I can’t deny being shocked and saddened when I realised how traumatic things had been for Carol during our separation; to think I hadn’t been in a position to help her was frightening and heartbreaking. And while I couldn’t forget how vulnerable our family was while ever we were dependent on the Navy I didn’t want to spoil what we had finally got. Here we were in beautiful Gibraltar with a two year posting to look forward to and although I did need to analyse carefully my ever changing circumstances (in terms of my ‘work-home life-balance’) I had to keep those good bits in mind to ensure our stay in Gibraltar was a positive one.
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As a serving member of the armed forces the Royal Navy’s interest in me would always be (first and foremost) military (since their primary role was the defence of the United Kingdom and I had a part to play). But that didn’t mean to say they weren’t interested in my well being or harmony within my family life. Just acknowledging that took the sting out of personalising the issue; after all I’d been in the Navy five years, loved my job and the culture and I understand how things worked. I was well liked, well respected and later in the year I was due for promotion so naturally the Royal Navy was a massive part of my identity.

What had changed, however, was that I was now a married man with children and therefore my priorities were changing and were now very different to when I first joined up. That wasn’t the Navy’s fault but what I needed to do was get a grip on it all.
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For me the whole thing was a massive learning curve; as a family man I now had to develop the skills of anticipation, to be able to look forward and spot obstacles or issues that might negatively impact on my family, and begin to think more about prevention than cure. From that moment on that is exactly what I did. After talking through things I think Carol recognised that she was actually a very strong young woman underneath which (despite the catalyst to finding that out being so dreadful) was something she was proud of and could (and would) now build on.
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Being able to talk things through together had been a real tonic. It had lifted a lot of anxiety and fears and bonded us even more closely together. Whatever was around the corner would never be as frightening as where we had come from because we would tackle it together and with that in mind we could now finally look forward to our two year posting in beautiful Gibraltar.
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