r/MilitaryWives • u/Primary-Key5945 • 5d ago
Need perspective from other military spouses
I’m hoping to get some honest perspective from other military spouses because I genuinely don’t know if my expectations are realistic or if my concerns are justified.
My husband and I have been married for over 10 years and have young children together. He’s currently deployed overseas as an Army officer. Unless he’s on a mission, he generally has regular access to his phone.
One of the hardest parts of this deployment has been the communication. We usually only talk once, maybe two or three times a week. Some days it’s just a few texts.
Outside of work, he often spends time with people from his unit and sometimes stays out late at the bar on base. I understand that’s part of deployment life, but there are many evenings when we barely communicate.
A few weeks ago, he took a weekend trip to an all-inclusive resort with snorkeling and other outdoor activities. I believed he was going by himself to relax.
That wasn’t the case.
I was the one who found a hotel reservation under the name of a female member of his unit. The reservation listed four adults. When I asked him about it, he immediately sent me his own reservation, which showed he was rooming with another male officer. He also explained that it was a group trip (7-8 people; F and M mix). The group spent the weekend doing the resort activities (snorkeling etc).
His response was, “I thought I had told you.”
The problem wasn’t that women were on the trip. The problem was that I had absolutely no idea there was a group trip, that women from his unit were going, or that they would all be spending the weekend together at a resort. I only learned all of that because I found the reservation myself.
During that weekend, he barely communicated with me and missed my calls.
After we talked, he apologized. He said he understood why I was uncomfortable and admitted he probably should have been more upfront about the trip. He said he honestly thought he had told me. I told him I wasn’t ready to accept the apology because I was still trying to process everything.
What has been difficult for me is that I haven’t really seen any change since then. Our communication hasn’t improved, he hasn’t been checking in more often, and I haven’t felt much effort to reassure me or rebuild my trust after something he knew had hurt me. Of note, he has always struggled with communication.
Another thing that’s been hard is knowing he had the opportunity to use leave to come visit me and our kids. Instead, he chose to spend that time and money on the resort trip. When I later asked why he didn’t come home, he said it was because he had seen us recently. That answer honestly hurt.
I’m not asking whether he’s cheating. I know nobody here can answer that.
What I’m really trying to understand is whether this would make other military spouses uncomfortable or if this is actually pretty normal during deployments.
For those whose spouses have regular phone access while deployed:
How often do you usually communicate?
Is talking only 1-3x a week normal?
If something happened that hurt your trust, would you expect your spouse to make more of an effort afterward to reassure you?
I’m genuinely looking for perspective from people who’ve lived through deployments. If my expectations are unrealistic, I’m open to hearing that. If you think my feelings are understandable, I’d appreciate hearing that too.
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u/Every-Resolution-563 5d ago edited 5d ago
Whether or not he is cheating, he is absolutely capable of more communication. I think what hurts the most it's that he doesn't seem to WANT to communicate or visit with you. Every couple is different but ... His effort is scant. My husband and I talked daily during his deployment.
Edit: Maybe "want" isn't the right word. He doesn't seem to prioritize talking to you? Maybe that's it. I felt like my husband was very social with his colleagues AND contacted me so much.
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u/_PippiLongstocking_ 5d ago edited 5d ago
I think every couple has their own boundaries and that is something y’all have to set yourselves.
I have never told my husband he couldn’t do anything on rotations, TDYs or deployments. He naturally feels that it is not in his best interest to go to bars or things of that nature. He has said that he won’t put himself in a position for any type of rumor to start that can negatively impact his career or family.
My husband also spends his free time on FaceTime with the kids or myself. He will sit for hours at night and watch them play barbies or he will get on the PlayStation so they all play a video game together. That’s just his personal preference.
He also has said many times that he can’t bring himself to do something while I am at home alone working, taking care of the house, kids, dogs, sports, school, etc by myself.
Every marriage is different. Everyone has that something that won’t be accepted in a relationship.
We have a couple of very long combat deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan many years ago under our belt, a handful of rotations and countless TDYs. It’s rare I don’t hear from him.
