How Do You Tell When You Don’t Even Know?

How Do You Tell When You Don’t Even Know? 05/16/2011

The Canadian military experienced a devastating event when a helicopter crashed overseas. All of the crew, soldiers and other personnel aboard came out (thankfully!) with little more than scrapes and bruises. My husband was among them. 

I got a call on my cell phone the day it happened from my husband. He told me the chopper went down, he was in hospital awaiting x-rays, everyone was fine and he’d call me when he had more news. I was on that call with him for 2 minutes, 40 seconds. I hung up the phone, completely in shock. Since I was in a car with my friend, who heard the conversation, she was the first person I discussed it with. I called my mother as soon as I was alone because, to be honest, I was in a panic and didn’t think I’d be able to get myself home in the state I was in. 

When I got home, and as I discussed with my mom, I refrained from contacting anyone. My husband told me he would call me as soon as he knew how he was doing so I decided to wait. I didn’t turn on the news (really for my own sanity when he’s away) but I looked online for any snippet of information I could get. I found a couple of pictures that took my breath away and brought the tears flowing again. Until I heard from him, I knew there was no way I could talk to anyone. I made the decision at that time to wait because I felt there was no use having more people panicking and I didn’t feel right contacting anyone without some concrete answers to the many questions I would have gotten. And regardless of the fact that my husband said he was fine, I needed to know more about what had really happened before contacting anyone else. 

Throughout the day my husband, his family and I have received so many wonderful, kind, loving comments for friends and family. I have spent a number of hours answering comments and emails. I have never experienced so much love and support before and am so thankful it came at a time like this. I am so thankful that my husband is safe and relatively uninjured. One of my nightmares came true last night when I heard about the crash. I had so many thoughts running through my head and experienced so many emotions. But I kept going back to those positive comments from our families and friends.

So this brings me back to my question: How Do You Tell When You Don’t Even Know? How was I supposed to tell someone something this horrifying when a) I didn’t know for sure that my husband was ok; b) I didn’t have any answers for any questions  and c) I couldn’t control my tears and fear long enough to have a conversation with anyone, let alone inform his family of what was going on. Was it selfish of me to consider getting myself under control first so I could better handle the many phone calls I would have to make? How did I become the bad guy when all I was trying to do was handle the situation the best way I knew how?