For Everything There is a Season

"In order to write about life, first you must live it." ~ Ernest Hemingway

Category: love (Page 3 of 4)

Road To Marriage

January 14, 2013 / / 2 Comments
 
“Become the kind of person the kind of person you would like to marry would like to marry.” ~ Douglas Wilson

Four months from this Friday I will be getting married.
A whole wedding and everything.

This is a big deal.

I know marriage should be a big deal in general, but let’s be honest. In our society today, people get married and divorced more often than many people change jobs. My fiance and I have both been married before so now we are going to be included in the second marriage statistic. You know, the one that says half of all second marriages will end in divorce.

We will not be on the wrong side of those statistics. I’m sure everyone in love says that right before they get married again. Truth be told, I was fine with never getting married again. That was before I met a partner who made me experience real love for the first time.

That is a strange thing to say considering I was married once before and engaged to someone else even before that. My first fiance was this great guy I met at work when I was about twenty-three years old. We started out as co-workers and then became friends. We dated for a while, I moved into his house, we talked about marriage, I got cancer, he proposed, and then four months before the wedding, the bomb dropped.

He told me that he had come to realize that he never truly loved me and had only proposed because I had just finished my cancer treatments and he felt like he was obligated to propose. That is was what he was “supposed” to do. He should have said something sooner he told me.

Nice.
Problem was, I still loved him.

So I moved out of the house, sought refuge at my parent’s home because I was such an emotional wreck and spent the following weeks cancelling all the wedding plans that were already in place. To this day, I do not think he was a bad person. Confused and gutless yes. But not bad. After a while, I decided I was too young to pine away for a man who would never love me. I found my own apartment and continued to throw myself into my career, my family, and my friends.

Enter the next love. My ex-husband. I met my ex-husband approximately eight months after the break up with the ex-fiance and I did not date anybody in between. I am here to tell you that is a big mistake. I would have sworn to you up and down that I was not on the rebound and maybe I wasn’t. I was twenty-eight years old and all of my friends were getting married and having babies. Now I absolutely thought that I loved him and that he loved me but now looking back, I wonder if subconsciously, I was more in love with him or the idea of being in love with him and having the life society tells us we are supposed to have. You know, the one with 2.2 kids and a white picket fence. Because there were signs there that maybe he was not the right person for me but I did not pay attention to those red flags. I wanted to spend my life with someone and raise a family. I thought this was the way to be happy. Tough thing to admit.

Approximately a year after we got married (we had dated for two years prior to getting married), my ex-husband changed in a way that resembled Jekyll and Hyde. He decided that he did not want children after all. His mood started to change dramatically at times, he developed flashbacks, and he was subsequently diagnosed with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) which was a result of severe childhood abuse. Then the heavy drinking started and the only thing more difficult than living with an alcoholic, is living with one that has PTSD.

I tried and I tried as hard as I could to keep my marriage together. Eight long years of trying. I certainly made my share of mistakes during my marriage but none that warranted the way I was treated. I thought that if I loved him enough, he would be able to work through his issues, we would have a family and be happy. Instead, I became an emotionally abused wife. The day that he became violent and I thought he would hit me, I began the journey to becoming his ex-wife.

It was not easy, but I have never looked back.
I was finally free.

Despite the fact that the year prior to separating with my ex-husband I began to get very sick from autoimmune related issues, my life really started to evolve. I took control of my life. After we sold our house, I took one of our dogs, moved into my own apartment and discovered I truly enjoyed living by myself again. No chaos. I spent the following two years figuring out who I was as a person and reshaping my definition of what it meant to be happy and that it did not have to include being married, or even having a partner for that matter. Being happy did not depend on whether I was a mother or not. In that quest to find myself, I truly became happy.

I reconnected with my old friends and I made new ones. I began to write and pursue other interests when I wasn’t dealing with my significant medical issues.. I became involved with my church. I dated quite a bit. I even fell for a guy or two. However after a while, I found dating to be exhausting. As a thirty-nine year old with a severe chronic illness, dealing with the drama associated with dating just became too much. Too many liars, cheaters, and men with severe issues. It wasn’t worth my precious energy. I decided that I was going to be content with living on my own, in a great apartment, with my very cool dog and my wonderful family, friends, and church community surrounding me. I had my head on straight now and I was not going to compromise my happiness, health, or peace of mind for anyone else.

