Judith, Me & Marriage
 I met Judith through my work as an nurse, originally when she was a patient of mine and then later when we worked together from time to time at the same military hospital. She caught my interest the first time I saw her, and the more I learnt about how the more I was drawn to her.
After seeing the mess my parents made of marriage you might think I would be a reluctant convert to the cause, but might to my surprise I am a devotee.. With the exchange of rings has come a new certainty and clarity of focus to my life. My direction is clear and my world solid, something I do not think I had had since my parents divorced. Make no mistake marriage is about work and commitment, you will only ever get out of a marriage when you put into it.
As our lives change and evolve I never cease to be amazed at the things I constantly learn about my dear lover. Just as I think I have figured her all out some new aspect jumps up and delights me. How you can compress so much into one person ? A passionate lover, a fighter, a rock solid wife, a gentle and clever mother, a caring and dutiful daughter - sometimes it is like watching the changing light flash across a landscape. I think if we lived until we were two hundred I still would not see all of her - but I am sticking around for the light show !
On Children
 And now I have a new love, or rather two new loves. If someone had told me ten years ago that I would adopt two children and almost instantly bond with them I would have laughed. They are demanding, time consuming, always curious, always bouncing with energy and utterly exhausting. Our house was once so orderly, but now from 6 am until 7 pm a sort of semi-organised chaos rules. You would think I would be relieved to be at work, but every second I am away I am thinking of them, I have pictures of them in my purse, and on my work desk. While they may not be from my own body I love them as though they were, and at times I frighten myself with the strength of my feelings. If I feel like this toward them what on earth will I feel like when I actually give birth to our own ? Every time I walk into our house after work the first thing I hear are the children laughing, giggling and enjoying themselves. It was a sound totally that barely existed in my own childhood so now to me it brings a joy to my heart that tells me that all this effort is worth while.
Our first two children are both adopted, having fostered our daughter for several years on and off then finally adopting her after her birth mother, our good friend, died. Later we fostered little Nicholas. The army had deployed me to the other side of the world for four months when he first came to us, so for three months Judith had to deal with him alone. By all accounts it was a difficult beginning, he was, to put it bluntly, a little horror. Damaged in the womb by a chronically depressed and addict mother, then born deaf into her chaotic life his behavioral problems as well as the physical ones were extensive. They included a food phobia, temper tantrums, a refusal to sleep, and at two years old was still not potty trained. For three months Judith did battle with him alone, but at least in Judith he had met someone even more stubborn than himself.
By the time I was on my way home I had learnt that he now knew what a potty was and how to use it, he was more or less eating what he was given (or going hungry), and was sleeping through the night. When the Koninklijke Luchtmacht (KLu) landed me safely at Eindhoven on a cold, sunny September morning I was met by my little family. In my wife's arms was this little blonde darling screaming in delight at the roaring of the second DC-10 Extender taxing in, it was just loud enough for him to be able to hear and feel it so he took delight in it and screamed at it in pure joy. Despite all the e-mails and messenger messages filled with horror stories of the trials and battles with this little fellow and his painful start in our house still fresh in my mind, the moment I saw his happy little face screaming back at the aircraft I knew I was in love. It really was that instant.
It was a big surprise for me, and very unexpected. When we adopted Hilke, as sweet a child as she is, it did not trip the ' mother gene in ' me, and I had felt guilty about that, and doubted I would ever make a good mother. But seeing Nicholas on that day on the ramp of Eindhoven Air Base I knew. I knew I could love a child as much as I loved Judith, I knew I could do this amazing job of being a mother, and I knew that we had to turn this fosterling into an adoption as soon as we could to keep him in my life.
Now here I am a few years along, Nicholas is five, Hilke is six, I am pregnant with Mariaska and I cannot imagine life without them. My day begins with the children waking me and for the most of each day it revolves around them. Judith and I have to squeeze our time for each other into a few short snatched minutes here and there, but that has just made those times that much more appreciated.
It took me a little while but I made it in the end, I have joined the ranks of that vast and largely unsung army called parents
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A while ago Judith and I were at an Officer's Mess Dinner at my Base, and at this dinner was an American Officer and his wife. They were very nice, charming in fact though I imagine to them we may have been a bit of a novelty with us being a lesbian married couple & me in the armed services. At one point in the evening the wife comes up to me and says "God has given you two a wonderful love". On the surface of it this was a complement, it was not until later that it occurred me that in fact it was an awful thing to say, even though it was said with good intentions. 
I find it one of the saddest ironies that just as Judith's hearing (see 