Backwards, then Forward.

So I am 25. I waited and dreaded this day since the day after I turned 24, not for the obvious reasons. I don't hate getting older, I just don't like my birthday. Last year, I had a crazy, ridiculous, unforgettable birthday. So I dreaded this one, afraid it might turn out the same or worse.

This year  has been weird. Nothing horrible notable as in years past where bad things occurred, such as accidents, lifelong friendship wrecking arguments, or apartment fires, it was just a drag. It felt like there was no forward movement, just circling the same spot hoping for different results. I don't know what the next move is, but I am going to reflect on my 24th year.

I struggled with my anxiety, and it sucked so fucking bad. I am still struggling, but damn it would be such a lie if I said this year sucked. It did suck at times, but it was so awesome. I got married this year, to my best friend.  My niece was born and everyday I get to watch her change and grow. My sister got married. Our whole family dynamic changed. I hate not having a steady income and I hate living with my parents and kind of hate living in the Valley, but I don't know if I would trade any of it for missing out any of this year.

Some days I hated being here more than anything, I hated my anxiety, myself, everything. So why is it I don't regret it. Changes need to be made. I can't live here forever and I need some stability for my sanity, but on my 25th birthday spending it with my husband, my sister, and my niece was the best thing I could have asked for. For better or for worse this is my home, my family is my home.

Sometimes life sucks, bad things happen, jobs are lost, people get sick, and all you want to do is give up. Then you realize there are enough amazing, wonderful moments that make you realize why you can't give up.

I am going to keep trying. Life is far from perfect and I don't want perfect. I am going to try and hope things get better. I am going to learn to enjoy those amazing moments as they happen and not in retrospect.

No Place Like Home...

So you know now that I have always had this urge to move away from my hometown. Although I am still here I haven't been convinced that this is where I ultimately want to settle down. I don't even know when it started, but I never felt like I belonged. I thought this place was supposed to be a starting point, not the whole journey. Okay so I am only 24 going on 25, but it feels like forever.

At this moment in time I am glad to be here, I get to enjoy spending time with my family and my beautiful niece. I feel blessed because I get to watch her change on a daily basis and I know sometime next year her and my sister will move away and it makes me sad and grateful at the same time. Sad thinking about the future but grateful that we have this time together.

When I was younger though being here didn't feel like home. I rarely ever felt at home anywhere. I love my parents, but sometimes I would walk into a friends house and think, this feels like a home. When I was 15 we moved and then we just kept on moving around from house to house. In the past 10 years I have lived in 11 different homes or apartments.

No wonder I never felt at home anywhere. Part of me feels like as soon as I get comfortable I am just going to move again. The only real home I knew isn't my home anymore, the place where I spent ages 5 to 15. Even where I am now, I know it is only a matter of time till I move again, probably within the next four months. I joke that I am a pro at moving now, but man I really hate moving.

Growing up I never felt at ease anywhere, even now there are moments when I don't feel at ease. I have good parents who had good intentions, but too often I felt like I was walking on eggshells in my own home. Constantly  waiting for my dad to yell at me for doing something. I grew up thinking I could never do anything well enough. I was a good kid, but I had the sense he was just waiting for me to screw up. Once you get accused of something so many times eventually you ease into the role. I was tired of being accused of being a screw up so I just became a screw up...it only took 20 years.

I never felt at home at home so I spent years waiting to get out of here. Why am I still here?

Right Now

So right now I can't sleep. If I am lucky I will manage to be in bed around 2am. On the nights I am not so luck I am awake until about 5 or 6 in the morning. I wish things were better. I am not miserable or depressed even. I know what that feels like and I never want to go back there. I just wish I were happier. I would do anything to be happier. In this moment I feel like a huge disappointment and in other moments I feel like an utter failure. Unable to accomplish all that I set out to accomplish. I want more out of my life and I am willing to put more in so that I can get more out. Sometimes I wonder if God is listening to my prayers. The prayers for peace in my heart and purpose in my soul. I think I know what I am supposed to be doing, but then I get discouraged and uncertainty fills me.

After one really bad day, I had these horrible thoughts, and felt purposeless and empty. I felt like I had no reason to get out of bed in the morning. These anxiety attacks have a way of paralyzing me from the inside out and I hate it. I want control of my life back and I am desperate to find a way to achieve that.

Anyway during that particular night I had the most wonderful dream. One of my biggest wishes and fears is becoming a mom someday. I want more than anything to become a mother, but my anxiety makes it difficult to think it is a possibility.

