Double Duty: AF Family Counts the Days During Parents' Dual Deployment

Disney Princess and “Toy Story” characters serve an important purpose for the Gamez family. The familiar Disney faces on 5-year-old Tomas’ and 3-year-old Eva’s calendars reminded them how many days remain before Mama and Daddy return from their deployments in Afghanistan. Eva and Tomas mark off each day as they look forward to reaching the week marked with a sticker and the words, “Daddy should be home this week.”
The calendars went to Ohio with the children when their mother, Tech. Sgt. Christina Gamez, took them to their maternal grandmother’s home before the holidays. Sergeant Gamez will begin combat skills training at Camp Bullis near San Antonio in early January before deploying to Afghanistan. Her husband, Master Sgt. Rodolfo Gamez, left in September. He is a member of the Air Force Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Agency at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas.
“Every night, I make it a point to [tell the kids how many days there are] until Daddy starts home,” Sergeant Gamez said two months before she reported to Camp Bullis. “They know that means it’s about [45 days after that] before Mama gets home.”
Sergeant Gamez is a financial analyst who was assigned to the 802nd Comptroller Squadron at Lackland before her deployment. She’s also writing a blog, “Double Duty,” during the couple’s deployments to help prepare other Air Force couples for the concerns they will face if they deploy at the same time. She hopes the blog will help fellow Airmen make difficult decisions before and during their deployments. “Double Duty,” is available at http://doubleduty.dodlive.mil.
Because of their ages, Sergeant Gamez tried to keep her children from hearing about the tragedy and violence where their parents would be spending the next year. The TV usually was on a Disney video or educational program and not the news, and she asked her mother to follow her lead while the children are with her.
But sometimes it was unavoidable, as when she was at Wilford Hall Medical Center at Lackland for a medical appointment with her children before she departed.
“The TV was on CNN and they were talking about bombs in Afghanistan, so my kids asked me, “Mama, why are they talking about bombs and Afghanistan?” she said. “I told them they were talking about a different part of Afghanistan, but that’s why mamas and daddies have to go over there and keep the bad guys locked up. I don’t typically watch the news. I watch something that makes me happy or want to laugh. I don’t want them to hear that stuff.”
As the day to leave drew near, Sergeant Gamez found herself alternating between the joy of watching her children’s soccer games and the melancholy of knowing she would soon have to leave them for the uncertainty of deployment. But like her children, she drew comfort in what the calendars have in store for her family when she and her husband are home again.
A special date the Disney characters are helping the Gamez children keep in mind will be about two months after Sergeant Gamez returns. The family went to Disney World in Orlando, Fla., before the deployments and plans a return trip soon after the reunion next year.
“I get sad because I wish I didn’t have to go, but I know so many things are going to be easier,” Sergeant Gamez said. “I know all of the benefits we’re going to have when we get back. For our first time in the military, we’re going to have almost a whole year when we will probably be together. We’re just living in the moment right now.”