Dealing with Deployment

So I have been house hunting… online this is the hardest thing I have ever done. Knowing I can’t sign a lease without my husband being here and knowing that when we get back we have to be in VA till his leave is approved is making this even harder. What is worse is that we can’t have an apartment; we can’t live on base because we have a pit bull.  Even with using a realtor it is very had to find a good house.  So that is the craziness of the next couple of months but what is helping get me through this deployment is my family and friends. Also it is keeping busy, and looking forward to the future.

This is the number one question that I get from people. How do you do it, how are you not sad every day and how do you keep going? Well to answer those questions ……

1   1.  I keep in my head that he is coming home, that I will see him on Skype and that he will talk to me all he can.  You have to stay positive and surround yourself with positive and happy people.

2   2.  I keep busy, I am still doing school and for the first half of the deployment I was working. I also see friends and go to the dog park with my dog. Staying busy is something that will help to keep your mind from always going back to the fact that your s/o is away.  Yes it is still there but keeping busy will keep you from thinking about it all day long.

3   I go and see his sister and her kids a lot. I also go see both my sisters as much as I can. Family is the best support you can have during a deployment. You can talk to them and they will in their own ways understand because they miss you s/o as much as you do.

4. I have a journal that I write in as much as I can, also I started this blog, not only to possibly help other people but as a way to get out what I'm thinking. You should always have a way to get out what is in your head. When you keep all your emotions inside you will at some point crack in one way or another.

I was not perfect at the beginning of this deployment nor am I perfect now but these are some of the things that have kept me from breaking down all the time. I still do whenever I see something on tv about a homecoming or when I am just having a really hard couple of day but that is normal. I hope that helped :)

-Brienne Mahaffey

More about me and my puppies.

So I'm going to start this out with a GO FALCONS! They are me and my husbands team so this win today was a very big deal. Even though we didn't get to watch it together, we did get to talk the whole time on Facebook. So that was the highlight of my day :)
So before I talked about communication. and today I thought I would talk more about my life. I gave you a small look at who I am. So now I'll tell you more.
 I am a huge animal lover and would love to run my own rescue one day. I own two rescue dogs, a Pit and a Ridgeback mix. Both of them are my life, I only wish I could do more. I am glad that my husband loves animals as much as I do but he has the strength to say no unlike me. :) I hope to one day foster puppies and dogs until I can do more.

 I have had my dog Bella since she was a month old. I rescued her from the ASPCA. I new the moment I picked her up that she was the puppy for me. She loves taking pictures and even more she loves food. She will do anything you want for food. She loves her daddy and is so sad that he is not home with us right now. This is Bella the day I brought her home.

Harley on the other hand I have had since he was 2. He was my sisters dog, but when her dogs started fighting she couldn't keep both. Knowing she could never put him in a shelter and knowing she had a sister who loved him, he came to live with me. He is a bit pickier with food but loves toys and cuddling with his mama. This is Harley and his cousin Rocky when they were both little.

I am also a very big family person. I have a very big family in NY who I don't see as much as I would like, but my sisters, parents, and grandparents are here and that's what matters. I am also very close with my husbands family, I go and see them as much as I can. I would do anything for those in my family knowing that they are the people who will always be there for me. I also have 3 girlfriends who are like family and no matter what I will always be there for them. I love my family and friends and mostly I love my husband who loves me for me and doesn't wanna change a single thing about me.  I believe everyone is blessed in their own ways, you just need to look on the bright side of life. I am also very blessed to be able to write this blog about my life and maybe help people maybe just a little . :)

COMMUNICATION

Sorry I didn't post yesterday.. was celebrating my 21st with my sister. Enjoy this post on relationships and communication.
Relationships are hard for most people but then add in the fact that you only get to see each other a couple times a year. Sometimes things can seem to hard and you want to give up. Trust me I have been there a couple times and once I did. I was lucky that he took me back because I think my life would have gone in a completely different direction if he had not. So I decided to talk about some of the mistakes that I made with my husband before I married him. I wouldn't change the things that happened but I wouldn't want to make them again.

