Pre-deployment Meltdown

Chad and I have been doing all the pre-deployment "stuff" for quite awhile now. There's all the physical things that you can get prepared for, but I still haven't figured out how to prepared for the emotional "stuff" (this is our 5th major deployment). I don't let myself dwell on the fact that he's leaving and so it gets pushed to the back of my mind most of the time. Yesterday, however, I suddenly realized that he only has about a week and then he's gone for 6 months. I thought about everything that I hadn't let myself think about. That's never a good thing to do. It made for a very hard evening with a lot of tears. I know that we've done this before, but things change, I've never had to deal with everything myself when Myshel was a teenager or when Vance was graduating for 5th grade and starting middle school, or when McKaylie was turning 6, or when Noah was a little wild child and wouldn't go to sunbeam class without screaming and crying. I've never done a summer deployment when my kids are out of school. If you think about it, everything's different because nothing in our lives stay the same. Besides each time he leaves there's always something new to "deal" with. I don't think I'm ready........................ but then I don't think I ever will be..........I don't feel like I can handle it all..............but I have to.................I don't think I'm strong enough..................but 4 kids need me to be.............................I don't want to do it.................but I don't have a choice. It's going to be a very hard week.