Valentine's Day

On this Valentine's Day I am feeling especially grateful for Brady Sullivan. I am married to an amazing man. I am so grateful for the gift that he is to my life. God has blessed me in a multitude of ways, but giving me the blessing of our marriage is one of my favorite gifts!


Here is what I love most about him:
-he has a faith-focused attitude
-he is caring and compassionate to others
-he is an incredible father & gives great priority to the well-being of our children
-I love his integrity & his unwavering dependability
-he is chivalrous & takes great pride in protecting, providing & caring for our family
-he is attentive to my needs
-he is loving & inclusive to all our family (all extensions)
-he takes great pride in doing his best in everything
-he is a man of God

And, even though we are 8000 miles apart he still found a way to send me these yesterday evening.

I was surprised at how much it meant to me to receive them. I mean what girl doesn't enjoy getting flowers...but I was REALLY, REALLY, REALLY excited...you would have thought someone had just given me a million dollars the way I was walking around with a big grin across my face.

I have received quite a few phone calls about how I am doing emotionally on this particular day and I have to admit things are going really well. I was telling Brady on the phone this morning that I have reached a point in this deployment where each day does not take as much thought. It doesn't feel as strange at this point that he isn't walking through the door at 5:30. I'm not having to push myself quite as hard to go to bed at night...by myself...in the vast emptiness of our king-size bed. I just don't spend as much time in my own head trying to convince myself to look at the postives in his absence. It just is. This is where are right now and it is our new normal for the moment. I am at peace with it (at least for today :) ).

Well, I did have a bit of an emotional breakdown two weeks ago (day 18 of deployment to be exact...everyone said the first 2 weeks are the hardest so I happily pushed right through those weeks and decided to lose it in the 3rd week). I may have been feeling exhausted (from several nights of little sleep), emotionally drained and frustrated and I may have taken it out on Brady via text messages. Luckily for the health of our relationship Brady didn't buy into all the emotional drama & didn't try to get defensive or hurt by my lashing out at him (sorry Honey). He did hear my requests for carving out time for more meaningful communication between us and since then everything has been going exceptionally well.

Here is the sweet note that Zeke gave me this morning.


Happy Valentine's Day Everyone!