So in this dream there was a young boy, not an infant, but a young boy about 2 years old and I went to pick him up to bring him home.I was his mom.  The one thing I want more than anything is to adopt a child who is in foster care. In my heart I believe there is a child, and although I did not bring him into this world I am meant to be his mother. I know it sounds crazy, but that is one of the few things in my life I am completely certain of, without a doubt.

When I woke up from that dream I felt this relief, happiness, and anticipation. One day once the rest of my life is figured out I will make that dream a reality. I will work hard to make the rest of it work, so I can to that moment.

So late at night in spite of the anxiety, bouts of occasional sadness, and general uncertainty I know I have a reason and a place in this world.

Right now I am thinking about someday.

Deep Thoughts...according to me.

So my assumption is that had one big event in my life never happened then my life would be completely different, because my husband wouldn't be in my life. 

So if my life were different because of a decision I made that would also affect my husband, because would change. So even if you are perfectly content with every moment in your life take a moment and think what if someone else got a do over, not on there whole life, but just one moment. How would that effect you? Whether or not you believe in God or some grand design, just think about every single decision we make every single day. Okay. Now think about all the decisions all the people in your life make, not just family and friends, but strangers, people you pass on the street. 

If any one person you cross paths with were to make a decision differently your whole life might change, just like that. So for those of us who believe are lives are dull, mundane, or even average, think about how easy it would be for all of that to change. I drove down the same road almost every other day to go to work, while in high school. My parents worried about all the dangers of the big scary world outside of this area, but it was while I was driving down a familiar road that everything changed. 

I hope you feel blessed each and every day when you get up and run through your usual routine with little excitement. 

Oh and a side note for all the bitching and moaning I hear about those poor people, those rich people, those people. Whoever they are "those people" that you love to complain about, and believe me I am guilty of it as well, remember we are all interconnected. Grand Design or not our lives are meticulously intertwined with those of strangers we may never truly know, but we depend on each other, we need each other. Think about that while you are out particularly during this holiday season. A decision someone else makes could have an impact on your life forever, the opposite is also true. 

What If...

I often wonder what the tipping point would have been. How far back should I go to change everything? Would I just go away to school in spite of the havoc that became my life post accident or would I just wish away the accident. So lets go with the latter and say the accident never happened.

So for that is where I will start, I will go back to that late day in March on my way to develop spring break photos. Driving down a familiar road and only this time there is no cyclist and I make it to the store, get my pics developed and head back to my friends to show them off.

It seems easy enough. Then I get exactly what I always wanted the opportunity to leave for college. 

Only my parents never wanted me to leave, the accident just gave them a legitimate reason to get me to stay. They never would have been okay with me moving 2000 miles away. So we would come to a compromise and I would be allowed to leave the area, but not the state and I would go to my first choice state school. The school of choice would put me far enough away from them, but still close to family so that I would not really be alone. 

This is where it get interesting, I applied for this school several months prior to graduating high school, not for anyone else, but because it had a variety of degrees I was interested in. If I had gone to that college I would have been at the same university at the same time as my now husband. My husband and I met online 500 miles away from each other. So it could have been  easier or nearly impossible to have met him on a large university campus. Truth be told I don't think our paths would have ever crossed. His political activism has rubbed off on me now, but back then I could have cared less. I would have been focused on my own life and getting myself situated. Maybe if we were destined the universe would have thrown us together, but it seems so unlikely. 

One more important factor is, coincidentally the boy from high school who I was hopelessly infatuated with just happened to be attending the same university as my future husband. So who is to say how that would have turned out. 

I am still trying to figure out if I believe in destiny and fate. I believe in God and I believe in choices. I think God has a plan for our lives, but I also believe we make our own choices that determine how we get through our journey on Earth.

So right then and there if one event had failed to occur in my life I may never have met my husband. An event occurred that was out of my control when I was 18, but I made the decision to stay here. In the months that followed the accident I decided it was best for me to stay put.

Setup for a Breakdown...

I find that I am regularly being told to live in the present or focus on the future and just let go of the past. My problem is that I tend to hold on too tight. Honestly if it were so easy I would be doing it already, just walk away from the past and move forward. I want to believe that I have no regrets. I think we all tell ourselves that so we can justify our current situation. For the most part I think it is true, we tend to live with few regrets. When we sit and breakdown those big life changing moments and sometimes the small less meaningful ones we start to rip apart at the people we have become.

