Silent Salute Award

I was so touched this morning when I received a comment from Ashley @ The Mommyhood Adventures. She decided to bestow myself and one other blogger this beautiful award created by Chelsey @ Bomb Shells & Southern Belles. Here's the meaning behind this award...

"To thank all of our friends and bloggy family who support our troops and stand behind us: military or non military, or perhaps with military connections or those that come from military families. These are the people who truly understand the sacrifices it takes to be a soldier, and a soldier's family member. The people who give thanks, as often as it is needed, and let it be known they are proud Americans; yet freedom isn't free!"

The rules are to pass this on to ONE other blogger and think of THREE ways I silently support our troops. WOW. What a hard thing to do.

First, I would like to send this award to TWO people as well. 

Karie @ Wife (Widow) of a Wounded Marine is my first recipient. We have never met, but sometimes reading her blog I feel like I know her very well. She lost her husband to an accidental overdose while receiving inpatient therapy for his PTSD. Some of the same struggles, tears, and frustrations she has over losing her husband, I have over my experiences with M, his PTSD, and our divorce. I would never dream of comparing the two situations, but her blog has helped me feel not so alone in my feelings.

-and-

"Jenny Wren" @ Learning to Set Fire to the Rain. It is SO HARD to find someone who is vocal about their divorce and/or separation from their service member. She is honestly THE ONLY person I know in the blog-o-sphere who has walked in my shoes and speaks about it. It takes a lot to be married to someone in uniform. It takes a lot to deal with the pain of PTSD, violence, rage, and war issues of your spouse. It also takes an insane amount of courage to walk away from that environment and you are often left with a lot of "Survivor's Guilt." To make the ultimate decision of divorce is equally as devastating. Through all of her trials and struggles, she tries as hard as she can to keep her head held high.

I encourage all of you to visit these incredible women's blogs, both from very different yet similar perspectives. 

Three things I do to silently support...

1. Pray. I admit I'm not a daily prayer as I should be, but when I do, I'm always praying for the healing of my ex husband, for service men and women in theater, and for the families left behind. I believe somewhere, someone is benefiting from my prayers.

2. Normally, I sponsor a soldier, send care packages to stranger service men and women, as well as participate in Christmas card programs. I haven't done much of that as of late, but once I can get back in my saddle...I will.

3. While not silent, I obviously spend a lot of time blogging about the military. My original blog "This Army Life" was all about my experiences as a newbie in the military world. I have since stopped writing but continue to get comments and feedback from people who read it. It's important to me to use my experiences, both good and bad, to help others. I aspire someday to work for a military related non-profit like Wounded Warrior Project, start my own, and/or advocate in DC for military issues.

I am proud of our military and what they've accomplished. I was a very proud military spouse. The people I've met over the past 2 years have played a very important part of my life. Some have stayed, some have left but each brought a little something to me.