Manic Monday: Faith

I have never really blogged yet about how my husband and I met and eventually ended up getting married. I think it is a great story to share and I don't know why I haven't talked about it til now....it fits in well with Faith. It took a lot of faith for both of us to get where we are today.


I had been divorced just under three years. I had been dating off and on, only one person seriously...but that had ended a little messily. My fault, not his. I had done some really dumb things in my new found freedom, but I was trying to get myself straightened out again and my life back to some kind of order.

I took a position at my church as Youth Director after much thought and prayer and things started to get better for me. My job situation got better. My living situation got better. Dating was still kind of bleh..... but I wasn't giving up just yet.

It is so hard to date when you are in your 30's. Specially if you aren't into the whole bar or club scene. I spent alot of time on the computer playing games and chatting. Dated a couple of people I met online but wasn't really serious about anyone. It was just before Christmas when I decided I was done with guys for awhile. I had just broken things off with a guy who turned out to be a psycho. I swear.... he even pulled the "I'm going to kill myself if you don't go out with me." bullshit. I called his bluff on that one and sent the cops to his apartment. Hee hee. I was just really really sick of all the stupid stuff.

Then, I was hanging out in an Arkansas Yahoo chat room and I met Brad. He and I just chatted a little and that was it. Christmas came and went, I moved and didn't have internet for a while. When I got it back up in early Jan. I ran across Brad's profile again. I said, "oh, what the heck" and sent him a message. We ended up chatting off and on for about a week. Decided to call each other on the phone....

Our phone calls ended up being 4 and 5 hour marathons. After about a week of that we decided to go on a date and meet in person.

We met on January 12, 2003. It took a lot of faith to meet in person someone you only chatted with online... you never knew what the person was REALLY going to be like until you saw them. He was exactly as he described himself and we got along great, started dating exclusively.

Brad asked me to marry him on Valentine's Day...yep, one month after we met. I said yes. That took a lot of faith.... believing that he was truly the right man after only knowing him a month.

We got married on April 1, 2003. Two months after he proposed. It was what you call a whirlwind romance. I think our friends and family thought we had lost our minds. They were kind of worried about us.

BUT.... we had faith that God had brought us together. We both had come through divorces and knew where we had gone wrong before, we knew what we REALLY wanted in a marriage. We talked about all those things before we got married. We talked about where we wanted to live, children, religion, working, money, dreams, goals....all those things.

It was meant to be, and I haven't regretted anything. Our lives have been one big adventure after another together. We have gotten married, moved across the country, quit our jobs and took over a business, had two children..... all within our first two years of marriage!

We have been married just over 4 years now and we are still as happy as ever. Everything isn't always perfect...that would be so boring! All the crazy stuff keeps life interesting and we have a lot of fun.

So, that is how we met and ended up getting married. Maybe next time I'll tell you how we took our honeymoon before the wedding.

Two Lives

I said I would elaborate on my "two lives". I really do feel like I have had two lives, the life I had when I was with my first husband, and the life I have now with Brad. *Sorry Bernie, I don't think I have any pictures of me with pink hair*

When I met my first husband, Jim, I was in my early 20's. I hadn't finished school and did not have a clue what I really wanted to do with my life. We dated for about a year and 1/2. What we really wanted to do was just move in together. My parents freaked out when we talked to them about it...so he and I discussed it and we decided to just go ahead and get married. We loved each other...so, it seemed like the thing to do. I was 24 and he was 22. We had a huge church wedding with all the bridesmaids and groomsmen and the boofy dress and cake and pictures and stuff. It was absolutely beautiful. The reception was very toned down....in the church fellowship hall, with punch and cake and cookies... no booze in my family!! (said in a gruff trying to be funny voice).

Should we have gotten married, in hindsight...no freaking way. Am I glad that we did, yes I am. I learned so much from that time in my life. He and I were such good friends. We had a blast together. We went to all kinds of movies, we read comic books, played video games, played card games, went thrift store shopping, cooked, watched t.v. shows together...we just enjoyed doing alot of the same things and doing those things together made them even more fun.

I was so outgoing when we met. I had a huge group of friends and was quite the clubbing, party woman. He was not a big socializer and so I became isolated from my friends and lost most of them. As a result, I became more dependant on him for my "fun".

It's easy to remember the bad things that happened in the marriage, but I really really try to think about good things. He was probably the most intelligent person I will ever know. He probably is up there in the genious level. I think that's why he had such a hard time figuring out what he wanted to do with himself. He had so many options available to him, he just couldn't pick one, so instead he did nothing.