 I never had any intention of being almost 25 and living where I do. I look back at these old journals that I wrote and I write about two major topics, 1) Boys, 2) Getting the hell out of here. I started writing in journals when I was in the seventh grade. So yea, when I was about 12 all I wanted to do was make it possible for me to leave. Not just leave but get as far away as possible and hopefully never come back. I was really dramatic. I could not stand living in the dream sucking place. I honestly believe is this is where dreams come to die. Remember I currently live here so no offense to those of you who also happen to live here. At a young age I could see people here had a certain attitude and closed-mindedness that I just could not imagine subjecting  myself to for the rest of my life.

The only out I saw was to do well in school and escape. In my journals, other than boys, all I wrote about was my plans and goals for surviving long enough to escape. I love my parents, but when they imagined we graduating high school and going to college, they imagined me staying close to home. I felt like that was a trap. I would never get to experience anything if I never left and college felt like the perfect opportunity. I meticulously wrote down all of my goals, and I intended on following through on them.

So, I didn't exactly follow through...I decided to fit in some fun with the hard work. I took all the right classes , minus those crazy math classes, but I tried. I had moments when I could not see through the haze of why I was doing this. The mantra was, one day it will all be worth it. One day. One Day. I stumbled, especially when I got distracted, by certain distractions, but I made it.

So one day I opened my mailbox and I received my acceptance letter to my dream college and a few others to state schools, that I considered backup schools. It was my ticket to get 2000 miles away from home. A home that never really felt like home. I never really felt as though I belonged here. Of course if you've read other posts you know that a couple weeks prior to receiving the Golden Ticket, I was involved in a traumatic , tragic car accident. So, I never went. I deferred one semester with the intention of leaving, but I chickened out and was destined to stay in the land where dreams come to die.

Only when I look back and think about changing that specific moment, I don't think I would change it. Check back for the breakdown on how different my life would have turned out had made a different decision. It is interesting, at least to me.

Why?

I have so much to say, but most days I find it difficult to express what I am thinking or feeling. I think in life that will always be the greatest struggle saying what you mean and meaning what you say, at the exact moment you want to say it. We spend so much time waiting and waiting for the right moment and it never seems to come around. Then one day you are sitting around and suddenly it hits you, it is up to you to create that moment. Time won't stop for you, or me, it is just gonna keep on and we are gonna end up exactly where we never wanted to be. For me that is confused and more confused. For you that might be at a job you dislike, a city you hate, alone, or worse with someone you know is all wrong for you. Is that worse? What is the worst place to be? Some might say being alive is all that matters. You have your health and a loving family, then life is good. And most days it is good for some, but all it takes is one moment of wonder to cause you to reevaluate every decision you ever made.

I imagine that for most out there the scenario is less dire and they are perfectly content in their lives and most days the same is true for me. Unfortunately I have always been a deep thinker, one who questions everything to the point of neurosis. Like why is it two people cannot ever seem to want the same thing at the same time. Is that Divine intervention, fate, chance, or just stupidity on the part of both parties.Why can't life be simple?
Not every moment of every day, but every once in a while, can't it just be simple.

Simple would be telling someone you loved them and them loving you back and everything working out. Or having a good job without constantly worrying about job security, or living paycheck to paycheck. Life isn't perfect and I understand that, but some things in life SHOULD just be as simple as that.

I feel like a five year old with ten million questions always wanting to know why. Why? Why? Why?

Tell me anything and I will ask you why.

My suggestion to anyone reading this, get over yourself and your crap and just do it. Whatever it is, just do it. Life is hard, and complicated, and frustrating as hell, don't make it worse by holding on. Let it go. Stop waiting for that perfect time. Stop holding onto your ego, be real and honest and do it now. Who knows what might happen tomorrow. If you wait too long tomorrow you might be forced to ask yourself why.

I hope you enjoyed my random rant.

All In

 She was faced with the challenge of dealing with a past memory that she couldn't remember. Someone from their past came into play and it was like a marker in time. Their relationship was split in half, between what was and what happened next. She suddenly saw their relationship from a completely different point of view. When you are dealing with chaos and are in the midst of it, sometimes it feels like  you are drowning and struggling and you forget the important stuff. When you see it from the outside in, you see that you made it through, you survived all of the craziness. It was easy to want to get away from everything associated with the hard times, but she knew that they made it through together. During all the chaos, although they struggled and had disagreements, they never gave up. They had nothing binding them together, they weren't married, they didn't have children, yet they never truly walked away. The never gave up. She wasn't ready to give up. It was actually the complete opposite, she was ready to go all in. He asked her, but she wasn't sure before and now she was. She was ready.

