They Never Said it Would be Easy Just That it Would be Worth It

So when I originally sat down to write this blog it was about 2 weeks ago and I was pissed off at my husband for some reason (that was so insignificant that I have totally forgotten about it now, but in the moment it seemed so important). He had worked my last nerve for that day and I was just about ready to burst with anger and irritation but instead I spent the day hiding in my bedroom ignoring him. Later that night we worked it out like we always do. Like usual he figures out that I am mad at him and giving him the silent treatment (as opposed to how the old me would handle this situation i.e. an eruption of anger, screaming and yelling usually followed by tears of sheer anger and cussing), and he came into the bedroom and,  although with a snarky tone in his voice, asked what was wrong and if I wanted to talk about it. We argued for a while and as usual worked it out.
Anyhow the point of this all is that as much as I complain about all the down sides to being a military wife (let me tell you as a navy wife its tough especially when he is on sea duty because he was gone a lot but luckily for now he is on shore duty and for the next couple of years I don't have to worry about deployments or underways) not to mention having to just deal with the lifestyle of the military and all that there has recently been some good to come out of all this. Over the recent holiday weekend (Presidents Day) we went on vacation to America's best kept secret. Guam, where America's day begins lol.

The view from our balcony at the hotel at sunset

Guam is like Japan's version of Hawaii. This is where the Japanese go to vacation, so although it is an American territory with 2 military bases on it, almost the entire island is tailored to Japanese tourists. On a whim we decided to go to Guam. Here comes the good side of being a military spouse: we flew to Guam for free! Since I have moved to Japan I have griped and moaned and complained about the loud jets and other issues of living on a Navy Air base but we recently learned that we could travel for free from base to base wherever the planes are flying! It is literally freezing cold here in Japan and the weather in Guam was 85+ degrees with some humidity and sunny! The ocean was beautiful! Crystal clear and warmer than the hotel pool! For 4 days we enjoyed the tropical weather of this beautiful little island territory. Not to mention the many people who spoke English and the wonderful variety of delicious food!

 Fresh Jamaican Salad at the Yo Man Serious Food Jamaican Grill

 My husband's plate of Boston Beach Ribs, red rice, Jamaican rice, and cucumber salad from the Jamaican Grill

 My plate of Jerk chicken and BBQ ribs with red rice, Jamaican rice, and cucumber salad at the Jamaican grill! The food was so good!! and the Mango Iced Tea will make you wanna slap yo mama!!!!

 Izumidai fish, with julienned veggies, sticky rice and the best garlic butter sauce ever!!! It tasted so good I almost licked the plate

 Olivia's dinner of red rice!!!! She ate almost all of it too!

 Kareem's sesame steamed salmon topped with sprouts and pickled red onions and steamed veggies and bbq potatoes with the same garlic butter sauce! It was so good!!!!!

 My plate of red rice, salad, and bbq ribs and chicken! at the Chamorro Village (the locals food)

Kareem's plate of Kalbi beef (beef short ribs) and chicken shish kabobs with red rice and salad. It was really good!!!!

This was pretty much all the food we ate in Guam.The only thing missing is the thai food we ate for lunch with the best fried bananas ever!, the brazilian bbq dinner we had that was super expensive and not worth half of what we paid for it, and the california pizza kitchen we had for dinner the last night we were there cuz Kareem had never eaten there before. The food there was amazing to say the least. Due to the fact that Guam has a very diverse history of who "ruled" it there is no one culture there. There is a little bit of Spanish culture (thanks to Magellan), Japanese culture, local "native" island culture, plus a mix of the melting pot of American culture mixed in as well, not to mention the many different surrounding Asian cultures mixed into this too. As you can see from the pictures the food is incredibly diverse but incredibly delicious!!! The staple here is rice! Whether it is red, white or jamaican lol everything comes with rice. And for some odd reason I love it! Before moving to Japan rice was not important to me and was only good when topped with gravy or some stir fry with soy sauce lol but now rice is great with almost anything lol. What I really liked about Guam was how fresh everything was. Everywhere we went the restaurants boasted about how fresh everything is and how they used local fish, produce and everything else. You could tell the difference and the freshness of the food made everything taste so much better!!!!

