First Casualty.

Well! Not even 24 hours in and I suffered my first "friend" casualty over - of ALL THE THINGS - the NAME I chose for this blog.

I had someone who I used to respect and valued their opinion once upon a time basically lecture me about how me naming this blog "The Life of a Deportee Wife" was making myself a "victim" and that I shouldn't base my identity on that, because I was more than that.

Excuse me?!

First of all, that statement is flat-out FALSE. The name of my blog is in NO WAY me trying to present myself as a victim. My husband was deported from the United States. I am his wife. I don't see how those two factual statements have anything to do with victimhood at all. If I was a stay-at-home-mom and I named my blog "The Life of a SAHM" would he have a problem with that? If I was a soldier's wife and I named my blog "The Life of a Soldier Wife" would he have a problem with that? So why is me naming my blog such a problem? Because it has to do with illegal immigration? I don't care! Regardless of ANYONE'S stance on illegal immigration, my husband and I are in the situation we are in and we are TRYING to make it right and this is our REALITY. So if you have a problem with the fact that I call myself a "Deportee Wife" (in fact there are many, many more American women whose husbands have been deported and that is what we refer to ourselves as) then that is your problem, and yours alone, and I don't have any time for that in my life.

Then he proceeds to lecture me about how illegal immigration is wrong (duh), David is only in this situation by his own fault (duh), he's seen me say things "here and there" against our country (forgive me if I get angry and frustrated and bitter at times and once I said I felt "betrayed by my country"), and blah blah blah. He makes the statement that he is not really familiar with immigration law (let me give you a nice long lesson buddy) but he knows illegal immigration is illegal. Again. DUH.

Alright dude. Thank for schooling me on the way I'm "supposed" to feel going through this situation. Look, I knew David's status when this all began and I didn't care. So don't say that I shouldn't have fallen in love with him or pursued him because honestly, my heart and my mind had no control over the situation. I thought we would get the chance to fix it before he got deported, but that didn't happen. We are still in the process of fixing it. But illegal immigration aside, our immigration system SUCKS. It is long, tedious, expensive, USCIS is understaffed and overworked, and even at the end of it all, the decision comes down to ONE SINGLE PERSON'S DISCRETION whether this visa applicant should be allowed to live in this country. If that person is having a bad day when it's time to make a decision on David's status, they can deny him just because they feel like it! And that is a SCARY thought when you're trying desperately to reunite with the one you love. There have been laws introduced recently that make it even more difficult and more expensive to come back into this country legally. I get it. They don't want fraud. They don't want people getting married just to come here. They don't want people coming in this country who can't support themselves and will just leech off the system. They don't want people coming in this country who have nothing to offer. I get it. David gets it. Many people would be surprised at how much David gets it. Most countries are like that. But as I said before, going through this process, I have experienced anger, frustration, bitterness, the feeling of "why us?", all of it. I think that's pretty forgivable considering I have woken up every single day for the past year and a half in the house we used to share, ALONE. I've been unexpectedly stuck with all the bills and all the responsibilities. The person I used to spend every single day with for years is now 2,000 miles away from me and currently CANNOT COME BACK FOR TEN YEARS without going through the proper procedures (again, even more expensive and time-consuming). Yes, we accept responsibility for the situation. We knew the possibilities. This is our problem and ours alone (although we are so grateful for the countless people who've offered support since it began). But that doesn't make it suck any less, and I think we're entitled to the feelings we tend to experience every once in a while. So yeah, one time I said I felt "betrayed by my country." But those were my feelings at the time, and I don't think I need to apologize or or have them validated or dismissed by anyone else. It's not their problem. It's mine. It's ours.

