A New Life

So I am on my own again. Currently I'm living with my wonderful mother (moms are truly angels!). I am still trying to believe in happily ever now, it just looks a little different now. I still have so much to be grateful for in my life, and so much to give. I am continually blessed with incredible friends, opportunities to serve, and chances to grow. I am hoping to get a little better at this blogging thing, and using it as a place to share my thoughts and insights, my blessings and joys in life.

Behold God is my salvation; I will trust, and not be afraid; for the Lord JEHOVAH is my strength and my song; he also has become my salvation. (Isaiah 12:2, 2 Nephi 22:2)

Rejoice!

My husband and I are working things out! I am so thrilled. It is all I have been praying for, and many of my friends as well. Our God is truly a great God, and he does answer our prayers. :D

So to celebrate and strengthen this wonderful endeavor, I am going to participate in Women Living Well's Completing Him Challenge - Be the woman your man needs.

This weeks challenge is simple- announce that I am doing it! I like that- intention is the first step. I am intent on strengthening my marriage- stating my goal makes it more real. I am so glad my husband had a change of heart. I am so proud of him. I even bought a shirt to wear the first time we get to see each other when I fly home from school next week. The shirt is from the Union28 store, and says My Husband Rocks. And he does, for giving our marriage a second chance! Ooh, and a THREE DOLLAR pair of spanking new jeans!

So stay tuned in for how I learn to "complete" my awesome man!

He forgot

So I went back and reread an email from when I was engaged and (ex)hubby was deployed. He was telling the story of our relationship: "I'll never forget that I won, and I will never forgot that Cheerio likes me better, and that I'm cuter... I will never forget a summer spent in a hammock, no ma'am." But he did. He forgot of all this and just moved on. And even if I will be better off and happier with the next guy, this hurts so much!!!!!

...He asked for a divorce...and I just wanna scream. I am doing ok, making plans. But all I want, really, is to FIX THIS. I can't, its out of my control. And that's hard for me.

Realization

I think I let myself disappear into being his wife, losing a piece of me, and maybe pushed him away. My goal this deployment is to be me. To really find my independence so we can develop a healthier interdependence when he gets home. Wow. I wanted a perfect marriage so bad that I endangered it by not being myself. Not all the time, but enough. Wow. OK. New beginning.

Prayer

Prayer is a wonderful gift from God. To know that he is there and listening to me gives me strength. I feel his power in my life as I pray. I recently read some advice about surviving deployment that advised to pray for your deployed spouse when you are missing them most. Reaching out to my Father in Heaven in prayer to bless my beloved, I feel the Holy Ghost buoying me up in the sea of loneliness. The power of prayer is real, and selfless prayer is even more so.

when I bow my head tonight
there'll be no me, myself, and I
just watch my wife and kids please Lord
that's all I ask for anymore
-Trace Adkins

Defining Home

I have this habit of saying "I wanna go home" when I don't feel good. It made me stop and think about what home is to me. Now that I'm married, and since I've been dating Alan, really, home is where he is ...or where there is a sense of us. A place that we have made our own and filled with things big and small that represent us. Right now we don't have that place. We're living with mom and it has been kinda hard to establish a sense of us in the small space we have. Not that it can't be done in a small space, but our space is made smaller by mom's stuff that is still here, and by the lack of privacy. With my husband away, I just don't feel at home. I mean, I know I grew up here, but it's not home anymore.

When my husband gets home, we are finally getting our own place. I can't stop thinking about it. I daydream about organzing my kitchen, about the placement of our books and photo albums. I just inherited an album of his baby pictures, which is so perfect. And there's the fireman with Mickey Mouse figurine we bought at Disneyland. Just things that make it our home. A home isn't just things, of course, it is a place christened by the love between two people, love that will eventually create a family.

Home is in the arms of my sailor.