Sometimes Often, I feel like I'm becoming 'that wife.' You know her, the one who just follows her husband around so he can pursue his career, allows him to support her, doesn't have a real contribution to the world or financially to the relationship (partly because she is stuck in some hole-in-the-wall military town), and bases her identity on her marriage and/or husband.

We don't have children and my husband has been deployed for nine months. I started a fledgling photography business shortly before he left but in case you hadn't noticed, everyone is a photographer these days, whether they know what they're doing or not. Most people don't understand why I can't charge $100 and give them a CD of images when I've taken over a year to learn the craft and invested a lot of time and money to provide a quality product. There are a few who do and they've been decent clients, but they're not really plentiful enough to do anything except to allow my business to (mostly) pay for itself. Consequently, I feel like I'm not contributing anything to this household. It's also a new house so between things for the house and a kick-ass R&R trip, I don't feel like I've managed to save a whole lot this deployment and really, I should be saving a LOT. The checking account isn't lacking by any means, but the savings just hasn't grown much.

What do I do all day? I'll be honest, some days it isn't much at all. My DVR and I know each other pretty well - there are days where I won't move far from the couch. I wake up in the morning and all that I'm looking at is another long lonely day to get through, wondering if I'll hear from my husband who is on the other side of the world and how the hell to fill yet another day. I will edit photos, surf the internet researching things like marketing, new shooting/editing techniques, etc. but a lot of the time, I wait around until the afternoon when he might have an opportunity to get online and before I know it, the entire day is gone. The dishes are still in the sink, laundry is still in the dryer, and various other household tasks are yet to be done. I look at them and think, "Eh, whatever." I still have little to no desire to decorate or make the house more of a home because it doesn't feel like a home. We were here together for maybe three weeks, nine months ago. It just feels like a house, a mortgage payment that I'm not contributing to.

I've tossed around getting a job here but really, the only jobs I 'qualify' for would maybe pay a little over minimum wage, if that, and I'd likely be driving 45+ minutes each way for anything over minimum wage. That would also leave very little time to devote to my business and I'd be doing something just to fill the time that I don't love when what I do love is being neglected. I've thought about going back to school but feel so guilty about taking out a loan or spending more of his money that it makes me nauseous. I don't have a degree and in this economy, that severely limits my earning potential. I know that, yet I just can't do it. On the other hand, a degree isn't going to do squat for me if I ever make my business successful (you know, before we PCS and I lose my entire client base and have to start over), so why waste the money on a piece of paper when I'm already my own boss? I see friends with degrees who have resorted to bartending after moving here - why spend the money and do something I hate (i.e. school) for just a piece of paper?

We've talked about starting to try for children and part of me wonders if I just want children to feel useful or if I'm really ready to be a parent. If we had children I'd be home taking care of them and contributing that way, at least. Then I wonder if I'll just base my identity on my children instead of my marriage and still be as unfulfilled.

I wonder sometimes if I need help or if I'm just a normal child-less military spouse going through yet another deployment. I kept telling myself it was the latter, but I don't know anymore.