Hi, I'm Amy Reno. I'm 20, I grew up in a little town in West Virginia, and I've been a Navy wife for a year and three months. My husband Jaime is a fire controlman second class on the USS Brookshire, a guided-missile destroyer out of Naval Station Norfolk. We live in Navy housing here in Norfolk. On February 25 his ship left for six months in the Mediterranean, and on August 20 it came home, and in between we had a baby, so I guess you could say it's been a big year.

I made this page for our families back home in West Virginia and in Texas, and for the other wives in our support group, and for anybody who has a sailor coming home and wants to know what it's like. My mom took all the pictures.

THE DEPLOYMENT, SHORT VERSION

February 25. Jaime left on a Thursday morning. I was seven months pregnant and I stood on the pier and waved until I couldn't see the ship anymore, and then I sat in the car for an hour.

March to June. The ship was in the Adriatic Sea during the NATO bombing over Kosovo, from the end of March until it ended in June. I can't tell you anything about that except what was on the news, because that's all I knew too. I watched CNN every night and jumped every time the phone rang. Jaime says he can't talk about most of it and he was fine and he was busy. Busy was all I needed to hear.

Care packages. I sent one every week. Beef jerky, sunflower seeds, Jolly Ranchers, the sports page, phone cards for when they got to port, socks, and pictures, lots of pictures. Once I sent homemade cookies and they got there in crumbs and he said the guys ate them with spoons.

E-mail. When the ship let them have it. Sometimes we'd write every day and then nothing for two weeks and you don't know why and you're not supposed to ask. I printed out every one and kept them in a binder.

April 13. Our son Justin was born at the Navy hospital in Portsmouth, 7 pounds 2 ounces, with my mom holding my hand, since Jaime couldn't. The Red Cross got a message to the ship, and the guys in his division gave him cigars he couldn't smoke. He saw Justin for the first time in pictures I mailed him. For four months my husband had a son he had never held.

The support group. The wives from the ship met once a month. That's where I met Anita and Julie, who I don't know what I would have done without. They brought me dinner when Justin was born and Julie came over at 2 in the morning once when he wouldn't stop crying and neither would I.

HOMECOMING DAY, HOUR BY HOUR

3:30 a.m. Wide awake. Gave up trying to sleep.
5:00 a.m. Fed Justin, did my hair, changed my outfit three times, ended up in the navy blue dress with the polka dots. Mom said I looked fine the first time.
6:15 a.m. Put Justin in his little sailor suit. He spit up on it. Cleaned it off. Put it back on.
7:00 a.m. Got to the pier. It was already hot and sticky and there were already hundreds of people there with flags and balloons and signs.
8:45 a.m. Somebody yelled that they could see it. Everybody ran to the edge.
10:30 a.m. The ship came in alongside the pier with the tugboats pushing it, and all the sailors were lined up along the rails in their white uniforms. You can't pick out your sailor from the pier. Every one of them looks like yours.

Here she comes. Every one of those white dots along the side is somebody's sailor.

10:35 a.m. My mom made me stand still for a picture. I was trying not to cry so I wouldn't ruin my makeup. That didn't work.

Justin and me waiting for his daddy. He was very good. I was not.

10:50 a.m. In the Navy the new fathers get to come off the ship first, before everybody else. Jaime was about the fifth one down. I handed Justin to Anita and I ran.

Six months. One of my shoes was hanging off and I didn't care.

10:52 a.m. And then the moment I had been waiting for since April. Anita brought Justin over and I put him in his daddy's arms for the first time. Jaime just looked at him. He didn't say anything for the longest time. Then he said, "Hey, buddy. I'm your dad." Justin stared at the white hat like he was trying to figure out what it was. Everybody around us was crying, even people we didn't know.

Father and son. My favorite picture in the whole world.

12:30 p.m. Finally got his seabag and got out of the parking lot.
1:00 p.m. Home. He walked through every room of the house like he was making sure it was still there.
1:15 p.m. He ate two cheeseburgers.
2:00 p.m. Jaime and Justin fell asleep on the couch together. I watched them for an hour.

THE FIRST WEEK HOME

Sunday night, all three of us, under the yellow ribbon I put up in February.

The yellow ribbon went up on the living room wall the day he left. It's staying up a while longer. My mom stayed until Sunday and then went home to West Virginia so we could have the house to ourselves.

That first week Jaime learned to change a diaper (it took a few tries), learned to give Justin a bottle, and learned that a four-month-old does not care that you've been standing watches for six months and would like to sleep in. We had a cookout with Anita and Julie and their husbands on Saturday, and on Sunday we didn't do anything at all, which was perfect. He still wakes up at five every morning. He says it'll wear off.

It's funny. You think when they come home everything goes back to normal. It doesn't, exactly. You've been doing everything by yourself for six months and you have your own way of doing it, and he has to fit back in. We're figuring it out. The other wives told me that would happen, and they were right, and it's OK.

ADVICE FOR NEW NAVY WIVES
From somebody who was brand new herself not too long ago:

1. Join the family support group. Go to the meetings even if you don't know anybody. Especially if you don't know anybody.
2. Write every day, even when the mail is slow and you don't hear back. It all gets there eventually, in a big bunch.
3. Keep a calendar, but don't count on the date until the ship is actually in. Homecomings move. Ours moved twice.
4. Don't ask about the things they can't talk about. They'll tell you what they can.
5. Have your own life. Six months is a long time to sit by the phone. Take a class, get a job, have a baby (OK, maybe don't plan that part).
6. Have the house clean the day before. You won't want to do it the morning of. Trust me.
7. Bring tissues to the pier. For you, and for the lady next to you.

To every sailor still out there, and every family waiting: hang in there.

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Navy wives, write me anytime: [email protected]
Last updated Saturday, September 4, 1999