We visited Cocos Island. We can now say we went there. It was nothing special but we can say we went there, and frankly it was completely overrated and overpriced!!!! If we ever go back (which I suspect we will) we will not be going to Cocos Island. We will save the money and go to the beach outside our hotel instead! 

We went to Fish Eye Marine Park. It was probably the cheapest thing we did but also our very favorite thing we did. You walk out into the ocean on a narrow boardwalk to a bomb hole from WWII and you go down into the bomb hole and can see all the local fish swimming around outside in their natural habitat! It was so much better than any aquarium you could ever go to! 

These are all the pics I took at Fish Eye Marine Park! It was by far my favorite tourist attraction! But I love the beach so I think that's why lol. 

We also visited Cocos Island, like I said before, the Talofofo falls, the Inarajan Natural Pool, Bear rock, Under Water World (a large over priced aquarium), and of course we walked along the strip of hotels and malls. They are also known for the worlds largest K-Mart which we also visited to get some little items like lotion and other toiletries. Let me tell you, for the worlds largest K-Mart it was disappointing at best lol. It was no different than you average K-Mart in your hometown. Talofofo falls was beautiful but I was chased by a huge bee. Yes I said it a huge bee. The only problem I had with Guam was the bees. They are about 3-4 inches long and they look like small birds lol. They come in a rainbow of colors and the locals tried to ease my fears by saying that they won't bother you but if you get stung by a black one you will die. After hearing that all the bees looked black no matter what color they really were. Bees terrify me and the ones in Guam are so big they would scare Big Foot lol. Although I love how the bees didn't bother my baby cuz if they had we would have never left our hotel room. And I love how my husband didn't seem to be bothered by them in the least but once we got on the plane home he told me they were huge but he didn't want me to be even more scared so he just pretended like they didn't bother him. What a great husband I have, cuz Lord knows if he would have freaked out like me we would have had a horrible time in Guam lol. 

Guam never sounds like a vacation spot. You never hear people say, "We are spending our vacation in Guam." or "We are going to Guam for spring break." That's why I said Guam is America's best kept secret. Very few people know how beautiful it is there or of all the fun things you can do there.  Very few people even know where to locate it on a map. But the truth of the matter is that although we had only heard a few things about it and they weren't always that good we had a wonderful time there. Yes it was hot and humid and we sweated so much you would have thought we just got rained on, we had a great vacation there. It might be due to the fact that right now Japan's mainland is in the middle of winter and its cold here and the last 3 years before this we lived in beautiful San Diego where it never gets this cold, but regardless this was a wonderful experience for us and we enjoyed every minute of it! So in summary although there are many downfalls to being a military wife (a great health care plan but shitty doctors yup I said it, dealing with the federal government on a daily basis, dealing with deployments, separations, being stationed far from the rest of your family and friends, moving often, etc. etc.) there are some great benefits too (living in a foreign country, free travel to other parts of the world, a great health care plan...on paper/in theory, military discounts on lots of stuff etc.etc.) Like I said no one ever said it would be easy...just that it would be worth it!

Until next time....