Best laid plans, right?

Then enter Chuck. What is it that they say? That love often happens when you are least expecting or looking for it? If you are interested, you can read our story here: Summer of Friendship…Summer of Love.

I knew within weeks of dating Chuck, that I would spend the rest of my life with him. I didn’t care if that involved marriage. I just wanted to be with him. He had become my best friend and it quickly became apparent to me that I could not imagine spending one day without him in my life. It was a big risk for me and maybe he would say the same thing for himself. The risk of loving again after you have been hurt so deeply in the past is probably one of the biggest acts of courage a person can perform. The difference for me this time though was that I knew I was with the right person. I knew what true love felt like.

The type of true love that makes you want to be an even better person than you already are. The type that supports you and encourages your dreams. The type that makes you want to work through all the very difficult questions and differences between you.The type of love that is ultimately unconditional.

I think I just wrote part of my wedding vows.

I am the woman who said she would never get married again but yet, here I am. Older, wiser, and with eyes wide open. I am the woman who is very glad to be a stronger, confident, and more self aware version of her younger self. One who, when she stands in front of her family and friends committing her life to another on May 18th, will know, with all certainty, that it is possible for marriage to last forever.

Hang On As Tight As You Can

December 27, 2012 / / 3 Comments
 
 
“I’ll lean on you and you lean on me and we’ll be okay.” ~ Dave Matthews Band
 

It is the day after Christmas and I am sitting here thinking of all the blog entries I want to write. My writing has taken a nose dive recently for a variety of reasons and I can always tell when it has been far too long since I have done any writing. Whole sentences and paragraphs start to form in my head in the middle of the night when I am fighting my enemy, the evil insomnia. Or I will be having a conversation with someone and sometimes find my mind wandering to all the thoughts in my head that I want to get written down.

Today is my day to get my mind and spirit back to my passion. To be honest, over the past month or so, I have been so distracted and overwhelmed, that I couldn’t even concentrate long enough to put all of those sentences and paragraphs together. But like so many other times, it was my fiance, Chuck, who gently reminded me with one of his Christmas presents, that writing is the one of the things in this world that I need to do.

He is so good like that; paying attention to what is going on with me and supporting me. I used to worry that because of my illness, he gets the short end of the stick, having to be the strong one more often than not. We have only been together a little over two years and we have endured our share of challenges, in regards to life, my health and, as all couples do, our relationship. Usually though when some type of challenge faces one of us, the other person is in a good enough place to be a strong support. But then what do you do when:

One of you gets so sick that you are hospitalized for five days. And more testing and uncertainty follows.

One of you is having a lot of stress at work.

Your dog gets sick enough to require four vet visits in one week and multiple tests.

One of your cars breaks down.

One of you has been hurt by someone you love and trusted.

One of you is faced with the possibility of another autoimmune illness.

One of you has a sister who undergoes life changing surgery.

One of you is told that you have a growth on your gallbladder that has a remote possibility of being malignant and you have to make a decision about whether it is worth the risk of surgery.

Christmas is fast approaching.

One of you is told that your mother is dying.

And all of this happens within the time frame of one month.

So what do you do? What do you do as a couple with so little time under your belt when both of you are stressed beyond limits that you think you can handle?

They say that love conquers all but I am not sure I agree with that anymore. Rather, I think love, friendship, determination, faith, compassion, selflessness, and most of all communication conquers all. Because once you are committed to someone, experiencing crisis is no longer a solo event. You have to be able to not only support your partner in their struggles, but deal with your own feelings as well. It is easy to get caught up in your own challenge of just getting yourself through the day, but it’s no longer just “your” day. The day belongs to both of you.

I cannot speak for my fiance but for myself, in the past month, if I was trying to be there as a support for him, I rose to the occasion. Almost to an extreme. If I knew he was stressed out and then asked me how I was doing, I would sometimes downplay something going on with me. I think there is a time and place for that, depending on the seriousness of what which each person is going through, but I am here to say that for the most part, it doesn’t work well. Because he knows me so well, he then worries more. Being a martyr for your partner’s sake is not the answer. Open and honest communication is.

We are by no means on the other side of the current challenges that we face and we may not always get it right, but I can say what has worked well:

*We ask each other “how are you today?” It seems like such a basic question but if you are in a relationship, think about the last time you actually asked your partner that question.

