At JT’s gravesite the day of his funeral, a beautiful young new widow whom I had never met graciously approached me and said, “I am so sorry.” Stunned, I looked at her and responded, “JT was my good friend; he wasn’t my husband.” With a gorgeous smile she looked at me intently straight in the eye, squeezed my hand tightly, and said, “He was your friend and brother, and I’m so very sorry for your loss.”* I will never forget how deeply her words affected me. This widow was comforting me? I was floored by her humble graciousness and selfless kindness. I looked around at all of the wives, female friends, and ex-girlfriends who had traveled so far to attend JT’s service, and I couldn’t help but think: We were all married to him, in a way.
When something can go wrong, most of the time, it will go wrong when your husband is away. After a day, for instance, where I sprained my neck, spent three hours at the doctor’s office with a sick baby, locked my keys in the car during a rainstorm, then got a speeding ticket and almost had my car impounded (yes, it was my fault—I was driving like a typical insane Southern Californian person on a Virginia country road), and then, to top it all off, stepped in a massive pile of dog shit while holding a screaming baby in the rain looking for my wallet that mysteriously fell out of my pocket. That night I wanted to curl in a ball and cry myself to sleep. And I did just that. Then I remembered something Boss said to me during a particularly painful time: “We can’t have a Great Love without going through hell and back.” And I had a revelation: so many other wives have, quite frankly, been through way more than I ever have. So many wives have been through more frequent and much longer deployments. So many wives’ husbands never came home. I consider myself a relatively new wife, and there is always another woman who’s had it way worse than me. So, even on the hardest days, like the one above, I just try to suck it up. I am one of the lucky ones and I’ll never forget that. The fact is, all military wives are Warriors, too—they’re strong as hell, formidable, tenacious, take-charge women who learn to be resilient, brave, independently capable, who possess more daily courage than the average American. I believe that very few women are born to be military wives. I certainly wasn’t. I cry at commercials and hate being alone. I sleep with the lights on and a gun next to my pillow. I believe we’re forged. With our blood, sweat, and tears—lots of tears—we’re continually molded and evolve into this life. And, after losing so many guys over the years, after witnessing so many close friends’ marriages end in bitter, painful, messy divorces, after watching the stress deployments put on families, especially our babies and children, my heart tears open again and again, and it takes so much work to keep it together. I know a lot of women, including me, who sleep on their husband’s side of the bed when he’s gone. I am not sure why; maybe it’s just a way to be closer to him? I started doing it automatically and discovered that almost all of my friends do it as well. But we keep it all together. Somehow, we do. We have to. We are the backbone of this community and we take care of everything at home so they can leave, do their job focused and confident.
One night at a dinner party in San Diego a kind woman said to me, “I don’t know how you do it, being alone all of the time, your husband always in danger. I could never do that.” I sat silent, not sure how to respond. Sometimes, I am honestly not sure how I do it either. I gazed at him from across the room, this tall, incredibly handsome, vivacious man, charismatic and intense, a man who loves me passionately, who would do anything for me and his family, a man who would willingly give his life for his brothers and this great country. At that moment, Boss caught my gaze, and, grinning from ear to ear, he winked at me. I finally replied: “I do it for Boss. I’d give up everything I own, crawl to the ends of the earth and back on my hands and knees. I’d do anything for my handsome husband. Look at him; wouldn’t you?”
I wish I could say I am a Navy wife simply because I am patriotic and want to support our country… and yes, a part of me is. I am damn proud of our military and their families. But when times get painfully, unbearably difficult, the only thing that keeps me in the game is my immeasurable pride in and unrelenting love for my husband. I believe in him and always will. I am an American, a Warrior Queen. I will somehow keep it all together—preferably with a nice glass of wine and no giant cockroaches to deal with.
At the end of the day, I’d do it all over again. I love this community. I love my brothers and I admire so many women who are stronger than I’ll ever be. We’ve had so many damn good times it has made the sacrifices worthwhile. I love this life with a zealous passion. It has given me purpose and profound pride. I wouldn’t give it up… although if Boss came home tomorrow and told me, “I won the lottery. Maybe it’s time I retire and we go shopping,” of course I’d happily oblige him.
By C. Kimberly Vaughn
I knew it while we were dating, but it was even more apparent after marriage that being a team wife was amazingly special. Deployments were difficult. Our first was his seven-month deployment to Iraq. We were newly engaged and we decided that I would plan our wedding to keep me occupied while he was away. His second deployment was a four-month augment to Afghanistan and started four weeks after our son was born. I moved back home to Virginia to get help from my parents. Luckily, with technologies like Skype and e-mail, we were able to keep in touch fairly often. We shared our son Reagan’s milestones via the webcam and I took tons of pictures. Then for Aaron’s third and final deployment he was back to Afghanistan. Yet again, he left just three weeks after our second child, a daughter, Chamberlyn, was born. (He sure had good timing when it came to changing diapers, didn’t he?)