I Now Understand Shaken Baby Syndrome

So I am not sure what is going on with Olivia but the last few days she has been unusually fussy and her sleeping is off. She is usually a good sleeper and has been since the day she was born. She slept all the time  as a newborn enough that the doctors kept insisting I wake her up and nurse her (although I didn't because I thought it was mean to wake a sleeping baby, and I still believe that she will let me know when she is hungry and don't worry she does!) and she went through her phase of waking in the middle of the night to feed but at about 3 months she began sleeping through the night and so have I and I thoroughly enjoy it! Now she is 8 months old and either she has started the terrible twos extremely early or something is up with her! She is fussy and not sleeping or napping well. The other night she woke up at 12:45am and tortured her father until 2:30am when he finally came and woke me up because he was so exhausted from lack of sleep that he needed a break and asked if I could try to put her back to bed. Needless to say yes I did put her back to sleep...after 45 minutes a dose of tylenol and lots of singing and rocking!
Why the tylenol you ask? Well, earlier that day I noticed she had been tugging at one ear and she had run a minor fever, one you wouldn't give tylenol to bring down but I thought it might be caused by an ear infection or she is teething. Either way my baby was uncomfortable and I gave her about half the dose for her weight and it seemed to do the trick. Fever was gone and once it kicked in she went right back to sleep...at 3:15am. The next morning she woke up 7am wide eyed and bushy tailed and thank heaven for my loving husband who was up getting ready to watch the Super Bowl (the game started at 8am Sunday morning for us here in Japan) and get the house in order since we were having guests. I on the other hand got to sleep in until 7:25 which gave me 5 minutes to get freshened up before our guests arrived for the big game.
Meanwhile Olivia needs to be dressed and hair combed, face washed, diaper changed and fed. The latter three my husband did while I rushed to make myself presentable. Although for him washing her face, changing her diaper and giving her a bottle was a huge struggle because she kept screaming out, "Momma! Momma!!! Momma!!!" and then crying at the top of her lungs when she couldn't see me! As cute as this is and as proud as it makes me that she wants me I know that is breaking my husband's heart that although she will say, "Dadda" she doesn't and it seems like she wants nothing to do with him 95% of the time. The 5% of the time she does want him it is because he has something she wants; you know like puffs, cheese, fruit, cookies, pretty much anything she wants to put in her mouth that he might have.
Now on to the shaken baby syndrome. NO I have not shaken my baby!!! But now that I believe she either has an ear infection or is finally getting those highly anticipated teeth she is extremely fussy! To the point where I can finally understand how a parent with no help or reprieve from the daily stresses of being a parent could be driven to shake their baby. Today Olivia screamed for nearly 30 minutes in an attempt to resist napping! (Why are children born with this innate sense that naps are bad and that they should not go to sleep even when they are extremely tired?) I sang to her, I rocked her. Then I decided I should recheck her diaper, take her temperature and be prepared to give her some tylenol if she has a fever. So she got a new diaper, had her temperature taken to which she had a slight fever and a half dose of tylenol. Following which she cried for another 5 or so minutes while I rocked and sang and finally went to sleep. But as she innocently cried I looked right in her eyes and said, "Olivia this is why little babies like you get shook!" It became clear to both of us that Mommy was tired and exhausted and needed a break and Olivia understood that she was nearing Mommy's breaking point. And we both understood how easily a beautiful little baby could end up with shaken baby syndrome.
I am in no way, shape, form or fashion advocating for anyone who has shaken a baby. I am merely saying that I understand how people can easily get to that point. Lack of sleep depletes patience and that lowers the level of tolerance one has for the sound of a crying baby. I don't think that most of the people who have shaken a baby had malice intent when they did it. They just wanted the baby to stop crying. As a parent you get frustrated and many times I have felt like Olivia is just straight up ignoring me and I have wanted to jolt her into attention but I know better.  I think the only thing that separates me (and other moms like me) from the people who shake babies is that I instantly recognized my breaking point and was ready to put her in her crib and let her cry it out until I could regroup but I was lucky enough that in that exact moment Olivia knew she went too far and quickly calmed down and just went to sleep.
On a different note, the wife I chose not to be friends with, is not going to be a Navy wife for much longer, sadly enough. I never wished for them to get divorced but merely to get along. I have never met a couple who dislikes each other so much (except for my parents but after 30+ years who could blame them? lol) The other day I found out they were getting divorced via Facebook! Yes I said it, Facebook!!! There was a post by the husband on a public site saying he was selling their dog because he was getting a divorce and moving back to the barracks!!! Who puts their business out there like that? They must really hate each other to just publicize their business like that? Just a thought.
On that note I am going to say, "until next time..." stay posted. Much Love from the Real Housewife of the Navy!