Alone

She struggled for months unsure of what to do next. In her mind their relationship had no chance of reconciling. She wanted to be able to see everything else that life and love had to offer. She was so young when she met him, what if there was something better out there. She was still so young, there was no urgency in settling down with one man for the rest of her life. Was it possible to end their relationship and maintain a friendship without everything becoming complicated and messy.

No. Because life is not that easy.

She started to reevaluate her own life and determine what she wanted outside of  their relationship, outside of any relationship. She spent so much time identifying herself, by her relationships, including friendships. Who would she be without said person in her life. Now she needed to find out who she was without herself standing in her own way. She was her biggest obstacle, constantly second guessing and questioning her own decisions.

She has always been such a quiet person from a distance, not one to speak her mind immediately. Well she intended on changing that, making sure that people knew who she was and make an impression. She was tired of standing on the sidelines of her own life. She needed this time to get her life together, without outside influence. As much as life is about the larger picture, it is also about each and every day that passes.

At this point there were so many people that had passed through her life and made an impact in one way or another. She had to understand that her life was not about these people, but about how she bounced back after  every negative interaction. Life had become so overwhelming, sometimes she wished it would just become easier, for one day.

Then something happened, that appeared to make it more difficult, but appearances aren't all they seem to be.

Letting go

She felt like she was drowning, completely overwhelmed by everything, She needed a break. It was a cliche, but she really did believe the grass was greener on the other side. Even if it wasn't she needed to find out for herself.

She began searching for the guy who she believed held the answers she was searching for. Maybe he held that piece of her heart that kept her from fully loving her present love. If he did, didn't she owe it to everyone to find out the truth.

She found him, and he didn't seem to hold much of anything, but distant memories. Some of them were really good, but none of them seemed relevant. When she spoke to him, it was a recap of where she was in life now and remembering where they had been together all those years ago. He had her past, part of her innocence, and the part of her life that was so much less complicated. Because what seemed like the worlds biggest problems in high school, are nothing when put up against the real world.

That is exactly what it was, he wasn't real. She kept him in this nice corner of her life,where he knew just enough to understand,but not too much to make him a fixture in her life.Wait, so he wasn't a fixture in her life, even though they knew each other for over a decade. She realized, he was not, because he came and went as he pleased, showing up long enough just to catch up. She didn't love him, she cared for him, and missed him sometimes, but she didn't love him.

It did not take too long to figure that out, but now what was she going to do. She was still confused about so many other things in life.

Struggle

While he was recovering from his injury, she became scared of losing him. Things that didn't bother her before now made her nervous. Now he was taking care of her, helping her through her struggles. He stood by her and just as they thought life was about to get easier, it didn't.

After spending the holidays fighting with friends over personal issues, they had one more thing to add to their plate. At 4am, the were woken up, by a faint alarm and the smell of smoke. As their apartment filled with smoke, they moved quickly grabbed some shoes and their cat and walked out as a firefighter came to their door. They stood and watched in the early morning hours as firefighters searched for the source of the fire, and saw smoke billowing from the building. It was after 7am when it was all over, and the fire dept said they could go in for a min to get a few personal belongings.

The fire had not destroyed their apt, but it had made it unlivable. Everything was covered with smoke and there were scorch marks on the walls. There were also holes from where the firefighters had taken their ax to the wall in search of the source. The source was the apt directly behind theirs. After what they thought was the worst six months of their life, they went into a new year hoping for the best. In the first month of the new year, they ended up without an apartment.

In the years since they struggled with everything from job loss, relocation, illness, and love loss. All of the big problems made it difficult to get through the everyday problems. It became about trying to get through each day and they needed each other just to survive. The love they once shared was drowning in everything else. She did not know if she could do it anymore.

Her mind began to wander.

Thinking about that guy, who did not share her struggles, the guy who reminded her of everything before real life happened.

He had nothing to do with her current life and that seemed like the best thing ever.

New Love

See the problem with the story of their relationship was that he always showed up at the end of her story. Yea, she could call and rant to him about her six months or so for a few weeks, but then life would take over and they would go on with their separate lives. Part of becoming adults included new experiences and new people. For her the two were intertwined.

Funny thing is a couple months after that amazing experience under the stars before high school graduation, she met someone new. He was so different that anyone she had ever met before, he was so motivated, confident, and genuinely kind. He was a really good guy. She couldn't help but to fall for him, because he was so amazing.

