This week's recap.

We haven't done anything too interesting this week, but I thought I'd sum up some of the highlights.


AJ's continuing with pre-ranger PT and seems to be doing really well thus far. They ruck on Fridays, and this morning he came home with a red, raw patch on his back where the ruck rubs against his skin. It looked pretty painful, and we still don't have any first aid supplies in our apartment so I couldn't help patch him up. :/ I guess I'll be making a trip to the PX for a first aid kit or some moleskin so we can prevent that in the future.


AJ's also continuing his efforts to gain weight, which means he eats pretty much nonstop. Really, he probably has to eat that much just to keep up with all the calories he burns in PT and hand-to-hand combat training. This week I've even driven to ALU to drop off more snacks for him on his lunch break. After lunch he always asks me what we have for snacks, and when I tell him he tells me he's already eaten all those things today. I'm definitely busy trying to come up with new snack options and just plain keeping food in our apartment.


It's been kind of a long week for AJ due to extra homework, hand-to-hand combat training (aka combatives), and an unexpected event on post on Wednesday night. On Wednesday we woke up late at night to someone pounding on our door and ringing our doorbell incessantly. It was pretty confusing and we couldn't think of who it would be and why. It turns out that it was AJ's class leader, who had been trying to call AJ but his phone was off (I've been telling him for a long time that he should leave his phone on at night!). The class instructor needed 100% accountability for every soldier immediately, which meant AJ had to personally locate everyone in his squad. I rode with him to a different apartment complex to check on a soldier who doesn't live where everyone else does, and we didn't get to bed again until 12:30am. AJ only got maybe 4.5 hours of sleep that night. That night we found out from the class leader that a suicide had been reported, so apparently the protocol is to locate every single soldier associated with Fort Lee to prevent any other harm. It's clear that the Army is stepping up and taking suicide very seriously, as it's a significant problem in the military. That tragedy has been weighing really heavily on my heart, even though we don't know the person who died. As someone who is not unfamiliar with suicide, I am deeply grieved for the soldier and their family. I don't understand why God continues to allow this issue to be an unusually prevalent part of my life or why he doesn't take away the pain of my personal experiences. I just know that he creates beautiful things out of very ugly tragedies.


As luck would have it, Thursday was a very, very long day. AJ left at 6am and didn't return until 9pm because he had combatives training after class. Of course that was also the one day that I didn't have plans to meet up with someone or go anywhere, so I was really lonely by the time he came home. I haven't seen him all day today either, but thankfully I was able to go out with another wife this afternoon. We had a really good time as always. I'm so thankful to have met her.


No plans for tonight, but hopefully we're going to visit Williamsburg tomorrow. I'm really excited for more sightseeing!