People still ask me all the time about Jeff's schedule. He is on shift for three days and off for four days every week. No, he does not come home at all during the three days of his shift, because fires and other emergencies happen at night, too. He works for the state, not a local department, so his station is an hour away from home through winding roads that he prefers me to stay off of, so the kids and I rarely visit him.
This means we don't see him for half of every week. That is unless he gets called to a fire or needs to cover a station for someone on a fire or any of several other things that could happen to cause him to have to stay at work. At 5:00 in the morning on the day he was supposed to come home from his last shift, he sent me a text saying that he would be late because they were sent to a local fire. I made sure to respond in a way that wouldn't add any more to the stress he was under (I'm not always so thoughtful), but all I could think about was that this fire could keep him away anywhere from a few extra hours to a few extra weeks. The worst part about when he's called to a big fire is not knowing when he'll be back, not having a specific day I can look forward to, just hoping every day that he'll be home tomorrow. Luckily, this time it was just a small fire that didn't keep him more than a few hours.
In the past couple weeks, I've had multiple people say something along the lines of, "I don't know how you do it without just breaking down!" As those who see me a little more often well know, the truthful response to that is: I do. I break down. Not all the time, but it happens. A few weeks ago, I brought my three children, all under 5 years old, to church with no husband. I had spent the previous week taking care of my kids, feeding them, entertaining them, driving them around, scheduling babysitters while going to appointments to get a root canal and rehab for a bulging disc in my back. It feels like a lot whenever I talk about it, but I didn't have time to think about it at the time. I was just getting things done because they needed to be done. I hadn't had enough time to myself to even notice the weight of everything. So when I brought my kids to church, and the older ones were in their Sunday school classes, and a very nice woman offered to try to put my crying baby to sleep, I had a chance to sit. In that moment of just sitting, the tiredness, the loneliness, and the stress all caught up with me. I sat in church and just cried. Sometimes all you need is a good cry, but I'm blessed to also have good friends and family who step in and help me whenever I'm able to humble myself enough to ask for it. I love them and I'm grateful, but there's nothing like having my husband home.
I don't mean to say that being married to a firefighter is all bad. I am so very proud of my husband and the work that he does. Our children love to tell people that their daddy puts out fires. When his schedule doesn't get changed, he's able to spend four whole days with us at a time! We could take a mini vacation every week if we wanted (at least when it's not fire season)! And when he is home, Jeff is so good at really being with us. He helps around the house, plays with the kids, and makes time to make me feel special. But I think my favorite part of having a firefighter for a husband is that I know he will literally walk into a burning building for a complete stranger, but I know that he would do even more than that for me and for our children. He is absolutely my hero.
Living the way we do can be very difficult. Having the support of family and friends isn't only helpful, it's necessary. I've had to learn to admit when I need help. I've had to learn to do things alone that I never planned to. But since joining the fire wife group on Facebook, I've stopped spending any of that time feeling sorry for myself. As much as I admire our firefighters for the life-saving work they do, I also have an ever-growing admiration for the women who support them. We are a big part of why our heroes are so strong.
I don't know who wrote this, but it really spoke to me:
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