The relationship with this new guy had its rocky moments and they broke up. They were young and didn't want all the complications or drama that romantic relationships can cause. The first break up was after she found herself ill and struggling with certain problems, their relationship was new and he walked away from it. They spent the summer apart.

The next breaking point came a little less than a year later. She wanted to meet new people. So they both met new people. That lasted for all of three months. Neither of them were ready for a long term commitment, but both struggled with the idea of seeing the other date. Truthfully, she couldn't stand the idea of him possibly falling in love with some other girl. It killed her.

It didn't matter what problems they had she loved him so much and just wanted to find a way to make it work. She knew they could get through this and at the time it seemed like the hardest part. Admitting that she was wrong and she wanted him back.

The trouble with love is that life happens. Life was going to show them how strong they were and how easily everything could fall apart.

Attempting Closure

It is a long story...

Six months passed and she received a phone call, from a mysterious number. It was him. He called her and he was kind of a jerk, but it was nothing she didn't already know about him. At this point she had started to move on with her life, plus they lived hundred of miles apart. It was horrible she still felt connected to him.

Every now and then over the course of the next few years they stayed connected in one way or another. Nothing serious ever happened, but part of her always wondered about him. Truth be told she could never imagine a relationship or future with him, she just needed to know that at some point over the last decade he felt the same way.

One night, after so many years she got almost exactly what she wanted, only the timing was all wrong.  She was in a relationship, and although she always wondered about him, it felt like it was too little too late. Trouble was he was persistent and she was a little bit weak. Every time she thought of him, he made her feel like that teenager who stole a kiss from her at school.

She turned him down, and told him it was too late, but she wondered about him and kept on wondering. It was enough to build into a hole in her heart that yearned for him and wanted to hear from him, just to see if there was anything there. They didn't speak for some time, and in that time she missed him more and more with each day. She searched for him, but simply couldn't find him anywhere. So she tried one last time, she found a way to find him, and she did.

She spent so much time going over and over in her head what she was going to say to him. Wrote down all of her feelings and thoughts, so she could get it right this time. He had to know how she felt, once and for all. Unfortunately he didn't respond the way she had hoped and then she didn't say exactly what she wanted. It all came out resentful, angry, and bitter. Upset that after putting herself out there for so many years that he thought his one gesture was enough to make up for all of that. It wasn't.

She decided she was finished with him. If she couldn't get what she wanted from him now, he was never going to come around. All she wanted was everything. She wanted to know if all that they shared was enough to risk an actual relationship not some unique complicated friendship. For so many years they got close to that point, but either one or both would back off.

She didn't want to live her life with the regret of not knowing how it might have turned out if they had just given the other a chance. She wanted so badly to give him a chance, give them a chance.

The problem was, she was 12 when she first told him she liked him and over a decade had passed since that time. They were both adults, and she had lived this whole entire life without him around. She cared about him the same, but she was a different person, so much had happened.

So much he could never understand...

Tough Enough

Within a few weeks of reconnecting and trying to decide what to do now, the universe decided.

While spending the afternoon together planning a trip out of town and running last minute errands a freak accident occurred. While trying to push a car, his hand slipped and slammed through some glass. Thinking that he had simply cut his hand she tried to stay calm. The problem was he was freaking out and there was blood everywhere. More blood than you could ever imagine from a simple cut. She got him to calm down and sit, while she dug through the contents of her car. She found a blouse and wrapped it around his hand and wrist to stop the bleeding, called 911, and waited. She couldn't wait, they were taking too long and he was bleeding through the shirt. She hopped in her car, made him sit in the backseat and sped to the closest hospital. She left him at the ER entrance and went to park the car.

She followed his trail of blood to admitting, he was already being seen, and she needed to fill out paperwork. Standing in a pool of his blood, she overheard an ER nurse say his artery had been severed and his hand was holding on by the bone. The doctor confirmed, that everything at his wrist had been severed, but the bone. He was going to need surgery to attempt to repair and regain use of his hand.

The next five days would change everything for her. First he was transported to a hospital hundreds of miles away, where there was a surgeon who could repair his hand immediately. She did her best to maintain her calm and keep him calm. She filled out paperwork, called his family, and hopped on an ambulance with the clothes on her back and the cash in her purse, to stay by his side. The entire experience was unforgettable, going to the wrong hospital, sleeping in different waiting room, trying to stay calm through his 12hr surgery. It was all she could do to not fall apart.

