Officially unofficial

Derick has been home for about a month and half..well a little less..and we just finished sitting through a workshop for families whose soldiers are getting deployed. At this point we are not sure about anything, only the fact that we need to be ready. Let me back up and explain-
Derick came home and went to check in with his unit in Arcadia. I get a phone call right after that goes something like....
Me: "Hey babe. How did it go?"
D: "Well, my unit is getting deployed to Africa for a year."
Me: .................."umm".............."Are you going?"
D: "No, I'm not on the list"
Well that is not exactly true. It is Qatar, in the Middle East. And He wasn't on the deployment list but he is on the "bench list." We have learned since that this bench list means he goes if there are men who can't go for whatever reason, medical or whatever. Here's the thing... because he is on the bench list he has to do everything the soldiers deploying have to do, everything! Oh and there are 5% of a battalion dudes on the bench list and 45 dudes not deployable!!! He has been doing his training like he is supposed to do and his sergeants are telling his he has about an 85% chance of going. We are getting orders sometimes next week to see for sure. If he is going, at least we known, but if he is still on the bench on his orders he can still get deployed up to the day they get on the plane. I don't know which is worse. Derick has to do everything like he is leaving- all the training, the pre deployment training for 30 days and everything. If he is not going he comes home and everyone else goes. We really don't know until he is home again.
We tried everything to get him to OCS (officer candidate school). The commander says that if he doesn't deploy he will start the paperwork for OCS. Because there is so much going on right now that he is not going to do it before.
So right now I am just trying to accept. I am having a hard time accepting my duty/fate. I just want to go too. I guess the units have known for a while and we have only about one month to prepare. They are deploying at the end of February. I don't know the specific date because he has some training first. So anyways that is the big happenings. It kind of keeps hitting me over and over. Sometimes I am okay sometimes I am angry and sometimes I am weepy and sometimes I am jealous. We have some major decisions we have to think about. Aka babies and big trips to Utah. The problem is we just don't know if he is going or not. I am trying to prepare as he is so it is not so bad when he really does. Oh boy.....