My healing....

Hey everyone! Sorry I've been MIA lately. Christmas, family in town, general craziness with two toddlers, lack of inspiration, etc. I hope you all had a great Christmas...
Ok so I've been meaning to write this post for a while but needed to not only be inspired...but also have time to think back....majorly hard for a tired Mama!
A while back I wrote This post...that was a tough post for me to write. I'd never been so transparent on my blog...showing my scars and wounds for the world to read. I am on a mission though...a mission to be the memory keeper for my family. To record my most precious and painful moments so that I never EVER forget them...even the bad and painful moments were invaluable lessons. If  you want to have the full story then please read pt 1 before reading this....ready? ok...

The night I met Ron....
I had broken up from my long term, on again off again boyfriend a week before and I wanted to go out! A friend of mine offered to take me out to play pool and blow off steam. I got off work, hurried home to change clothes, and met my friend Sarah in downtown Portland. Sarah had a friend with her...a guy friend that was visiting from college. He was nice and we all had fun together. About half way through our evening, and while walking from one bar to the next, The guy friend called his friend Ron and asked him to come meet up with us. He leaned over, while on the phone with this guy and told me, Hey you'll like him...I want you guys to meet. I gave him a rude and annoyed look. The LAST thing I wanted or needed was to meet a guy or be set up. I wanted NOTHING to do with men for a LONG time. I had been hurt badly by my ex and really needed to heal. Rather than saying this to him I just smiled and said ok. (I am a people pleaser at heart and can never hurt people's feelings). We were at a different bar...it was packed...smoky...loud...people were everywhere...and Sarah's guy friend leaned over and said...Oh hey there's my friend! I looked toward the door and saw him....
He was cute!! He had dark shaggy surfer hair, a skate t shirt, shorts, and flip flops on, and a big smile on his face. We were introduced and I was immediately drawn to him. The weirdest thing was that I didn't feel scared, or apprehensive, or guarded at all. I felt at ease, and excited to get to know him. We felt an instant connection. He was super nice, easy to talk to, laid back. He invited all of us to go back to his house to hang out so we all left. Sarah and her guy friend had rode together and they agreed to follow me, as I followed Ron. When we got to his house I went inside with him and we waited for Sarah and her friend to get there....they never showed. They stood us up on purpose so we could get to know each other! We spent the next 6 hours talking nonstop. Family, God, School...no subject was off limits and we were excited to learn as much as we could about each other. I left his house as the sun was coming up but I was not tired. I felt electricity...a feeling I had never felt before. I called my Mom on my way home and woke her up. I told her I met the guy I was going to marry...
Obviously she was terrified for me considering I'd ended a bad relationship one week prior. She was concerned that Ron was a rebound but that couldn't have been farther from the truth. God had truly designed this...from start to finish he had aligned our paths so that we would meet that night.

When I met Ron he wasn't currently living in Oregon. He had been living in Orlando Florida and training with a Wakeboard coach (he was a semi-pro sponsored wakeboarder...hence the shaggy hair lol) and was only in Oregon to visit his family for a couple weeks. I didn't know that he was going to leave in a couple weeks...he didn't tell me until I was already majorly falling for him. We spent every day together...with the exception of when I was working. We spent every night talking in person or on the phone. I was truly in love with him. It only took a couple weeks and I couldn't imagine us ever being apart. I vividly remember one night, as I was on the phone with him after leaving his house (he used to call me as soon as I left and we would talk on my whole drive home) and he told me he was leaving. He had to go back, to finish his training, to pursue this career. I was CRUSHED. I felt an ache so deep I could barely stand it. How could things work if we lived on opposite sides of the country?? I got home...sat in my car crying on the phone with him for an hour...and then he said something that I'll never forget...he said, Hey do you want to get breakfast? (We had spent the whole night talking, the whole drive home talking and crying, and it was now 5:30 am and he was asking me if I wanted to get breakfast?) Heck yes I do! We met at a little restaurant near my house and while we were eating he leaned over...with the hood of his sweatshirt up...and kissed me. I knew he was the guy God had planned for me....and he knew it too.

He left for Florida a few days later...

And came back! :) He couldn't be away from me and I couldn't be away from him!

We got engaged one year later and married a year after that! We've been married for going on 7 years now and I can truly say that God makes things happen for a reason. If I hadn't broken up with that ex when I did I would have never been out with my friend that night...I would have never met Ron and my life would not be what it is today! I am eternally thankful to God for his crazy amazing plans. I would not trade my husband for the world!!

