Unifying the New Generation of Military Widows

I met my husband through my sister, who was about to be married. I married my sister's husband's brother, my brother in law. It started off with one simple phone call to introduce myself as a new member of his soon to be family. That one phone call turned into hours upon hours each day. My husband Sgt Jose Regalado was stationed at Fort Knox, Kentucky. One night, Jose told me he bought me a one way ticket to Kentucky. He wanted no answer to whether or not I was going to be there. He would know my answer once he got to the luggage area. To his surprise, I was there. On September 26, 2008, the moment I saw him smile, I knew I had just met the man I was going to marry, the man I knew I was going to spend forever with.

We married eight months later on May 3, 2007. As soon as we married Jose and I began our talk about babies. "A lot of them Sharri, a whole battalion." The days passed faster than I could ever imagine any other time in my life. We did everything together. We knew we couldn't avoid a deployment. Jose was a Cav. Scout. We made plans to travel the world. Travel Europe. We were Hoping to get stationed in Germany. Jose and I refused to live a plain life. We wanted to live. We had amazing ambitions. Life was going by fast but we lived each moment as best we could. Five months after we were married, Jose received orders. We were going to Fort Hood.

November 28th, two weeks before Jose's deployment we found out I was pregnant with our daughter Jaimie. Jose was updated every week with a picture of my belly. The months flew by. Eventually, R&R came on September 11, 2008. Jose got to meet his daughter for the first time, in the airport where I fell in love with him five times more as I saw him hold our daughter. The 18 days went by, as did our savings account. "Sharri if I die, think of all the memories we'll have, don't care about the money." It was the best $10,000 I've ever spent.

Jose and I were on countdown, three and a half months left. Eventually we got down to 55 days, just a few weeks.

There had been false notifications being done around the post, as I laughed a few hours before the notification. I laughed as I told my sister, "I bet we're gonna be one of those false notifications, they better be ready for an ass kicking."

I sent one last text to him, "I love you." As soon as I sent it I knew something was wrong. I knew something was wrong with Jose. I knew he was either hurt or had already been KIA. My stomach was in knots but it didn't prepare me for what was to come in just a few short hours.

My sister got a call from the soldier left to do the notification as I was not at my house, and I'm not the easiest person to track down. We thought we were a part of the false notifications. I forgot to mention that my brother in law is also in the Army. We called rear d as we tried to figure out of the upcoming news was real. It was. I prepared myself my sister, we were sure it was for her husband, who was already in Kuwait awaiting his flight home from his deployment. The thought never passed my mind that it would be Jose. As soon as the door opened, they came straight to me. My life felt like it stopped. I fainted before they even officially told me what happened. Everything else was just a blur until the day I actually received Jose at the Los Angeles Airport. He came Home. We met in the airport. He met his daughter in the airport. I received him at the airport. We lived a lifetime in a short year. We had a love that people hope to have but rarely find.

He came home.