Here is a follow up about my son Miguel and his enlistment into the Navy. Since my last my post the time dragged and then all of a sudden his leave date was upon us. For the most part in the last few months my emotions had settled down. Miguel was very busy with school and spending time with his friends, girlfriend and of course us his family. We had a lot of last time for this moments, for example we all went out for sushi, we all went to see the Avengers (super fun movie), last time with Miguel on taco night etc... the picture above is his last beef dip day with his friends, May 23rd the night before he left. For the past few years we would have beef dip day at our house for Miguel and his buddies. They claim I make the best beef dip in town!! About a week before Miguel's leave date it was starting to hit me, one week left. It was especially hard because Miguel had so many people he wanted to spend time with in the last days to come. I wanted to be selfish and say "what about me", but I know that Miguel love's his mom and will miss me:-) We had a great party for Miguel with a wonderful turn out. What a wonderful feeling to have so many people around you that wanted to share their support. Relatives came that I've not seen in awhile and friends from San Diego, really made Miguel feel special. It was such a good turn out it was hard to spend as much time as I wanted to with any one given person. I felt a little bad the next day. We are a very lucky family. This picture below is Miguel, Morgan, William, his girlfriend Kariann and his best buddies, Alex, Emily and Connor. Miguel has really wonderful friends, outstanding! This is after beef dips.
4:00 o'clock in the morning May 24, 2012. Miguel's recruiter is picking him up at 4:45. What was especially wonderful this morning was Miguel's friends came over to give him one more hug of support. Who does that at 4:00 am, Miguel's friends!! I love them all so much. Thank you Morgan, Alex, Alex G, Kariann, Emily and Connor for being such great friends to Miguel, he is so blessed to have you all in his life!! This picture was taken at 4:30 am, they all look so good. Ha!
OK, so We all gave Miguel his hugs and he was off. Not so bad because I knew at about 9:00 am I was able to go watch him get sworn in. I was not going to because I could tell it made Miguel a little uncomfortable, but my friend Nancy encouraged me to go. Brian, Kariann and I along with Miguel's dad and grandma all went. I'm so happy I took Nancy's advice and went. It was one of the proudest moments of my life. All of a sudden is was real, and I understood what my son was doing. What a brave young man. I did not cry, eyes waterd but I held it together. They let me take pictures but mentioned like 5 times that we could not post them on any kind of media website or the internet, darn. After Miguel was sworn in he had a waiting period of about an hour before he was shuttled to the airport. We all were able to keep him company. I know that Miguel was happy that we did go to his swearing in and enjoyed the last few minutes he had with us. I keep thinking if I had any last words of wisdom, but really did it matter at that point.
Now I'm home and doing pretty good until Morgan gets home from school. This is the moment it hit Morgan, he walked through the front door and let it all out. We sat on the couch and cried and hugged. This will clearly be an adjustment for Morgan, him and Miguel have always been so tight. Next is waiting for the phone call from Miguel to say he made it. At about 6:00 pm I started getting anxious. Miguel went to Chicago for boot camp and they are two hours ahead of us. Finally at 9:00 pm our time I received my 30 second phone call from Miguel stating he was there safe. Last thing he said "I love you mom" then hung up. I replayed those words in my head in my sleep all night. My lil man.
We are on day three of Miguel being gone. One thing I did do was put Chicago time and weather on my IPod, funny I know. This will be a different summer, for Miguel is gone and Morgan is now working full time. It will be me and William keeping busy. I've been writing Miguel everyday so as soon as I get an address I can send of the letters. For any mom's out there going through you child enlisting there are some great website's that offer good information. I signed up with NavyforMoms.com. They have good information on what to expect the first few weeks that your child is gone.
I'm so proud of my son and look forward to hearing all about his journey. This was totally unexpected, but welcomed. We love Miguel and support him 100%. On that note I want to express how thankful I am for all the wonderful people in my life that have offered their support. On this past Thursday my phone was blowing up with text message and voice mails of support along with emails. Thank you so much it really made the day easier knowing you all have my back! Truly, truly appreciate all the words of encouragement and support. Next stop Chicago in about 9 weeks for Miguel's graduation.
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