How quickly my fairy-tale life would come to an end. Team wife was one of the most special titles I have ever earned and one of the most challenging and excruciating to lose. I learned all that life in the teams had to offer… the good and bad. I knew that Aaron being a SEAL presented opportunities for danger, but our strong faith in God aided in the ongoing worries about the dangers of his career. We truly believed that God had a plan for each of us and if His plan was to take Aaron early, then that was what it was. We didn’t go on worrying daily about dying or becoming injured. We lived life to the fullest, took pleasure in the time we did have together, and focused on our future—together. However, “together” was not a part of God’s plan for us. On August 6, 2011, while the world learned via television of the Chinook helicopter crash carrying thirty men in the Wardack Province, I was learning that Aaron was on board and that there were no survivors.
Being a Navy SEAL was in his blood; it was just who he was. He loved it—everything about it, even the parts that are uncomfortable or painful: the days, weeks, and months spent away from family, the broken bones and pulled muscles, strained backs, and blisters. To Aaron, all the pain and difficulty just made being a SEAL all the more worthwhile. In my eyes, the fact that so few can endure what these men do is a testament to the type of men who become SEALs. These elite warriors can do what is unfathomable to so many. Their devotion, desire, and mental and physical strength are amazing. I also learned through my years of marriage to Aaron that these same attributes are found in most of the wives as well.
What made us so successful and happy in our marriage was simple. We loved each other. Aaron’s career in the teams was a huge priority and it was for me as well. I knew all that Aaron had gone through to earn that Trident, and I admired him for it. The key for me was that I knew I was Aaron’s foremost priority. Even though we were apart a lot, I knew I was his first priority and because of that, I knew I could support him in all his endeavors related to the teams; therefore I could make sure that I wasn’t placing any undue stress upon him. He needed to have a clear and focused mind, and that included having no issues at home. Don’t get me wrong; we argued and yelled, too, but if you don’t have some of that in your marriage I’d think it would be pretty boring. And team guys—they are anything but.
By Diane Shipley
October 1984, Navy SEAL Training Compound,
Coronado, California
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Basic Underwater Demolition Training Class 131
Secures from Hell Week
I quickly answered the phone on a Friday afternoon and barely recognized the hoarse, gravelly voice on the other end. “I made it. Come get me, honey,” was all he said. I raced to Coronado.
Driving around the BUD/S compound looking for Don, I found the sidewalk littered with sleeping, beaten men who survived Hell Week, and I drove right past without recognizing him. Lips split and face swollen, he looked nothing like he had the week before when I dropped him off; he stumbled into the car and fell fast asleep.
During the ride home I nudged him out of his sleep and said, “I’m pregnant.” A small, slight smile crossed his face, acknowledging what I had said, and his head went slowly back to the comfort of the passenger-side window.
Unknown to us, the baby I carried would become our next SEAL legacy, and seventeen years later, almost to the day, I would again drive into the BUD/S compound when my son’s Hell Week secured to pick him up, 115 SEAL training classes after his father’s Hell Week secured.
From a small Tennessee town, I joined the Navy and met Don while serving onboard the second ship in the Navy that allowed females as crew, the USS McKee (AS-41), and Don and I were married by the ship’s chaplain in a small ceremony.
It’s a sad fact that most SEAL marriages end in divorce, most stemming from the incredible amount of time SEALs spend away from home on training trips and deployments overseas. It also stems from resentment of leaking pipes and flat tires with a child on each hip while Daddy has a great time traveling the world with a machine gun.
The age of the Internet has made it slightly easier on wives, with e-mail and Skype. In my day as a SEAL wife, we wrote letters to stay in touch and made the occasional phone call, which often did more harm than good. During our first SEAL deployment, Don left within days of our son being born. He called me from a nightclub in the Philippines, drunk. I could hear the hookers’ “Me love you long time” chatter in the background.
Coming home, he deployed again in short order for six months and then again for another six months after that. I’m sure every team wife imagines just how “special” it will be after a long separation. A new hairstyle, a new dress, you’ll run into his arms for that first welcome-home kiss, and he’ll hoist his son over his head and the tears will flow!
Well, it didn’t turn out that way for me.
Don arrived from his first deployment with a black eye, and from his second facing charges for assault. His third was uneventful—until, having just put our son to bed, I lit some candles and dressed for some Don and Diane time, only to find his platoon buddies (bachelors all) forcing the door open, each one carrying a case of beer. And they had just gotten off the damn airplane a few hours earlier.
My son never really knew who daddy was for several years. And I realized then what my life would be like married to a SEAL.
All SEALs mature after a while. The many years of separation with missed Christmases and birthdays harden SEAL families and bind them together. Separations become second nature, but they do become harder as the years go on and more is expected of the SEALs as they promote in rank and take on bigger responsibilities. They become platoon chiefs entrusted with keeping their men safe, while we are entrusted with keeping the home front intact and caring for the children the men have left behind. It’s a huge responsibility and we’re doing it 100 percent alone.
Alone, except for the greatest support system I found—the other team wives.