Ok so when I would go up there to see him in VA. We would spend our time when he wasn't working just hanging out at his apartment watching movies playing video games and such. This was fine I loved spending time with him, but the problem was when he was at work I couldn't leave. With his ID being the key to the room and me not being able to have one I was stuck. I would get bored and then he would come home and I wouldn't be in a good mood from being stuck there and would take it out one him. I think back on it and gosh I was probably soo annoying I have no idea how he put up with it. So my advice is when you are bored dont try to start fights talk about it tell your s/o that you wanna get out and do something. While he is at work look things up online to do, the zoo, the movies, dinner... ANYTHING.
When he wasn't here I would get invited to go out with my friends and would think nothing of it. He didn't always like this idea because he wouldn't know some of the people going and he wasn't with me. To me I felt like he didn't trust me, to him he just wanted to lookout for me. I wish I saw it through his eyes because it caused fights that were unnecessary. So when you have a fight always try to look at where the other person is coming from. I now understand and I don't really go out unless it is with my sisters or my girlfriends he knows.
Then there was the fact that we only saw each other a couple weekends a month and we tried to keep our relationship spiced. That can be tricky because I get nervous talking about sexual things. Sometimes I just wasn't in the mood and this caused fights because we didn't always have that long together. I didn't think about spicing things up. Yet you need to, girls maybe have a glass of wine, but also talk to your s/o tell them what you like what you don't like try new things have fun with it. You only have the time you have together.  Have fun with it, read about it, there are many possibilities.

So if you didn't find the common thing in all my mistakes it is communication and I believe this part of me is getting better but I will always be open and talk with my husband. He knows me better then anyone because he wont take nothing for an answer to whats wrong. Don't let communication be the downfall of your relationship.

Brienne Mahaffey

A little about me and my life.

Hi, so I'm new at this whole blog thing, but I'm also new at this whole wife thing, and the Navy wife thing, I'm so excited to be able to share my story and the adventures of my new life.. so I'll start with a little about my life....

My name is Brienne Mahaffey, I just turned 21 years old and am currently going to school online, I'm not sure what I would like to be but mostly it will be something to do with animals. I am hoping to one day to own my own animal rescue. I am a very happy person but I owe most of that to my husband who made me the person I am today. I am very big on family I'm very close to my family and my husbands family. I have two sisters who I know will have my back no matter what I decide to do. I also have a brother-in-law and a sister-in-law who are two of the most amazing people I have ever met. I have been married for six months this month to the sweetest honest most hilarious person I have ever met, and might I add very sexy ;) We have two dogs, a four year old Pit Bull named Harley, and a three year old Rhodesian Ridgeback/ Cretan Hound mix named Bella. My dogs are my babies and I would do anything for them.  That's me in a nut shell :)

Ok so the reason I wanted to start this blog was to share my life, not only as a Navy wife but as a Wife in general. I wanna be able to encourage the young women out there to fallow their hearts and do what makes them happy.

Me and my husbands story is not the most traditional one that there is, we are not high school sweethearts nor have we been best friends since we were little. We started dating March 17, 2011 and we got married July 28,2012. We met online through a dating website and as soon as we started talking I knew there was something different about him. We talked and texted and got to know each other. I learned he was from Ga same as me but was in the Navy and stationed in Va. When he came home to visit his family I finally got to meet him. I swear I knew he was the one the moment I saw him. This is the first picture we ever took as a couple...

We have had our ups and downs with him being 8 hours away while we were dating but we had a system. He would come down as much as he could and I would go up when I could get time off. It made it a little easier. Earlier this year he got deployed to Afghanistan, it has been hard but I'm not going to complain because I get to talk to him everyday unlike most people who are going through deployment. This past July we got married, this was on his r&r and that means that he had to go back. We have been married six months this month but have only been together as a married couple for 5 of those days. Saying good bye to him when he had to go back was the hardest thing I have ever had to do. School and our families are the only things that have helped get me through this time. I am getting him back soon and am excited to start my journey as his wife. I cant wait to share all of the experiences with you from his homecoming to our big move to Va in a few months.