My husband just finished with his year of undergraduate pilot training (YAY) and it has been such an experience! We graduated at the end of April and I say ‘we’, because it truly was a team effort. My 5 year old son and I endured the long hours my husband spent away from home in the flight room, the scariness of living in a brand new place, knowing no one, the sometimes lonely days and feelings of being overwhelmed with our new life in pilot training.
With this being our family’s very first assignment in the Air Force, I didn’t fully know what to expect! I also didn’t know any other WAFs, so tried to read up and do my research about what to expect. You can never really prepare for it all, but here are a few things that I learned during our year of pilot training that kept me somewhat sane. Key word being ‘somewhat’! ☺
MAKE THE TIME TOGETHER COUNT!
Kind of a no brainer, but I didn’t realize how valuable our weekends were until those were the only two days I could have my husband’s full, undivided, not stuck in study mode, attention. Cooking dinner together, having a full Saturday of errands together, or just simply hanging at home and enjoying each other’s company were the best parts of those seemingly long weeks. It also made my husband appreciate that he had those two days in a row to (mostly) devote all his time and attention to us and we all soaked up all the quality time we could!
COMMUNICATE WHEN YOU HAVE HAD A ROUGH DAY, ARE FEELING A LITTLE DOWN, OR JUST NEED A LITTLE ‘ME’ TIME!
Every mother has those moments! All my mama friends know what I’m talking about – I am no supermom and definitely had my fair share of ‘moments’. Communicating this to your husband will keep you from going crazy on the days when you haven’t had a break from the kids, are missing your friends and family, or just feeling a little neglected. I can proudly say I had those moments and I had to learn to snap myself outta my funk, or else everyone was going to be real cranky. A solo trip to the gym to get out of my head, or an hour at Starbucks reading or Pinteresting was always what I needed to reset myself and go back to being a good mom and supportive wife. The cooking, cleaning, grocery shopping, play date planning and mommy-ing is not always the easiest gig. It’s important to remember to keep yourself happy and make sure you are taken care of, since you are the one taking care of everyone else.
GET OUT THERE!
This one can definitely be easier said than done. I like to think I am a social butterfly, but it can be a little – or very – intimidating going into situations where you know absolutely no one. My son and I attended any and all events we could. Story time at the library, park meet-up play dates and different events at the fitness center and bowling alley were my saving grace. Social networking is an amazing tool for knowing what was going on and meeting other moms. As intimidating as it can be, just remember that all those ladies were in your shoes once and were the ‘new girl’ at one point or another!
During the last year, I definitely experienced those feelings of loneliness and had quite a few days of feeling homesick. I’m only human! It’s ok to feel that way. This year of pilot training was an amazing experience for me as a mom and as a wife. I learned to make the absolute best of a new situation for my son and be a better communicator and support for my husband during a very important time in his life. I hope you too can make the most of this time, because I can guarantee you your husband cannot do all the early show times, long hours of studying, memorizing and most importantly, flying, without YOUR support! WAFs are the real MVPs! ☺
MEET ALEX