It was not until after he was in the recovery room and she able to speak to him, that the enormity of the situation hit her. With a brave face she held his hand, smiled, said she loved him and left when the nurses asked. Then she walked away from his parents, over to the empty stairwell, fell to the ground and cried for the first time.

He could have died.

Yea, it was a hand injury, but his artery was severed, he could have bled out, had she waited for the ambulance, or if she had not found a way to slow the bleeding.

He could have died.

Her heart stopped at the idea of never seeing him again, actually never seeing him again. She loved him so much, so much more than she had ever realized.

After he was released from the hospital, she moved in with him, and helped him through his recovery.

This was her test, but there was more to come.

that became complicated.

It is just a story, but here is some more...

Those last few months, they started to really talk again, like friends do, but with some differences of course. In between that first kiss and the end of high school, she managed to date other guys, but it always came back to him. So every now and then he would take her out to this quiet, deserted place, where they could talk and kiss and talk and kiss, mostly talk. It didn't matter to her anymore, because she knew they would be going their separate ways so she might as well take it all in.

It was always late at night, when no one else was around and you could see the clear sky, filled with stars. During those evenings there where some unbelievably memorable moments, ridiculous things happen when you are out in the middle of nowhere. The best moment for her was their last, a few nights before graduation they went back out to that place, to talk and kiss, and then nothing. They stopped, lied down next to each other on the ground and stared up into the clear beautiful sky, all night long. It was one of those moments she knew she would take with her forever.

They graduated high school and went their separate ways onto their separate lives. The relationship they had was a unique one, it almost can't even be explained. She always knew how she felt about him, but she could never read him and decipher what it was that he wanted. They had a friendship that lasted so long, but didn't develop into anything else. The talked and kissed, but never anything more.

There were a handful of moments though, where it almost crossed that line to something more. Completely exasperated she always pushed away. She wanted more, the same way he wanted more. Only they wanted completely different things. She knew if she crossed that line, then she would be completely gone and he would have every last bit of her heart. So this was it, they made it through high school without crossing that line and now they could move on.

The universe had a different plan.

A simple story...

So I am back, I started a new job and it is kicking my butt, I am incredibly exhausted, yet I can't wait to go back for more. Tomorrow is my day off and I am seriously considering going in to pick up some extra hours, while they are available. Anyway so tonight I am going to take a different approach to my post.

First you have to forget everything you have learned about me. I am just going to share a story with you, whether you take it for reality or fiction is completely up to you. It is just a story, nothing more. Enjoy. 

  

Like most stories go there was a girl who met a boy and was immediately smitten with him. He was her first crush. All other boys up to this point where just friends, playmates, other kids to run around the playground with. This boy was different though, he made her feel different, it was good feeling. These kids grew up together, became friends with a weird relationship, but friends none the less. She always knew she liked him, but she was so scared of even mentioning it to him, because she knew he could never feel the same way. So the older they got the more she wanted to tell him. Because he didn't know this, but he literally made her knees weak and just with a smirk. So one day, with the encouragement of some friends, she got up the courage and did the schoolgirl thing and wrote him a letter, right before summer break. She was right to choose that time, because the letter he wrote back broke her heart. And at twelve it takes a whole summer to mend a broken heart. Although they said it wouldn't affect their friendship, it did. 

So two years passed before they spoke again and even then it was a few words in passing, nothing like before. Then it happened, they became friends again, not close friends, but enough so that they could hold a conversation. And it started all over again, this boy who was now a teen had this pull on her heart, one she could not explain not even to her closest friends. He wasn't the type of boy she should be interested in, because he didn't seem to be that nice of a person. She didn't see any of that though, all she knew was what she felt, and he made her feel all sorts of crazy. 

She couldn't do this again, she couldn't put herself through this to be turned down and brokenhearted. So she played it cool  and acted like nothing he did would bother her. It worked for a minute, until he tried to kiss her that first time, her first kiss. She moved so fast his face almost hit the wall behind her. Her mind exploded, what in the world was going on. This was all she ever wanted and now she was shutting him down. She was shutting him down because it was all she had ever wanted. What if it was nothing like she had imagined, what if he just hurt her again. This was her first kiss, something she waited so long for. This could be the best or worst thing ever. 

