Deployment Part One

Deployment Part One – Of course I am writing this as a family member of someone deployed to a War not as a person who has gone through it. Pretty much if our country is at war, even if the President said it’s over, you can count on your loved one going to the hostel area eventually. I wanted to know as much as possible when my youngest brother was preparing to be sent to Kuwait and then Iraq. First I couldn’t even find either on a map if it had glowing arrows pointing it out. Weather, the terrain, and location of bases were next on my list. Terminology is very important to know. When researching I saw right away the abbreviations are used more often than not. For the record; FOB is Forward Operating Base, remember it.
After learning basic facts I started to scourer the internet for connections to the group my brother was in. I quickly found a mom, who had a blog, and through her found an address for my brother before he even knew where he was. This was a break through because he had been told over and over that he would not be in one place long. We, as a family, decided to start sending letters because the worst that would happened would he him not getting them. He did receive them, and yes mail takes quite awhile. I actually got a Christmas card returned to me 2 months after I sent it. The envelope had 6 post marks from several countries; luckily it was just 1 of many cards for Christmas.
Over a short period of time I found about 12 sites that were very useful and I ended up looking at them at least daily for any kind of update. I don’t know if it’s a good thing to have all this access or if we would be better, as family here in the states, to only have as much information as we did years ago. Every story you think could be your loved one. It becomes too much some days. The main thing is to remember to be patient and plan for things to not occur in the sequence that your solider may think they will happen. This can be frustrating to you but imagine how your loved one feels.