We also had three amazing retrievers. I loved those dogs like they were my children. Chapal, Cayenne, and Cosmo...those of you who are familiar with comics should know the name Chapal. It was taken from Spawn. Cayenne is just what you think: pepper. Cosmo was from Seinfeld. One of the shows we watched religiously. I am not even going to go into detail about what happened to them. It upsets me way to much and is too depressing.

I was in nursing school when we met, during our 7 years together, I quit nursing school, went back to college and graduated with my BA in English. He also graduated with his degree in history. We were homeless for about two months the 4th year of our marriage. We had been renting a house and the landlord sold it out from under us without telling us...we had to move out and couldn't find a new place in time. I lived with my brother and he stayed with friends..it was really weird at the time and it was over Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday. We bought a house together and went to Florida on vacation with his family. I loved his family as much a my own. One of his sisters even lived with us for awhile. We were poor, but it was okay. We were living the lives of young people free to do whatever they wanted, no kids, going to school. It really was a lot of fun, even being poor.

As we got older our ideas of what we wanted out of life began to change. I wanted to teach school and was working very hard at getting my certification. He decided that he wanted to make more money and took a job that put him on the road most of the year. I think in a 6 month period I saw him 4 times. I wanted stability, a nice home, a family, a "real" job. He decided that wasn't important to him. One of the things I remember him saying was "how could anyone get any kind of satisfaction/gratification from teaching?" He wanted to be mobile, able to travel whenever the urge hit him. The idea of settling down in one place and having kids wasn't what he wanted anymore. He didn't like what I was becoming and I really didn't like what he was becoming either. We just didn't fit anymore...and because of all this and more, we ended up getting divorced. It was very sad, and emotionally difficult. There wasn't any fighting or cheating or any nastiness like that. It went very quickly.

I had lost my best friend, and the person who I had thought was going to be my partner forever... The things I had loved to do so much now became dull and painful for me. I quit watching television, I quit going to movies. I gave up my comic book reading, and sold my cards. I didn't go thrift shopping and wear funky clothes anymore, and I quit doing fun things with my hair. Maybe it was because of the divorce and the loss, but maybe part of it was because I was finally growing up.

*I will continue this....*

What Planet Have You Been On?

Okay, I watch Oprah sometimes....I'm a stay at home mom...it's expected. I will not be watching her show again any time soon after this past Tuesday. It was all about marriage and how it goes wrong for women. I only made it through the first guest. Lance Armstrong's ex-wife: Kristin Armstrong.

I was thoroughly disgusted by what she had to say. How she tried to be the "perfect" wife and "lost herself" in the marriage.

This part of the interview was the point where I turned it off.

"What is the greatest conspiracy in modern history? Kristin says it's not Watergate or the assassination of John F. Kennedy—it's marriage."I think a conspiracy is anything that's shrouded in silence," she says. "I think women are awesome communicators. So why don't women talk to women about what it's going to take to not just make [marriage] work but make it great?"

Kristin says that in order to have a healthy marriage, husbands and wives have to find a balance between pleasing their partner and staying true to themselves.
"There isn't anything wrong with making sacrifices and working together. But I think as long as each person can hold onto themselves, and it's a mutual experience of growth—that's the beautiful part. That's the point."

Oprah says she never walked down the aisle because she didn't want to sacrifice herself and her feelings for a man. "I was in tears when I read [Kristin's article] because this is why I never got married," she says. "I just wanted to always be myself.""

Excuse me? We (women) don't communicate about marriage? Where was your mother? Where was your grandmother? Where were your friends who were married?????The women I know talk about their marriages all the time, sometimes too much. That is where I learned what makes a good wife and mother. Given, not everyone has a good role model....I was lucky. But you had to have had friends!! And lost yourself? I see you didn't lose yourself enough to go back to your maiden name. HA! What a joke. Sounds to me like someone is trying to push their book. And Oprah...I thought you were a strong woman. I guess I was wrong. Why can't you be yourself and be married as well? Your husband is supposed to compliment you and make you more...complete you.

I understand about failed marriages, I had a failed marriage. We made each other miserable, but not once did I feel like I was giving up my identity for him. I don't feel like I gave up my identity for my husband now. Just like you, Kristin: I gave up my job, sold my car, left my family, and moved far away from everything I had ever known with my new husband. You know what though, I am still me.

Unfortunately my husband is addicted to Dr. Laura. If you listen to her, she has some excellent suggestions on how to maintain an awesome marriage. I just read her book "The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands". I recommend it to any woman who is married, or getting married. I thought it was a great insight into how men think and how we women think. The great thing about it was that I was already doing most of the things she says a lot of women forget to do.

I just thought she was rather pathetic trying to say what she (Kristin) thinks makes a great marriage when she just fell flat in hers. Go pander your wares to someone else girl, this happily married woman ain't buying.