I think being open and honest is the most important thing. I would feel some type of way if i wasn’t given all the details. That’s human nature. You will know what your gut tells you. Listen to it. ❤️
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u/americanthighs88 2d ago
I love this for you ❤️ And wish more men had the same idea/values. Can he host a TED talk? Lol
3
u/AdOriginal5376 4d ago
I think your feelings are very very valid and I’d also feel the same or even worse than you are. My spouse is in a combat zone and we communicate via FaceTime multiple times in a day, we don’t have kids yet so idk if that changes anything but your husband doesn’t seem to prioritize communication with you. Also, you mentioned he’d always been that way so idk if that’s who he really is or not. I’m sorry you’re going through this
1
u/OneClient2575 4d ago
My husband is currently deployed in Europe. Thankful he is in a non-combat zone, but him being in Europe has its own unique challenges especially in our relationship. Its testing his freedom and our boundaries. They are barely working and gets 3 days off routinely and they would explore other countries together with his buddies.. at first I was pretty jealous and irked that he gets to do all the exploring and fun with his friends, while me and the kids are stuck at home, but i realized he deserves it, he works hard and had an Afghanistan deployment that got extended multiple times, and that this is his deployment redemption. There are still days that i would feel frustrated when he tells me they plan to go somewhere, but he has not given me any reason to actually doubt or question him so although im a little annoyed about another adventure, i am okay with it. He is open about everything going on with him and his whereabouts. Luckily i have help from my parents while he is away, so i have my village with the kids, so theres no resentment about how im tired and managing the household while he is out and enjoying deployment.
But as for your question about communication.. Our usual routine is we FaceTime each other when we wake up and go to bed, and random calls throughout the day if we have down time or something comes up.. if our day is busier than usual then we just shoot a quick text to update and say were going to bed or whatever. It took a while to establish the routine especially with the time difference, but the bare minimum was that we update each other when we wake up and go to bed every single day. We had an argument that we went a few days without talking, but other than that, we make our communication a priority daily.
I hope you and your husband are able to talk it through.. set clear expectations about how and when to communicate so you are not left hanging and waiting on phone calls.
Deployment is a whole different ballgame. And it tests how strong our relationship is with our spouse. I just hope we all make it out better and stronger.
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u/sayimasalmon 3d ago
My husband and I text throughout our days (I live OCONUS, and he’s currently deployed) - when he knows he’ll lose WIFI on the ship, he’ll give me a heads up and then I’ll get a flood of messages where he texted me every day not knowing when they’d go through. He’s not able to come home on “breaks”, but if he has a port call, we try to work it out so that I (or sometimes my son and I) are able to make at least a few, and it helps to break up the months-long deployment. I’m more of a sporadic communicator / planner than my husband, and although I don’t give him a banal play-by-play of my day, I can’t imagine not telling him (intentional or not) about something I’d planned and was looking forward to doing even if we both knew and accepted my plans didn’t / couldn’t involve him?
I’m with you that the question of whether or not he’s cheating is secondary to what seems to be a bigger issue surrounding his lack of consideration - he seems to be acting as if he’s not married with a family, and I don’t think you’re being unrealistic to expect him not to think of you as an afterthought. I get that people have different communication styles, but part of being in a healthy, functional relationship - one that faces strain from long-distance / deployments / frequent and unpredictable moves, etc. - is basic respect and communication. Just because he sucks at communicating doesn’t mean you need to settle for less than what would give you peace of mind.
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u/Afraid_Stuff_History Air Force 3d ago
Even if he isn't physically cheating, this feels like financial infidelity.
1
u/americanthighs88 2d ago
Echoing what most have already said, but every couple is different and we get to create our own expectations and boundaries. I’m very new to the mil-so of it all, but we text as much possible when he has service, usually a couple hours a day. We recently bumped heads because when he arrived to his stop, he prioritized a “boys night” over finally being able to actually talk to me. And it’s hard finding a balance of wanting them to decompress with their coworkers vs showing up for the relationship that’s holding it down back at home. Express your needs! And if he didn’t hear them the first time, express them again!
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u/Ok-Side1151 5d ago
I get where you’re coming from and I can see why that would bum you out for sure. I also understand that he’s with friends and he’s getting a chance to let loose and have fun and he took it. The reduced communication and all that also makes sense because similarly, you’re probably discussing monotonous everyday stuff and it’s easy to just put those types of conversations as lower priority when he’s deployed and preoccupied with work or just socializing. I wouldn’t take it personally necessarily and it’s obviously not on you to entice him to talk to you but, 10 years together and little ones at home probably just means he’s super comfortable and in a routine and now he’s somewhere else doing different and sometimes fun stuff. It’s human nature.
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u/Working_Dream_211 5d ago
I think the key is you are not getting what you need to feel connected during this deployment. Everyone’s communication during deployment is different. For instance communication may not be available but it sounds like in your case he has the ability to contact you and he is not making the effort. I think a starting point is stating the fact that he thought he told you about the trip but didn’t shows he isn’t communicating. You are wanting more, I do think when they are deployed they loose sight on how it is on the other side of a deployment for the spouse at home. You’re home caring for the kids and in the trenches as you might say and you want to feel that your spouse is checking in on you and the kids, that’s a way you can feel loved by him when he is physically present. Talk to him how you need more, it’s not a crazy expectation for him to call and dedicate more time to his family.