Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/32804
truth that no one—not their friends or even their husbands—understood exactly what they were going through. But standing at the front of the room, guiding the discussion, was Sue Wagner— a woman who did. It was during her son’s tour of duty in Iraq that the 49-year-old Sun Prairie resident found her own mis- sion right here at home: serving military mothers. Both bubbly and nurturing, Wagner’s experience had led her to the helm of her BSM chapter, where she serves as president. And though it is a position she never ex- pected to be in, it is a role that has changed her life, and the lives of countless others along the way. “We are not a military family,” Wagner explains, in slight disbelief of why her son, Brandon, had wanted to join the Army. She’s seated at the kitchen table of her Sun Prairie home, the scene where Bran- don’s talk of becoming a soldier grew over the years from the casual ambitions of a young boy to the firm, unwavering plans of a young man. For Wagner, the military was a world of unknowns—unfamiliar jargon, esoteric rules and, in a time of war, uncertain terms of deployment. In short, it was a world Wagner didn’t care to enter. So like the concerned “hover mother”—as Brandon had lovingly coined her—she was, Wagner did her best to change her son’s mind. “And then everything I was afraid of came to life.” Then, during Brandon’s senior year in high school, her efforts came to a screech- ing halt. “He looked at me and said, ‘I’m going to do this with you or without you. But I’d like to do this with you,’” she explains. “And then I knew it was a done deal. This was his choice. I stopped making it my choice.” In 2008, one month after he graduated, Brandon left for basic training. Just over a year after leaving, he called to say his unit was preparing to be deployed. “We knew it would happen, but you still dread the ‘d’ word,” Wagner explains. “And then everything I was afraid of came to life.” Wagner and her husband made the trip to Brandon’s base before his deployment. For four days, the couple, along with the families of other soldiers, waited anxiously for their final chance to say goodbye. “It was just a torrent of emotion. Our 42 BRAVA Magazine May 2011 four days there, I was completely on edge,” she explains with tears in her eyes. “That last hug was the worst. I’d heard other moms say you just have to get that last hug, but you can’t cry. You have to smile. But how could you not cry?” The couple returned home as their son began his nine-month deployment. In her day-to-day life Wagner went through the motions, but a piece of her mind was always focused on Brandon. “During the entire time he was de- ployed…I slept with the phone by my head [in case Brandon called],” Wagner admits. “I was a fanatic.” When he did call, she learned in the mere minutes they had to talk that it was best to stay upbeat and report the mundane details of life at home. Brandon didn’t want to, or wasn’t allowed to, talk about what he was going through on his long, hot days doing ground-sweeping missions to search for bombs. Wagner also couldn’t tell Brandon about her struggles. Normally a put-together woman who had successfully spent over 30 years at American Family Insurance as a compliance consultant, she suddenly struggled to get through the simple rituals of daily life. “I could get up and go to work every day, but I had a hard time when people would ask if I’d heard from Brandon,” Wagner explains. “It was all I could do to not break down.” Balled up with tension and anxiety, Wagner often couldn’t sleep and couldn’t shake a relentless sense of worry. They were feelings she didn’t know how to express to anyone—let alone her son. She also never had the heart to tell Brandon about the day she confronted her biggest fear of all. It was in the midst of an emotional roller coaster that often boiled down to “good days” and “dark days,” that Wagner sat down, on a good day, to plan Brandon’s funeral. “I know it sounds really morbid and sad,” she admits. “A friend asked me what would be the worst thing that could hap- pen. And I said that he wouldn’t come home. So she told me to confront that, and I did. I got out a manila folder, labeled it ‘What if?’, made all the [funeral] arrange- ments, and then put it in a drawer and set it aside. “I remember when [this idea] was sug- gested to me, I thought ‘That’s just wrong,’” she continues with a little laugh. “But it was a big stepping stone for me because [this fear] was weighing me down.” In those initial months of his deploy- ment, as Wagner searched for different ways to cope with her anxiety while being supportive for her son, advice from other