Great News :D

Today a giant cloud that had been over our heads for the past 3 months disappeared.

Back in December, right before Christmas, Matt got a letter from the National Guard saying they were deploying him for a year and he had to leave in the beginning of January.

Of course, it was really stressful news... coming at a busy season right when we were planning on telling everyone that I was pregnant, and Matt's grandma didn't have long to live. On top of that, we were shocked because he had talked to the military a year before and filed for a discharge... we naively thought he was out, when he was really just in the inactive reserve for 2 more years.

They only gave Matt 2 weeks to file an exemption, so he started working on it immediately.

Meanwhile, the paperwork was taking so long, that the unit he was supposed to go with left without him... we thought that meant that the exemption went through. But, at the beginning of this month they sent another deployment letter saying he had to leave on May 7th... right before the baby's due date!

So Matt went and took action again. I think they were actually still working on his previous exemption, but that didn't stop them from amending the previous deployment and trying to send him somewhere else while that was being worked on.
Finally today they called and said the exemption went through... and because of some emotional problems Matt had in Basic Training, they weren't only going to exempt him from this deployment, but he was getting and honorable discharge as well!

I'm so relieved!
Now we don't have to worry about him being discharged for a whole year and missing our kids growing up... and we don't have to worry about any future job complications because of a dishonorable discharge!

I'm glad we didn't spread the originally bad news to many people since it would've caused worry... worry when we didn't even know if he was going or not because of the exemption filing.

Anyway, I'm thankful for the people who do go overseas, and I'm amazed at the women who can be strong enough to send their husbands away for a year like that... I don't think I could do it, especially when the military is just not for my husband. Ever since he came back from Basic Training, he's been wanting out.

I'm just so glad it's finally resolved and our life can go back to normal!