Millions of people will spend their whole lives searching for a soul mate and never find one. Unfortunately, some of you people reading this article might make up some of those millions. One person whose love life will not be turned into a statistic is RWC freshman Claudia Lauch. At the ripe age of 20, Claudia married her high school sweet heart, Jesse Lauch.
“I met Jesse in high school sophomore year,” Claudia indulges. “We were together almost two years before we decided to get married.” Naturally you would think onlookers would shriek at the idea of getting married so young, and yes the two caught this feeling from others. Even though this was a common vibe around their family and friends, it did not change Jesse and Claudia’s decision.
“When we first started talking about the idea, it all seemed so weird, especially how everybody took the news,” Claudia said. “But we knew it felt right, and I have no regrets!”
As if getting married at a young age wasn’t enough to handle, soon after the wedding Jesse would be getting shipped off to join the Marines.
“He was already in the Marines when we decided to get married,” Claudia continued. “He got out of boot camp in November and proposed on Christmas Eve. We got married the 11th of March, 2006.”
At the beginning of Jesse’s enrollment, he was stationed in Jacksonville, North Carolina, which will also be the Lauch’s new home once Jesse returns from Ramadi, Iraq.
Claudia’s Lance Corporal has been gone since September 10 but will be gracing her presence for a much needed period of time in April.
Not being able to see a loved one for that long of time is one thing but imagine not even being able to talk to him. “I don’t ever know when I can talk to him; it might be every nine days or half a month,” Claudia explained. “I have my phone basically glued to my hand. I never know when he might get to call.”
The question I’m sure everyone is pondering is how in the heck does she do it? How does an individual go so long without seeing the person she loves?
“Keeping busy is the best thing to do. With two jobs and school, I sometimes don’t even have the time to be upset,” Claudia said. “Other times it’s so hard to even get out of bed knowing I still have forever until I can see him again, but some days are better then others.
“No matter how hard and stressful the situation is, in the end it’s all worth it because he is my everything.