We just PCS’ed to Fort Riley, Kansas… not our first move, not our hardest, but somehow it feels different. This year marks 18 years of military life for our family. My husband is two years away from retirement, and for the first time, the light at the end of the tunnel doesn’t feel like it is so far away.
That’s a weird feeling.
Over the years, I’ve lost count of how many moves, how many goodbyes, how many times he was deployed for 12 or 9 months. Months in the field. Months at school. Months of solo parenting, making new friends, and learning a new zip code again. People have always asked me, “How do you do it?” And the truth? I did it because I had to. There was never really a choice.
You just adapt – That’s what military spouses do.
But lately, something unexpected has been happening. With two years left, I’ve started to feel things I didn’t even know I had buried. The survival mode I’ve lived in for nearly two decades has started to lift, and emotions I kept tightly locked away are showing up uninvited.
Just the other day, I was talking with a friend about finally looking for our forever home. I casually mentioned I’d been scrolling Zillow, dreaming about a place we could actually stay in for good, and before I knew it, my eyes started leaking. That’s right, actual tears. I wasn’t sad or overwhelmed, just… surprised. Surprised that simply saying it out loud, “forever home,” made my chest tighten and my throat close up.
It turns out, I’d stuffed that dream so deep inside myself I forgot it even existed.
After 18 years, I don’t think I have another move left in me. And that’s hard to say without choking up. I’ve always made the best of each place. I’ve decorated rental after rental, planted flowers even though I knew we’d be gone before the roots took hold, and tried to bloom where I was planted, even if it was temporary soil.
Fort Riley has actually been a good place for us. There’s a small-town feel that reminds me of what my hometown of Fort Collins, Colorado, felt like 30 years ago, before the prices skyrocketed and the crowds came in. That used to be home. I always thought we’d go back. But the truth is, it doesn’t feel like home anymore. I’ve made peace with that.
Now we’re talking about staying in Kansas. Planting real roots. And honestly, it’s exciting and terrifying all at once. For so long, the idea of settling down felt impossible, like trying to hold water in your hands. So, I just never let myself hope for it.
But now, I’m allowing myself to feel it. And it’s a lot.
There’s so much beauty in this military life. I’ve met incredible people, had experiences I never would have had otherwise, and I wouldn’t trade it. But there’s a flip side too, a quiet grief that builds over time. Eighteen years of being the new person. Of reinventing yourself in every new place. Of proving yourself again and again in new communities. Of different states with different rules, and the endless paperwork and reset buttons.
There’s a weariness that builds up in your bones that you don’t even notice until it starts to loosen. And then you realize just how heavy it’s been all this time.
This blog isn’t a how-to guide. I don’t have five tips for thriving as a military spouse. This is just me, speaking from the middle of the mess. I hope if you’re reading this and you’ve been pushing something way down deep for the sake of survival… that maybe now, with your own light at the end in sight, you’ll let yourself feel it too. Your eyes will start leaking, and you will have no idea where that came from.
You don’t have to keep it buried anymore.
It’s okay to long for stability. To cry over a house listing on Zillow. To want a garden you don’t have to leave behind. To imagine a place where you can finally exhale.
After 18 years, I’m not the same person who started this journey. And I’m learning that maybe the bravest thing I can do now… is feel it.
While you are waiting on that forever home, here is another Military Mom Collective Blog: 5 Tips for Making Your Rental Feel More like Home
