Enjoying a lively conversation last night over dinner with some other vet wives, we landed- as we often seem to do-on the notion of learning. One of the ladies, married for over 20 years to a veteran with PTSD said, “I’ve been learning so much about how to live over the years. But believe me, the learning is not over!”
We all chuckled. Perhaps out of humor or more likely out of personal identification. It resonated with us. Always learning. Another lady followed it up with, “I still have a lot of work to do on my stuff.” As we all do.
No matter what issues our vets struggle with, we have our issues too. The good news is that we do progress. The other good news is that we always have room to grow!
As I discuss in depth in the book Love Our Vets: Restoring Hope for Families of Veterans with PTSD, we love them but cannot fix them. What we can do is take care of ourselves. Always being open to learning along our journey with our vets we love is a key to finding fulfillment. Let us never stop learning. It doesn’t always feel great, but it is.
One lady shared that her learning process involves finding her voice around her vet. Not letting his anger or off moods intimidate her into silence. Her vet recently had been more irritable than usual. Noticing that he had stopped taking his meds, she bravely brought up the subject. “I don’t like taking all those pills!” he complained. She responded gently with her request. “Well, could you at least just take the ones that make you less irritable?”
We who love our vets need to continue to learn and grow on our journey with them, regardless of their progress. As I receive encouragement from all of you, I also encourage you too! We are worth it, and so are our vets!
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