You know, I'm a conservative Libertarian. I still hold conservative beliefs despite going through this. True, I am a little more familiar with the immigration system at this point and hitting brick wall after brick wall looking for solutions, and I am seeing firsthand--THROUGH EXPERIENCE--how unfair and exasperating it can be to try to fix this and make it right. But the fact that someone who I thought was a friend, would call me out like that for MAYBE switching sides on ONE issue, and then proceed to lecture me about this and unfriend me IMMEDIATELY after, not even waiting for a response (again, this situation has been going on a year and a half, not sure why he's all up in arms about it just now), it just blows my mind. I hate to use the word "intolerance" because I just really don't like that word. But holy cow how intolerant can you be??? He claims "No one knows what really happened or why David was deported" but did you even ask? Because I've been pretty candid with the people who've actually asked me or seeked out a conversation with me, at least as far as what little information I had on the subject for awhile. We're not trying to hide anything, but thanks for making it seem like we are. Oh but at the end, he DID say "I still wish the best for you and David and hope you end up together, good luck" because that makes everything he said alright.

NOOOOOOOPE.

So to any of you who may feel this way, please know that I understand where you're coming from. Your views are your views and generally I respect them--conservative, liberal, moderate, WHATEVER. I don't have to think they're right or agree with them, but you are allowed to feel what you feel. But this is my REALITY. Whether or not that makes me a victim is irrelevant (for the record, I do not consider myself or David victims of anything other than unfortunate circumstances and bad timing). And so sometimes that reality catches up with me and I just hate this situation and I hate that it's so hard to fix it. I hate that I, as an American citizen, am actually starting to plan to sell my house, move to a country I have never lived in, where I don't speak the language, and start my life all over again because the man I fell in love with, my other half, my soulmate, is not allowed to come back here where he has lived for the past 16 years, is fluent in the language, is business-minded and hard-working, paid his taxes, YES I'M SORRY HE WAS HERE ILLEGALLY, but if he was allowed to come here legally he would be the type of person anyone would want to live here, because the US is telling that man that he is not allowed to come back here unless he waits a lot of years and pays a lot of money (and even after all that, they might still say no). I'm sorry if you think I'm saying "poor me, poor me" but the bottom line is that I hate the situation and I think that's pretty acceptable for me to say. But we're trying to FIX IT, not wallow in the "poor me, poor me," as much as we might want to sometimes. We're both tough, and we're fighters, and that is what we're doing now. We're fighting like hell to be together no matter where in the world we end up, because we are the love of each others' lives, and the only thing that matters right now is being back together for good and starting a family and building a life and a legacy. So if you feel this way, please know that I understand where you're coming from....but I don't appreciate it, and I don't need it. You either support me and David or you don't, and if you don't, move along please.


"The Life of a Deportee Wife" IS my identity right now. 100% of everything I do every day is done with the end goal of either bringing David back to this country, or finally moving down there to be with him once again. That is my identity and I have chosen to embrace it. And I have chosen to share my experience and my journey because my life sucked and my world was horrible when I felt like I was going through this alone--and once I found an amazing group of women who are going through the exact same situation as me, even though it still sucks, it suddenly became not so horrible! So why is it so bad if I want to offer that to others? While at the same time sharing my life with the people who actually care to know what's going on in it?


If you want to have an honest conversation about my situation, or the struggle of reconciling my views and beliefs with a situation I'm personally going through, or the process we've been going through, or how this happened, or ANY of it...just ask. If you know me, you know I'm pretty much an open book and I'd love to have a conversation and share my thoughts and my knowledge and my beliefs. But it's not fair if you don't ask, and then you just make an ASSumption about things like that. And don't you DARE lecture me about what we've been dealing with for the past year and a half.

But what do I know? I'm just apparently a traitor to this country and my political beliefs because of something I said on Facebook once because I was having a bad day.

Good riddance.

First Post.

Welcome to my blog! This is the second attempt at a recent blog for me. I figured I'd start fresh, since I'm giving up Facebook, and also I wanted to start a new blog since I'm (as of last July) officially a "Deportee Wife." And that is going to be a big part of my life, and our journey, from here on out.

This is the first post, and it kind of sucks. It's late, and I'm tired, and about to go to bed, so I'm not going to make the first post of which I was imagining, but stay tuned for more updates to come!