My Daughter is Going to Iraq

I have been in a bad funk for a couple of months. We found out that my step-daughter is going to Iraq this summer.

She was supposed to go last year but "she wasn't ready" according to her CO. but now she is going ready or not.

She will be in some sort of special advanced recon unit, she will be going out looking for those "we" are trying to knock off. I am scared to death for her and ever since she told us about this I have had a hole in my stomach and my heart.

It is somewhat of a soap opera like story but we did not know that she even existed until 7 years ago. Her mother never told my husband that she had a baby and 'mom' would never tell the daughter who her father was, or who she suspected the father was.

Then one day out of the blue my husband gets a phone call from a young lady "looking for her father." FYI.... she was conceived and born about 8 years before we met and married.

We did the DNA testing and yes, she is my husband's daughter. They look just alike. We accepted her with open arms and have done everything to make her feel like one of us. When she was 12 and being abused by her step-father, she was sent to live with her grandparent's. By this time my hubby and I were married and my daughter is only a few months younger than she is so it would have been a perfect situation for her to come live with us, but..... we didn't know she existed and well, it is what it is. We have her in our lives now and I want to keep it that way.