Coping, coping skills and the liar you become

I hate, detest, abhor lying! I am not wired to be a good liar, I think people can read me, those who want to take the time to anyway. But something I am coming to realize and acknowledge in my life is that people can easily see exactly what they want to see. I hear so many "atta girls" that sometimes I want to scream in frustration. At the same time, I guess all those drama classes I took in high school paid off so much so that my father in-law recently praised me for my aplomb and "exceptional thespian skills" for my seeming calm under any circumstance, including deployment. Thespian skills, this term got me thinking, it's just a fancy way of saying that I'm putting on airs and basically I've become an adept liar something I would never have thought to describe myself as.

Some days I feel like every smile is a lie. When I talk to my in-laws and paint this rosy picture of the put together woman, wife and mother, I wish that I could truly be honest and that's why I started this blog, to finally find somewhere to be real. Why is it that when you do have an opportunity or perhaps are forced to a place where you let that facade slip a little people feel the need to have an opinion about it? Recently I posted something on my facebook status about deployment plain and simply sucking. I do not regret nor do I take back that statement, it is truth, it is MY truth. But I get asinine responses that I should be grateful that my husband is doing something truly worthy with his life.

Well yeah, I am one of the proudest women you'll meet. I am full of pride for my husband knowing he sacrifices something that I could never have, that he believes in something bigger than himself and gives up so much personally for it. He has a great deal of integrity and is one of my personal heroes. That said, it still sucks!!! I love him, why wouldn't it suck that he's deployed. And I'm not some fresh married 17-18 year old, I've been at this a while, I have a right to state it when I feel the pressures of deployment weighing me down. I have birthed 2 babies during deployments. It is merely by the grace of God that my husband was able to witness our youngest child born, so yeah I think I've earned my right to complain.

So it becomes easier to simply say "I'm fine" when asked how you are because sometimes other people's commentary does far less good than they intend. The truth is I cope, one day at a time. My kids keep me busy but still I find I have far too many moments of sadness and depression and loneliness especially after going through the holidays as a single parent. And I don't say this lightly because what I hate more than anything is to sound like a whiny little wimp of a woman who can't cope. I DO cope but part of that coping is to be HONEST about what it really feels like to be me and I really need this venue to just put it out there.

Sometimes I rationalize to myself that people such as my immediate family or close personal friends can't really handle the reality of seeing me in pain or hurting, they feel they lack the words. They want to solve my problems or tell me to just look at it another way, as though I haven't tried to see my situation from every conceivable angle. I don't knock them for this, I understand it but in the same token sometimes we can't fix things, they have to work themselves out in time and sometimes all that's really needed is a shoulder and someone to lend you an ear. I understand this reluctance because I have also experienced it from the other side in different situations. As an example when my father passed away I remember wanting to talk to anyone who would listen about the difficulty of losing my father, but now sometimes when I hear someone has suffered a similar loss I find myself at a loss for words of comfort. I do try to offer a shoulder but I feel sad that my words fail me at those moments. I think human beings have a hard time dealing with the depth of pain and would much rather gloss over life and live in a blissful ignorance of other people's pain and that may be an over simplification but I just sometimes see the world that way.

So once again I am relegated to the "I'm fine" commentary, the mirthless laughter, the fake smiles and the broken heart and sadness in my soul. So thank you blog for giving me a place to write it all down without judgment.