*By sitting down together, we have learned to prioritize the most immediate needs of the week, day, and even hour. It may be him traveling to Boston Christmas morning to spend time with his mother, knowing that I physically can not make the trip that day. It could be me doing some Christmas shopping for him so that he is freed up to deal with other things.

*We make sure we connect as frequently as possible and make each other the priority right now. I will actually consciously have to stop whatever I am doing sometimes and make sure that I have not been so wrapped up in my own problems and stress that I have not made myself emotionally available. On the flip side, I will also ask him if he needs time alone.

* Make sure we laugh together every single day, at least once.

* Depend on other people. Historically, both of us are terrible at this and the events of the past month have taught us that not only is it okay to ask for help, but that you also need to know who you can depend on for help. Especially when you need a listening ear. One human being cannot be all things to another.

Finally, and maybe most importantly, we hang onto each other as tight as we can.

Making Love Last A Lifetime

November 7, 2012 / / 1 Comment
 
Chains do not hold a marriage together. It is threads, hundreds of tiny threads which sew people together through the years. ~Simone Signoret

On November 7, 1970, two people pledged their love and commitment to each other. For better, for worse. For richer, for poorer. In sickness and in health.

My mom and dad.

Today, they celebrate forty-two years of marriage. Forty-two years. Can you imagine? I can’t. Maybe because in order to achieve that, my fiance would have to live until he is ninety-seven and I would have to make it until I am eighty-four. Heck, I can’t even picture fifty years old at this point!

But those two people, once in their early twenties, have made it that long and I hope and pray that they make it many more years together.

Like most marriages, their marriage has not been perfect. There have been many arguments and conflicts. There were multiple job losses and sleepless nights. The early years brought very difficult financial times, including standing in line at the A&P supermarket with their food stamps; trying to do whatever it took to keep their heads above water.

Despite the fact that both my brother and I are divorced, we both learned a lot from my parents during those early years and from the years since then. I can’t really speak for him, but they have taught me that marriage is a true partnership. They have demonstrated that with this partnership and a strong work ethic, it is possible to make a better life for yourself and your family. I am proud of how far they have come since those early years.

There have also been a lot of scary moments. A car accident and open heart surgery for my dad. Ovarian cancer and breast cancer for my mom. Moments that caused chaos and rattled the very foundation of our family. Moments that also strengthened their love as a couple.

Until recently, my mom has always been the talker and the emotional one in the partnership when it came to my brother and I, while my dad tends to be more reserved with his feelings. Most of the news and information in the family tends to go through my mother. I think that is true for a lot of families in that generation (they are in their sixties) but yet, when I sit here and think of the expressions of love I have verbally heard expressed in reference to each other, it is my father’s voice that echoes the strongest with me.

The year was 1997. After I had been in remission from a cancer diagnosis, my fiance at the time had suddenly broken off our engagement and relationship. Since we lived in what was originally his house, I went to live with my parents until I could figure out what I was going to do. He had told me that he had realized he had never really loved me. I was emotionally devastated. I remember floating in my parent’s backyard pool telling my dad this and how maybe my ex was just confused and would eventually come to his senses. I know, I know. I was being foolish. My father just looked me straight in the eye and said “Chris, when you love someone, you don’t say things like that. I have never ever told your mother I do not love her.You don’t do that.”

Simple yet profound words.

It has been interesting to watch my parent’s marriage evolve over the years since my brother and I have left the house and especially since they have retired. It seems like in a way, they have renewed the romantic part of their marriage. My mother refers to my dad as “her love” on Facebook and my dad was proudly telling me yesterday on the phone about the large bouquet of flowers he thought to order for my mother to celebrate their anniversary today. All I can say is, “who stole my parents??”

Maybe it is because there is no longer the chaos and stress of working full-time jobs and raising children. Perhaps it is because they now have more time to appreciate each other rather than trying to figure out how to just get through the day and pay the bills. Whatever it is, it makes me happy. It makes me happy to see that despite the odds and despite the challenges this world presents to us every day, true love can win out and last a lifetime.

Thank you mom and dad.