She laughed him off and walked away, she wasn't ready, not yet. A couple weeks passed and the next time he tried to kiss her she didn't stop him. She was scared as hell, but she didn't stop him. One thing she did do was lie through her teeth to him. When he asked if that was her first kiss, she said of course not. She had kissed this other really specific person last summer or some lie to that effect. He couldn't have that part of her, or at least he couldn't know that she had given that part of her to him. It would give him more power over her heart than she could handle. Wasn't it enough that this was the first boy she had ever liked, did he really have to be the first one she kissed. 

They never dated. She was always so afraid of asking him for more and she was smart enough to know better, so they just stayed friends. Friends who occasionally kissed. It never went passed that, she wouldn't allow herself to go there. They got through the last couple of years of school in and out of contact with each other. The last few months were the most interesting. 

Creating a New Path

Quick disclaimer,so although I try to be as unbiased and as fair as possible when retelling these stories, I might still get some facts wrong, this is my story. Now where was I, oh yeah in the middle of sharing a story. So after running into this old friend I came away with a new sense of peace, which had been missing for such a long time. The one thing I was still lacking and I am still lacking is closure. Appearances might not be quite what they seem, but from a distance she looked really happy. And I am honestly hoping that after everything she does find herself true happiness and joy.

The second interesting development was getting the chance to talk to a good friend after several months. Funny story is her and I took a mini break from each other, when we last saw each other we weren't on the best terms, but not the worst either. All these months later and we are still friends, she is someone I can still confide in, which for me is rare nowadays. Yesterday she introduced me to a few interesting ideas and a book recommendation. It all revolved around how to put myself back together to move forward and the actual concept of forgiveness. Not just saying, oh I forgive you, but actually implementing it into your everyday life. Then I went on to tell her about my run in and she had her own opinion on the subject which led me to realize a few more things.

This person who once was my absolute best friend, does not have to be my enemy, she just isn't my friend anymore. Unfortunately and I know this for a fact, directly from my ex-friend, she will never forgive me, and with the language she used I am almost certain she hates me. I will not disclose the circumstances that ended a decade long friendship, but I will simply let you know that it was not a guy or a lie. Yesterday, I officially accepted that her and I will never be friends again. However, just because she completely incinerated all the paths, I don't have to do the same.

I thought that when it ended, that she burned everything with her including all of the good, the memories and happy moments. Because when a romantic relationship ends you don't want anything to do with anything that person came in contact with ever. I know now that I can keep the good and accept the bad for what it is.

So my good friend, reminded me that in our lives we are gonna have so many people who come and go, and obstacles that we have to face. We all need to know how to forgive those who hurt us, but also learn what to take away from each relationship and situation. I know I can't just walk around this world holding onto the hope for closure or anger because I didn't get any. I am only responsible for my own actions and I can only that others take responsibility for theirs as well. So my advice to everyone else, stop being angry and start forgiving. There is so much more to life and we need to start living it, without the negativity.

Crossing Paths

So I have been struggling the past two days to come up with something new to write about, then two separate things happened to me. First,  I crossed paths with an old friend, the person from Regrets: Part One. Then , I got to speak to a good friend, who I hadn't really spoke to in several months, and she  gave me some really good advice, which included some reading homework.  These two thing might not be as important had they not happened within a day of each other.

I last personally spoke to my ex-friend over two years ago and since then I have struggled with moving on from that friendship. This person had become such an enormous part of my life, that I considered her family, it was like losing a part of myself. For so long immediately following our fall out replaying the events that led up to the end. In a romantic relationship it is so different because you have prepared yourself to some extent for an ending. For me she was someone who I could always count on for anything, no questions asked. I had witnessed this person have other relationships end dramatically. The only way out was not just for the bridge to be burned to but to be incinerated so you couldn't even find the path back if you wanted to. I know that sounds really judgmental and incredibly harsh, but it is also the absolute truth. I find myself guilty of doing the same thing on occasion, of course I was immature and in high school.

Another thing you should know, in case you were wondering, I don't hate this person, not even one tiny bit. I know I could have handled the situation that ended our friendship differently, but I didn't and I can't take that back. What I regret is that in doing what I thought was the right thing, I simply ended up alienating her.  In order to avoid an altercation I decided that it was better for me to say nothing instead of saying something I might regret. When I want to be mean I can be a very nasty person. This was my best friend I didn't want to say ugly words simply out of anger. I believe there are certain things that once you say them you cannot ever take them back.

