Your spouse is deployed, but you want to try to plan a date night anyway. This could work you think, even though you are 6,000 miles apart. You need that time with your spouse, and setting up a “date night” over video chat is the best way to do it.
Here is how to have a date night when your spouse is deployed…in GIFs:
Step One: Figure out when they will be able to talk and when you can talk at the same time, for longer than 5 minutes.
Step Two: Put the date and time in your calendar, knowing it might change.
Step Three: Put the kids to bed early that night, hopefully, they won’t give you any trouble. Being a solo parent is hard work!
Step Four: Get ready for your “date.” Do your hair, make-up, and put on a fancy dress, just for fun and to make things more date-like. Pour yourself a glass a wine, everything is perfect!
Step Five: Put kids back to bed after they keep getting out of bed. Pray they fall asleep before 8 pm, the time you have scheduled for your deployment date.
Step Six: 8:05 pm. No word from the kids, no word from the husband. Just wait.
Step Seven: 8:35 pm. Still waiting on your spouse, and you are getting quite sleepy.
Step Eight: 8:55 pm. Debating on if you should call it a night, figuring he got held up somewhere. That happens, you know. But you can’t help but feel a little disappointed.
Step Nine: 9:15 pm. Decide that your deployment date is a bust for the night. Get ready for bed, maybe tomorrow will work out better? Check your phone one more time, just in case.
Step Ten: 9:45 pm. Crawl into bed, close your eyes, and fall asleep.
Step Eleven: 9:55 pm. The phone starts to ring, he finally made it. Your phone wakes you up, but you don’t care.
Step Twelve: You finally get to have your deployment date. You are in your pjs, but you don’t care. You finally get to talk to the love of your life and all is well in your world, at least for now.
As military spouses, we sometimes have to make the best out of what we have, go with the flow, and hold on to the good moments among the more difficult ones.
Have you ever tried to have a date during a deployment?