My hurt

I have wanted to share my story for a while but didn't know how. How do you share the deepest details and hurts that you have experienced? How do you streamline all of that into something that's readible and makes sense when its all just a huge ball of pain inside of you? I'm just going to start....I hope I don't lose you. 
***takes deep breath***

I was raised in a small town on the Oregon Coast. I am the youngest and have one brother who is 8 years older than me. My Dad was in the Navy when my parents were first married and they did quite a bit of traveling, so they waited a while before starting a family. When my Mom finally told my Dad that she wanted to have a baby, my Dad's response was no. He didn't want kids now...sure he did when they first got married but now he didn't. No kids. My Mom was understandably upset and angry. She walked out on him and was gone for about a week..staying on her parents couch. She agreed to come home if my Dad would change his mind and start a family. He agreed and they had my brother. He loved my brother and embraced being a father. They went fishing, played sports, and really had a tight bond. After my brother was about 6 my Mom wanted to have another child. She approached my Dad again about it and my dad emphatically said no. There would be no more kids. He was done. My Mom left again...this time for about 6 months. She moved to the city, got a job and an apartment and prepared to raise my brother by herself if my Dad wasn't willing to be sensitive to how badly she wanted another baby. My Dad was basically parked on my Mom's doorstep during that time begging her to come home. 
She finally agreed after my Dad agreed to another baby. He made it clear that he didn't really want this baby but was doing it for her. That's when I entered the picture. As most of you can probably guess by now I have had some issues from that situation. I have known since I was a child that my Dad didn't want me. I don't know how I found out but I've known for a long time. As a result of this knowledge my Dad and I have always had a strange relationship. I have never felt close to him. In the beginning I tried really hard to win his approval..which was always nearly impossible. I played the sports that he wanted me to play so that he would spend time with me...although all the time that he did spend playing sports with me was spent with him instructing me on how to do things differently...not being proud of me. I spent most of my childhood trying in vain to win his affection and approval. I never felt like he loved me...although he told me he did. He honestly just didn't know how to relate to me. He thought if he was hard on me it would show that he cared...or if he criticized my sports that he was interested. A 10 year old girl doesn't see things that way though...they feel unloved and that their Daddy isn't proud of them. I grew up being very close to my Mom. She was everything that my Dad wasn't. Nurturing, caring, patient, and gave me unconditional love. She filled in the gaps in my heart. My Dad was very emotionally abusive to my mother. He never hit her or was violent with her but he told her on a fairly regular basis that she was stupid, etc. He would not let her have any say in how things went in our family. All the vacations were where my Dad wanted to go, the budget was done by him, the bills were paid by him, he decided EVERYTHING. He was extremely controlling and my Mom was a passive peacemaker. Not a good combo. I vividly remember an occasion when my Mom decided to invest in something similar to a 401k through her work (she was working part time while I was in school) without consulting my Dad. I came home just before dinner from playing at my neighbors house. I saw my brother sitting at the end of our driveway on our fence. He looked stressed. I climbed up next to him and listened...I could hear my Dad screaming at my Mom all the way out on the fence (we had a VERY long driveway and very good insulation in our house). My brother eventually had to get involved in that argument so my Dad wouldn't be violent towards my Mom. My Mom left my Dad when I was 14. They had been married for 30 years. My brother was in college and out of the house and I moved with my Mom from our small town to a big city. I started over. New friends, new house. I was damaged from so many years with an unloving and emotionally abusive father and didn't know where I fit. I carried that feeling with me all through high school and in to college. I tried to overcompensate for my pain by being outgoing, bubbly, happy ALL the time (at least on the outside). I made friends easily and kept myself very busy. I fell in love for the first time when I was in college. He was dark haired, brooding, had a major chip on his shoulder, and was pretty moody (sound familiar? Ya he was pretty much exactly like my Dad). We were serious almost instantly! He became emotionally abusive towards me pretty gradually. He would occasionally say things that were rude or very insensitive but follow them up with a couple good things to keep me from getting too hurt. It got worse...and worse. We were together off and on for about 3 years and whatever sense of self worth I had before that relationship started had dissolved completely by the end of it. He lied to me all the time. Always kept me guessing. I was a Christian and loved the Lord...went to church regularly before him and for my whole childhood. While in the relationship I stopped going to church and stopped praying. I disconnected from all my Christian friends and replaced them with partying friends. The only way I can describe it is that I lost myself. After I finally broke up with him I couldn't believe how far I had fallen. I was a miserable waif of a human being. I honestly didn't believe that I deserved better...I just knew I couldn't take any more! I changed my phone number so he couldn't contact me and I could make a clean break!

My family helped me heal and I got back into church. I knew that God loved me and wanted me to have more. More love. More consistency. More fellowship with believers. More time with Him. I went out with a friend about a week after the breakup and met a really amazing guy. That guy would end up changing my life and making me a mother!

To be continued.... 

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