We truly became a team of our own. We helped with each other’s kids; we changed flat tires with ease. When the holidays rolled around, we helped each other keep our homes as normal as possible for the kids. SEAL wives, and kids, take on the courage and warrior spirit of the men we married.
Wives, mothers, sisters, and children are the unsung heroes behind the scenes of these brave fighting men and go without any medals, ribbons, or glory. We provide a safe haven for them to return home to. We are the constant in their lives and we are why they fight.
I am very proud to have kept my marriage together for over thirty-three years now, and I can tell you that the day my husband graduated SEAL training is still one of the proudest of my life. The only thing to top that was the day my husband stood next to the commanding officer of BUD/S training at our son’s graduation and with a warm hug welcomed him to the teams.
By Kristy
Honor, courage, and commitment—those are a few words I’ve heard used to describe the elite men who fight for our freedom. As a Navy SEAL widow, I never thought they would be used to describe me.
My husband was as humble as they come. He never let on, outside of our tightly knit community, that he was a special operator of any kind. I respected him for being so passionate about his career choice, and for being smart about keeping a sense of normalcy in our lives, safely and discreetly. As I started my new life, in a new place, with new people and a new and very different kind of community, I began to learn that as a SEAL wife, you are three different women.
Person one is what I would consider your average wife. Planning BBQs and play dates for the kids. Packing in a full day of work, making dinner, going to the gym, and spending quality time with the family.
Person two is a SEAL wife—basically a single parent, head of household, counselor, confidante, and ball-buster. I wasn’t really a single parent, but with my husband out of town 65 to 70 percent of the time, usually unable to be reached, I got a taste of what it would be like. I always knew I was lucky to have him come home—and just long enough to get the schedule that we were on, a finely tuned machine, totally out of whack. I mean that in the best way; I’d rather be a little unorganized and have my man home than be sleeping with my cell phone on. I always knew I could never keep him from that rodeo. It’s just what they do and how they are wired. So you roll with it.
When I say “head of household,” I don’t mean for tax purposes. I mean running the house. The schedule isn’t easy, and if there’s a hiccup somewhere along the way, it can all fall apart.
I actually enjoyed being the counselor. If he trusted me enough to share his thoughts on a topic, be it something about bills due, children, or this year’s presidential campaign, I had to be rock solid. If you’ve accepted the role of a team wife, that’s exactly what you have to be, a rock.
Person three is the worrywart. I have never been a “sit by the phone” type of gal. Before I met my husband, if I was busy and I missed a guy’s call, it was no big deal. I’d call him back. But once I met my husband, that changed. I had never in my life thought that a phone call could be so important. Since becoming part of this community and having seen loss and heartbreak, I never wanted to miss what could very well be the last call. We spoke every day. Often it was about nothing, but nothing was so much more—it was how we loved. We really had to rely on our ability to communicate with each other. That’s how we survived the long absences.
Sleeping with your phone isn’t ideal, but some of my best memories are those 3 a.m. wake-up calls. We were dreamers; we would talk about what we could, especially when he was deployed. When I asked him how his day was, I would get one of two answers: “Good” or “Same old same old.” The rest of the time, which could be as long as an hour, we dreamed of what we were going to do after he retired. From career choices to having a garage full of motorcycles, camping trips, and a huge home for the family to visit, built just the way we wanted. I’d have a perfect kitchen so I could cook my heart out, and he’d have an outrageous man cave that was far enough away that he didn’t wake me up when the boys came to visit.
I still have every e-mail my husband ever sent me, and ten or fifteen saved voice mails, just random ones, so I can go back to hear him say “I love you.” I came into this relationship knowing that there could be a happy ending and hoping that there would be, but not naive. Who knew that saving these silly things would be so important one day? I had always just put them in a folder, not knowing that one day t
hey would be like a journal of our life together.
When that hollow knock on the door came at 6:30 one morning, the e-mail saving came to a screeching halt and being a single parent became a reality. His death shattered all of those dreams that we had together. I have never said, “Oh, that will never happen to me” and I have never asked, “Why did this happen to me?” Even knowing that, statistically speaking, the more times you roll the dice, the larger the risk. The risk is great, but these men chose to sign on the dotted line; therefore, so did we. That being said, we wives serve our country, too.
They say that you can’t choose who you fall in love with, but you can most definitely choose your path. I chose to follow the path my heart led me to. I still stand behind him with honor, courage, and commitment.
Rest in peace, my love. I hope I served you well.
24
Links in the Chain
If you do anything for fun, doing it professionally in the military may ruin it for you for life. After my nine years in the teams, I no longer scuba dive. As a veteran of the SDV teams, I see no point going polar-bear swimming or even exploring the reefs at Hanauma Bay or Truk Lagoon. Not when there’s a perfectly good barbecue joint just down the coast road a stretch. I don’t rock climb or go to the beach. Mel thinks I’m crazy for refusing to take cold showers, but anyone who’s gone through BUD/S will understand.
Service: A Navy SEAL at War Page 28
