The "Wife" Part of Marriage by Lauren(Faith & Deployments)

“I’m a Wife”, I remember thinking that days into our honeymoon, “I’m a Wife”. The whole word Wife still throws me off from time to time. And lately with my third homecoming almost around the corner and just having passed our first wedding anniversary I have been thinking a lot about what that means, particularly to me. I know every wife is different, each relationship has different expectations. And honestly, my husband doesn’t expect much, he is quite content with anything that I decide and rarely ever says anything that puts me down for being a wife. I have no set “responsibilities” no “rules” I have to follow in our marriage. And for that I am extremely thankful, though sometimes I wish I had something, even an outline to go by.

I realized the more and more we dive into the fireproofing study over at the SPA Diaries, I have these pre-requisites that I feel is a wife’s responsibility to do, and I didn’t even realize it until now. This does not mean, by any reason, that I feel like every wife who doesn’t do these things is a bad wife. It’s just my opinion of the standards I have set for myself as I continue on this journey of “wife-dom”.

I feel that a wife should:

1)      Handle all the important paperwork in the family- this is especially important for military wives. Since this deployment started I have snapped countless times over the fact that I am not on every policy, nor do I even understand most of them since I left it all to my husband. So now I am in the process of reading all our contracts and fine print and calling the companies and asking questions.

2)      A wife should have some sort of “standard state” that her house should be in, all the time- For me, messy isn’t an option. Yes my house is not as clean as others, but I am working towards if people just show up, we aren’t scrambling to throw things in the closets and up the stairs to make room for people to sit at the table or in the living room. I may have not dusted one week, but at least my house is “tidy”.

3)      A wife should handle all the shopping- and I don’t just mean grocery shopping. I mean Christmas shopping, birthdays, etc. Honestly I waste more time in a store because of my husband’s short attention span and he rarely ever cares what we buy other people, it is easier to just buy and tell him later.

4)      A wife should be that “support”- this means a lot, and I think as a military spouse, it is even harder. I try so hard to put on that “front”, the one where he doesn’t hear me cry on the phone on my bad days, or say negative things when he tells me his schedule changed, and no matter how many times he doesn’t want to study for his promotion test, I give him the option to have “quiet” time every evening to encourage him to just study even for 30 minutes. I really struggle with this one. I tend to snap into “negative nancy” mode whenever the military messes with my routine or plans, but I am learning to just keep it to myself.

5)      Every wife should know how to cook- It doesn’t have to be a five-star restaurant quality, but basic meals, how to read a cook book are a must. Heck, even throw it in the crock-pot and let it do the cooking. But not knowing how to cook isn’t an excuse in my book.

6)      Back-up plans are life-savers- Every wife should always have a back-up plan, just in case. With no matter the situation. Hubby originally had his birthday off but got called in- back-up plan. Homecoming was pushed back a few weeks- back-up plan. Paid in full vacation that hubs will now be deployed for-back-up plan. Who says military wives can’t plan? We can make any situation work to our advantage, just always be prepared for your “set-in stone” ones to change.

7)      Every wife should set the rules of the house- this may not apply to non-military families, but for military ones, it has to. Think about it, how often if your husband really home? And if he is, for how long before he passes out in his ABUs? Children’s routines, your routines, should all be set by the wife. After all, we’re the ones whose home duties never stop when the husband deploys and we’re the ones that have to be two people at once, so why shouldn’t we set the rules?

8)      No matter what, stand by your man- this one is huge for me. Mainly because it involves respect. My husband may say things or do some things that I clearly disagree with, but putting your opinions of the issue or matter aside and having the balls to say “regardless of what I may think, this is my husband and I support his decision” is huge in my book. That shows that you are solidifying that you are a team to everyone who tries to question it.

9)      Wives should never forget family birthdays/anniversaries/special events- I honestly fail at this one. I haven’t even bothered to get any of my in-laws birthdays or such to send them cards and we’ve been married for over a year, but it is a goal that I am setting to fix this next year. Cards mean the world to people and while we may not always send gifts, cards are the best thing we could ever do to show our family and friends that we care.

10)   “I don’t know how” is not acceptable- For military and non military wives. Everyone is capable of learning. Everyone. We may not excel at anything we try or it may take us a dozen times to learn how to turn the generator on, but we should not be solely reliable on any man, especially our husbands, for how to get things done around the house. We all know how to pick up a manual and figure it out, and let’s face it, most of the time we figure it out before our husbands anyway

These are just some big ones that I have realized. Let’s face it, God made women to handle everything that men weren’t capable of. How many guys do you really know who can juggle a job, kids, a house, finances, their wife’s schedule, volunteer work, soccer practices, get-togethers, and still manager to know just how much Tylenol each different kid needs to get a fever down? Not many. We’re special and we are truly to heart of our husbands. It may be a rough and tiring road with little recognition or respect from others, but if we were suddenly gone our husbands would be lost.

I am so thankful to be asked to be a guest blogger for He Wears Combat Boots. I really hope your homecoming is amazing and I can’t wait to read about it later!

Click HERE to see her blog!!