The Navy has sent Petty Officer 1st Class Alvin Torres to sea five times before, but on his sixth deployment Friday, Torres had to leave his young family behind for the first time.

"This is the toughest one, definitely," said Torres, 36, as he held his 2-year-old daughter, Gillian, and hugged his wife, Anna.

The Torres family's goodbyes were repeated by dozens of Navy families that watched sailors depart Friday on the guided missile destroyers Paul Hamilton and O'Kane, which left Pearl Harbor to join the John C. Stennis Carrier Strike Group in the Persian Gulf.

Family support group representatives for both ships have already helped the sailors and officers prepare cards and messages for Valentine's Day and for the birthdays and anniversaries that will be missed while the Paul Hamilton and O'Kane are at sea for the next six months or longer.

But the preparations and plans for e-mailed messages and photos could not possibly hold back the emotion felt by new and veteran Navy families saying goodbye.

Petty Officer 1st Class Travis Wolf, 29, wiped tears as his two sons, Justis, 8, and Jaxon, 5, hugged his legs.

"Seeing the kids cry — that's the hardest part," Wolf said.

Minutes later, a young boy in a baby stroller wailed "Daddy! ... Daddy! ... Daddy!" as his father boarded the Paul Hamilton.

Chief Petty Officer Quincy Mayes' three children — two are 6 years old and the other is 7 — don't comprehend what it means to have their father away for half a year or longer, Mayes said.

But Mayes knows that he will miss all of their birthdays while his wife, Reyna, will be left behind to deal with the children's schoolwork — as she juggles her own master's degree studies and a job working for Planned Parenthood of Hawai'i.

"It's going to be hard," Reyna Mayes said. "And it just gets harder as the kids get older."

The Pearl Harbor-based Paul Hamilton and O'Kane are part of a battle group sent to "deter and dissuade any aggression in the ... Western Pacific, Indian Ocean and Arabian Gulf regions," said Capt. F.W. Pfirrmann, commodore of Destroy Squadron 31.

Family members left behind Friday said they understand and support the mission and are willing to do their part at home. And many said the goodbyes do get easier with time — "because he keeps coming back," said Cathy Shirashi.

She said goodbye to her husband, Lt. j.g. Jon Shirashi for his fourth deployment, along with Shirashi's parents, sister and various aunts and uncles.

But as the Paul Hamilton left Pearl Harbor, Cathy Shirashi walked away from the dock and said with a sigh, "I guess I'll have the bed to myself now."

Reach Dan Nakaso at dnakaso@honoluluadvertiser.com.