last, my husband is back from Iraq.
by Korinthia Klein
October 5, 2007
During the fifteen months my husband was deployed to Iraq, I had to function as a single parent. It was an exhausting, stressful time — so exhausting, in fact, that my sleep-researcher brother totaled up the number of hours of sleep I was averaging during Ian's deployment and declared I should be dead. But as hard as it was having Ian away (see the Babble essay I wrote back in the spring for details), the idea of having him back at the end of the summer also caused me to worry about what readjustment would be like for all of us.
There's a stock image of the family reunited. As the wife awaiting her husband's return from war, I was supposed to be giddy, all happy preparations and excitement. In truth, I was extremely irritable the week before Ian's plane finally landed in Milwaukee. Anticipation drawn out over such a long period of time can make you feel sick. The sheer exhaustion was catching up with me and I worried I would collapse in the home stretch. I ate too much, was short-tempered with the kids (now closing in on six, four and one), and a little scared. It's hard to welcome someone back into the most intimate folds of your life when you're not sure who that person might be anymore.
The scene where the wife and kids meet the returning soldier did not go at all as planned. My husband wanted to see us at the gate as he stepped off the plane, but the guest passes we needed to pass through security took more than an hour to get. The kids got squirrelly. The baby got hungry. There were a lot of little shoes to take off and put back on. The stroller had to be collapsed. My daughter's backpack full of stuffed animals had to be searched for bombs. We got lost trying to find the gate. We missed Ian, paged him. He missed us, 
By the time I got my arms around Ian, all I could do was sob.paged us. By the time we all found each other at the information desk, I was shaken and frustrated.
Aden ran to her daddy and hugged him. Mona followed her big sister's lead. By the time I got my arms around Ian, all I could do was sob. I was happy to see him and angry that he'd been gone. I wept with relief and joy and regret and fatigue. (The scene was politely ignored by passing strangers.) On the drive home, there was too much to say, and no way to say it in a van full of small children. Ian was able to let go of the frustration of the airport instantly. He said in Iraq you learned to let the past be history because you needed all your attention in the new moment. Still grouchy, I worried we were already on a different page.
And in the weeks that followed, there were plenty of things to get used to. Ian marveled at the quiet as we went to sleep, because he'd lived so long with mortar fire and the constant whine of generators and military jets. I kept forgetting that he didn't know where things belonged and that he still had to be introduced to some of the people and places the kids and I know best.
But we quickly established a new routine. School started. We potty-trained our toddler. The children adjusted remarkably well. It's hard to believe Quinn's daddy was a stranger to him only a few weeks ago. He rides around in his father's arms as if it's the most natural place from which to survey the world. The baby has crying spells that Ian at first took personally, but I reminded him that it's hard to compete with a breast-feeding mother no matter who you are.
©2007 Korinthia Klein and Nerve Media
About the Author
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Korinthia Klein is a violin maker and mother of three in Milwaukee, WI. She and her husband are currently collaborating on a book chronicling both their experiences during his deployment in Iraq. |
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