It’s hard to explain just how bad a week can be during deployment.

Granted, all it takes is a look or a simple exchange of a few words between military spouses for each other to understand.

But, when you’re trying to explain it to someone married to a math teacher, an accountant or car salesperson, well, it just doesn’t compute.

During one deployment, after a particularly gnarly week, I had finally returned a phone call to a friend whose husband works in construction. I was weeks late; we’d played phone tag forever and I knew she was a bit miffed at my lack of attention.

I tried to explain. I stumbled and bumbled up my words, and I knew she wasn’t buying it.  

So, finally, I said it.

“Seriously, I have had so little time that I haven’t showered in over a week!”

There was a rather pregnant pause in the air.

I assumed, at that point, she was probably infinitely judging me or trying to smell me through the phone.

And then, she gasped. And loudly offered to hop on a plane and come help me because after all, “Everyone deserves to shower once in a while!”

We had a good laugh after that. I assured her I was fine, and that sometimes, when you’re alone with this parenting/working/homefront gig, you have a rare bad week, and you’re lucky if you eat more than the crust of your kid’s PB&J sandwich once every few days.

In fact, those weeks, you’re lucky to get a semi-regular shower, even if we don’t want to admit to that.

Later, as I told the story to my fellow military spouses, they all nodded excitedly in agreement.  

No need to be embarrassed. It seems to happen to the best of us, I guess.

In fact, it’s so prevalent that, among my group of military-wife friends, it is now the barometer by which all hard weeks are measured.

“How often have you showered?” I’ll jokingly ask a friend at my daughter’s pre-school who looks like she hasn’t slept all week.

On a text-message chain about a Friday playdate, several of us warned that it had been “one of those weeks,” and we hadn’t showered in a few days. We then reached the consensus that someone better bring wine.

Granted, some of it is exaggerated, tongue-in-cheek sort of fun. Just relating to each other and remembering that we aren’t alone in the chaos that is running a deployment household.

But we also know that, sometimes, it’s also true. That there is too much to do and too many places to go and too many people who need taking care of. And before you know it, you’re taking a “sponge bath” at night before bed and applying an extra layer of deodorant in the morning.

Not my proudest moments, but they’ve happened.

Luckily, not every week is like that. Most of the time, I can bathe regularly, as well as handle life as a military wife.

And when I can’t? When it’s been one of those weeks?

I splash on some extra perfume, and call it a win.