Erin Henderson giggled as her husband, Marine Corps Maj. Derik Henderson, explained how she is the better communicator in their relationship.
A self-proclaimed introvert, Derik admitted that he values his alone time but appreciates when Erin nudges him to check in while he’s away.
“Erin will remind me, saying, ‘Hi, how are you?’” he said. “And I go, ‘Oh, hi, how are you? You’re right. How are the kids today?’”
At the time of the interview, Derik was TDY stateside at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, while his family remained at their home on base in Böblingen, Germany. Faced with their most recent long-distance situation, Derik traveled alone so he could focus on his coursework.
The two have built a life with distance between them since early in their relationship after they met while Derik was stationed at Camp Lejeune. A few weeks and a couple of dates later, he deployed to Afghanistan.
Independent and a travel lover, Erin avoids counting the minutes until she hears from him, and was planning a weekend trip with their two children, Leif, 4, and Emmy, 3, to Austria to see the cows coming home from the mountain.
“We’re staying busy,” Erin said.
Fate’s full circle
Born in Germany and growing up in North Carolina as the daughter of a retired U.S. Army soldier, Erin was familiar with the military but thought she didn’t want to be plucked from her North Carolina home.
“I was doing actually everything in my power to avoid [the] military, truth be told,” she said. “I wa
s like, ‘I’m not moving, I’m not doing anything.’”
She avoided swiping right (signifying a ‘like’) on the dating app Bumble when she saw Derik’s location as Sneads Ferry, a popular place for Marine Corps officers to live. Eventually, though, she matched and initiated the conversation. Now she’s returned to Germany as a military spouse.
“It’s funny to be here — full circle,” she said. “Then we had our daughter in Korea. It is kind of funny how life does that, right?”
Traveling the world on orders
For Derik, the military was a way for him to see the world, and he committed after seeing a commercial of slaying dragons with a sword. As the first member of his family to have served in the military, Derik joined through the delayed entry program 22 years ago, telling his recruiter the biggest draw for him was travel.
Since then, he has been able to do just that. He’s been stationed in Japan and North Carolina, then South Korea and Germany with Erin by his side. Their two children have visited nearly 20 countries, and for the holidays, the family will travel to Budapest for Thanksgiving and then visit the Christmas markets.
Erin said that one of the most important things military spouses can do when faced with an overseas permanent change of duty station is to, “find your tribe.”
For herself, she enjoys CrossFit, joins travel groups, runs her photography business — Erin Henderson Media — and explores the culture of the new places the military sends her family.
“You’ve got to get into a new routine,” she said. “Embrace what’s around you and lean into it. Because if you make yourself a hermit, or you don’t just fully dive in and embrace it, you’re not going to really get that experience like you would. Dive in, go do all the things.”
