exploring the options

There has been nothing much of note going on lately, nothing which I have felt the need to gripe about here in my safe place. But today I find I have something I want to hash out.

Sid tells me he's considering not staying in the Navy. That when his final year is up in August, he's going to get out and just run like hell. So right now I'm in the weird spot of having to separate what I want from what I want for him, and it's actually pretty difficult. If he stays in, it would be easier in that we would have a reliable paycheck every week, with no worries about getting fired or being laid off. Then again, if he gets out, it would be easier in that we wouldn't have to worry anymore about deployments, money be damned. I am sure that either way, we'll cope.

But. His staying in means that IUI is still an option for us. His getting out takes the possibility of spawning off the table indefinitely. In this, I am not sure I am ready or able to accept that second scenario.

And though I have taken a step back from this situation enough to tell him that I will be on board with whatever he decides, that I'll support him 100% either way, I cannot make myself believe that I will truly be okay with more waiting. But I will not trap him into a job he hates just so that we can be a family. It isn't right, and I won't make him do it. It never ends well, that kind of entrapment. If he stays in, it will be because he chose to, not because I coerced him. And so I had better be ready and able to accept the second scenario.

Obviously, we have not yet talked about it much. We're both still mulling over what we want to say and how we want to approach it.

I know he's not happy in the military, and I am not exactly thrilled at being tagged "a military wife". I know he would like to leave that bullshit behind. And yet we have these perks of military life that will be hard to leave behind: health-care being the main one. Because, hello, I don't pay for my twice-annual bloodwork. I don't pay but $3 for my monthly bottle of pills. I didn't pay for my eye exam or the frames of my glasses (just the lenses). Sid did not pay for his EKG, or his gold toof, or his shittons of various other dental work. Sid didn't pay for his semen analysis, or his eye exam, or his glasses. It was covered by Tricare. And if he gets out, we have no more insurance. I assure you that while we're by no means poor, I don't think we can afford to pay for his constant dental work out-of-pocket, AND consistently foot the bill for my bloodwork. I think we will be royally screwed!

These are all things I'm sure he's thinking as well. And yet if he's willing to take that risk, then so am I. It might turn out great in the end. And it might not. Like so much of our lives right now, it's a total crapshoot.