Partners In A Healthy Lifestyle

September 7, 2012 / / 2 Comments

The very first time I ever noticed my fiance, I was sitting in my usual pew at church. He was walking down the opposite aisle of the church to sit in his own pew by himself. He had a certain presence about him. Maybe it was his long trench coat that hung on his 6’2″ frame or his stylish cowboy hat. Maybe it was his unassuming presence or the gentle way he looked at people when they were talking to him.

The very first time I knew, although I was in denial about it for months, that I was very attracted to my fiance, he was kneeling by my side after church, offering to lend me some of his movie collection as I was trying to recuperate from a very difficult hospitalization. I subsequently fell in love with him for a million and one reasons. Attraction was a part of that love. I was attracted to him on an emotional, mental and of course, physical level. In my eyes, I never saw him physically as anything less than perfect.

So because of this, it came as a surprise to me when last year he mentioned to me that he had lost weight since we started dating in September 2010, that this weight loss was intentional, and that he wanted to lose more. He told me how much he weighed when we started dating and again, I was surprised. I had never thought of him as overweight and to me he had been perfect just as he was when we started dating. I guess that is what happens when the pheromones are in charge! I found him attractive on all levels and his weight was irrelevant to me.

Ignorantly thinking that men are not as concerned about self image as woman are, I didn’t think much of it and 2012 came upon us. I drastically changed my nutrition plan, eliminating gluten and dairy (to help control my autoimmune symptoms) from my diet which meant that at dinnertime, Chuck did too. After my Guillain-Barre fiasco in February, I got more serious about my health. I started exercising regularly and fine tuned my nutrition plan; eating healthier than I had in my entire life. Because Chuck and I are together most evenings and weekends, my healthier eating affected him as well. It was important to him that I be as healthy as possible and do whatever I needed to do to try and manage my autoimmune illness and although I offered, he never considered the possibility of making two separate meals when we ate together.

And as the months have gone by, I have noticed the changes that he has made one by one. Getting to the gym more often. Eating smaller portions at meals. It has been interesting to watch because he is not dieting, but rather just making lifestyle changes, one at a time. It has been great because to be honest, it has made my lifestyle changes a LOT easier when there are not always so many tempting foods in the house and when your partner doesn’t want to eat out all the time. That is not to say that we don’t treat ourselves or indulge from time to time but when we do, it is without reservation or guilt.

He has become my biggest fan and cheerleader in my quest to become healthier and lose weight. For the first time in my life, I have a partner that supports my mission. It is also the first time I have been in a relationship where I am losing weight rather than gaining weight. And he has never ever complained. Not once. He eats every single gluten-free, dairy-free, vegetarian, sugar-free, cardboard tasting recipe I have ever tried. Together we figure out which ones we both like more than others and then I experiment some more so we are eating food that we truly enjoy. When he cooks on the weekends, he cooks gluten and dairy-free. He makes sure the ingredients are measured so that I can then calculate the Weight Watchers points as I do the Weight Watchers program in addition to my gluten and dairy-free lifestyle.

I have come to realize that we have become quite a team. We each have our own strengths and weaknesses when it comes to nutrition and exercise. He is better at staying away from take out and fast food. I am better at making sure we have vegetables with our meals. He is better at the fitness aspect of things and has been good in helping me construct an exercise plan that is doable with my illness. I am better at meal planning and keeping the kitchen stocked.

I have blogged about and been very open about my health and weight loss journey but here’s the thing. It is not my journey. It is OUR journey.

That man that I was so attracted to two years ago? I realized when I looked at him about two weeks ago that he is NOT the same man. Not physically. I was so wrapped up in my own journey that although I knew he was losing weight and I could wrap my arms around him a lot easier, I was not fully aware of his amazing transformation.

I saw him getting dressed that morning and just exclaimed “Oh my God!”

I exclaimed a lot of other things but well, this is a public blog so we will leave it at that.

He had muscle definition in his abdomen, legs, and arms that I had never seen before. The result of exercising five days a week. The result of eating healthier. The result of losing thirty pounds in the two years we have been together.

I have to admit, it gives me a twinge of guilt now and then when I look at him. I am not any more attracted to him than I was before he lost weight but I cannot lie. He looks great. I fully appreciate the changes in his body and I have to wonder if on some level that makes me a bit shallow.

But then I stop and think about how concerned I was about his elevated blood pressure at his doctor visit last year before he lost weight.

I stop and think about how maybe this weight loss might prolong his life and therefore our time together.

