April, you’re here again (and now almost over) and like every year, you represent something so meaningful in my life, not just for me, but for my child as well. Month of the Military Child. I’ve written a couple of blog posts about it (you can read them here and here), but this year feels a little different.

Last year, I had no real concept of struggling through a long deployment with a child and this year, well, I do. Don’t get me wrong, I was around when my own mom had to solo parent, but it’s different from this side of things. While I’m sure I felt for my mom when she was going through it, nothing compares to seeing your child deal with deployments. I was “lucky” Hudson didn’t fully understand what was going on (though, we are dealing with the repercussions this side of the deployment).

While I can always comment on how tough deployment was for me (and for all military spouses no doubt), this past year I got to see it through my child’s eyes, and through the eyes of my friends’ children.

These children go days (sometimes weeks) without talking to their parent, and even when they get to, it’s sometimes only minutes (we were fortunate enough to have amazing communication with the husband when he was deployed, and I certainly didn’t take that for granted). These are the children who don’t understand that every helicopter they see isn’t daddy flying (or every man in uniform isn’t “Dada”). These are the children who rely on one parent to be both parents in every situation you can imagine. These are the children who are upset when daddy isn’t home, and these are the children who go through things like separation anxiety when their military parent leaves AND when they come home.

Here’s the thing though, these are the children who are strong and resilient beyond belief. You’ll hear it over and over again, but it’s because it’s true! These are the children who step up when they’re needed and who never fail to make us see just how blessed we are as military families. These are the children who learn to deal with the situations they’re handed and these are certainly the children who make all the struggles worth it.

My heart goes out to those children with a deployed parent, especially during these difficult times, and I’m sending good thoughts for every parent raising these amazing children on their own right now!

Photography by: Hannah Foulke Photography, Jacksonville, NC   

You can find more of her beautiful work here!