I stop and think about how happy he is with himself and how proud I am of his accomplishment.

And I realize that those are the things I am really appreciating.



August 2012
 

When Mother’s Day Means Something Different

May 13, 2012 / / 4 Comments

This is a picture of a flower that was handed to me today in church by one of the children. We celebrated Mother’s Day as well as Children’s Sunday today. Children’s Sunday represents the close of the Sunday school year and it is a celebration and recognition of what the children in our church have accomplished throughout the school year. The handing out of the flowers has been occurring for a few years now. I remember the first year the flowers were presented on Mother’s Day. Before the children came out to present them both that year and this year, my minister prefaced this beautiful gesture by telling the congregation the flowers would be given to those of us in church that “look like a mother.” I remember sitting in the pew that very first year and thinking how difficult it was going to be for me when the children bypassed me and I was left without a flower. Left with an outward sign of who I am not. A mother.

But miracle of all miracles, I received a flower that year and I have received one every Mother’s Day since. All the women in our congregation do; because even if we have never given birth, adopted, or raised a child of our own, we all have in some way mothered a child or another human being. The flower is a symbol for the mother that lies within us.

Mother’s Day has notoriously been a very difficult day for me over the years. Correction: I have made it a difficult day for myself. The reason is simple. I love children, have always wanted some, or at least one, and have never had a child of my own. The reasons are numerous and complicated. I know it is something that I will eventually write many essays about but for today, writing about Mother’s Day is enough.

As the years have gone by, I have struggled with Mother’s Day because I have always focused on what I did not have and that is: a child of my own. One that I can raise, nurture, and love. As the day would approach and come to slap me in the face with my reality, I would dread it. Because I knew that most likely, I would never have the opportunity to be celebrated on that one special day each year. I would never possess that which is known to most of our society as the ultimate bond between two people: the bond between a mother and her child. It can be quite a difficult thing to live with in our culture and society where being a parent is given the utmost priority and acceptance. It can be quite a difficult thing to live with period. Sometimes you feel like you don’t fit with the rest of the world. Sometimes you just feel plain old sad. But those are topics for another day as well.

Luckily though, my thinking about this issue has evolved over the past year or so. And it has not come easily. Changing my thinking about going through Mother’s Day with no children has taken a lot of soul searching and yes, even some acceptance. It is not because I like children any less. But rather because I am more focused on what I do have rather than what I do not have. To start with, I have my own incredible mother. One that has nurtured me and supported me my entire life and whom I would probably be lost in life without. I do not want to waste precious time feeling sorry for myself on Mother’s Day when I could spend that time honoring and thinking about my own mother. And there is my fiance’s mother. How grateful am I for her? The person that brought the love of my life into existence. The man who has completely changed my life.

Most women in my life, whether they are friends or family, are mothers. I have been blessed by the grace of God to know them and to witness the everyday struggles, challenges, joys, and blessings that come with raising a child. To be honest, I do not think that every mother is a great one or even a good one. But in my circle, they are. So on this day, I honor them in my heart. I feel lucky to be a part of their lives.

What I have also come to realize, similar to how my church treats the women in our congregation on Mother’s Day, is that being a mother is not just about having a child of your own. It is about how we, as women, nurture and support the children in our lives whether it is in our own family or in our community. I now can stop and think of the times I have nurtured other people’s children. I have cared for, nurtured, and loved nephews, future adult stepchildren, goddaughters, and children of friends closest to me. I have supported the children in my congregation in their endeavors and activities. I have been a mother to every single pediatric patient I have ever taken care of by holding their hand, disciplining them, and singing to them in the middle of the night when they were scared or in pain.

I have been present.

Is it the same thing as raising a child of your own twenty-four hours a day? No, it is not the same. But I do not think that fact makes it any less important, or any more important for that matter. It just makes it different.

I am not living in denial of the difficulties associated with losing a part of my life’s dream. Now though, I try to not let it define me by who I am as a woman. From this Mother’s Day on, I refuse to let it overshadow what this day is supposed to be about and that is love. So Happy Mother’s Day to all of the women in my life who are mothers. Those who have:

Given birth to a child,
Adopted a child,
Raised a child,
Encouraged a child,
Been a role model for a child,
Helped a child,
Loved a child….
You are all truly my inspiration.
Photo Courtesy of Chuck Myers
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