So in the years since I have wanted to say all the words I never had the chance to say, none of them out of anger, but out of the hope for salvaging the friendship. The trouble was anytime I saw her anywhere I would turn around and walk in the opposite direction. Still afraid of saying things that you can't take back, having it turn into a confrontation. In this public setting for privacy reasons I keep this persons name private, but even in m everyday life it has taken me almost those two years to say her name out loud. I would literally just say that person, you remember that person. Trying hopelessly to incinerate that bridge and all paths connected to it. Unfortunately that also meant that I had to destroy the good with the bad, or so I thought.

Two days ago, I crossed paths with her, she didn't see me, but I also didn't turn and run the other way. I finally felt at peace, like maybe we could coexist in this world together. This might not be my most exciting post, but there is a second part to my story. Come back and keep on reading.

For the Record...

Okay so this is blog is my personal vehicle for venting. It feels better than writing in a journal because I can actually get all of my thoughts out and put them out into the universe. I am a perfectly healthy 24 yr old women, at least according to my doctor, minus a couple treatable ailments. I don't think of myself as sad or depressed, just reflective. Some might confuse the two, but personally I feel like it is important to reflect and move forward. Pretending like I have not had obstacles or circumstances that have prevented me from excelling is a bunch of crap. This is me being completely honest with myself and with everyone else for that matter. If there is anyone out there who can look at their lives and not have some moments of weakness or regret, then you are not looking deep enough. I am just like everyone else, I have dreams, goals, and plans for my future. I am also painfully aware of the fact that life happens, every single day, and things don't turn out the way you planned. I am a hopeless optimist at heart, but I am also a practical realist. I am not broken or some lost little girl. I am a person filled with faith, hope and the idea that there is good in all people and in the world. Don't you ever get tired of walking through this life smiling and nodding, even when you don't feel like smiling and nodding. Sometimes I just wanna break it down and tell you the truth from my perspective. It might not be pretty and you might feel uncomfortable with it, but who cares, it is my life. You can go on and smile and nod like you don't have a care in the world, but I see you and I know inside there is something eating at you. Whether it is a relationship you struggle with, bills you can't pay, a job you can't stand, or the deep wonder if after everything you worked so hard for your whole life if this is it. You know what I mean, you worked your whole life with the mantra "Someday it will all be worth it." Well was it? All the hard work was it worth it. In the grand scheme of things it probably was, but late at night when you can't sleep because you think it might not be, you swallow the feeling wake up the next morning and keep moving forward. Well I am here, to let those feelings out and not shove them down into the pit of my stomach. None of us are perfect. None of us have a perfect life. The only difference is I am not going to walk through life with a fake smile on my face, just to impress everyone else. When I smile, it is genuine. When I laugh, it is impossible to stop the laughter. I am as real a person as you will ever know. If you can deal with that, then keep on reading. I will have many more interesting and sometime ridiculously boring things to say.

Regrets: Part One

So I am one of these people who tries to convince themselves that EVERYTHING happens for a reason. I want to believe that so badly and to some extent I do believe that, but some nights I cannot sleep because I am just filled with wonder. What if things had happened differently and I had made different choices...would that change my entire life? Good things happen, bad things happen, that is life. But over the past six years I feel like I have made my share of huge life altering mistakes. I have burned so many bridges in the name of protecting myself, that I have somehow ended up feeling filled with regret. If life is just this huge butterfly effect, then any one choice made differently would cause DIRE consequences, lol. However, if I did have the power to go back and do things again, I think I would. Not everything just the last conversations I had with two people who had been my friends the longest and when it came down to it, I wasn't strong enough to keep going. At one point I was so broken, lost, and sad, that I honestly did not have the strength to fight for the friendship. Some days I don't regret a single word, but then when I remember all the good times we had, I regret everything. If I could do that moment again, I wouldn't change my stance, but I would change the way I handled the situation. But, by the time that moment in time happened I was already so freaking depressed and that all it took was one more ounce of bad news to set me off into a panic stricken frenzy. It is nights, like tonight when I yearn for the advice from someone who has known me for over a decade, that I have the greatest regrets. This was the person who I called during some of the worst situations I had ever faced. This was the person whom I called FIRST, to pick me up from the scene of a frightening car accident, even before my parents. We grow up and move up and that is another part of life, but there is something warm about holding onto past memories. It has been made perfectly clear that this person will never speak to me again, and I can make my peace with that. She hates me and I can live with that, because the opposite of love is indifference and if she hates me, it means she still cares. At least that is what I tell myself when I miss having a best friend.

That is my first and biggest regret, because if I had a do-over, then I could have someone talk me through my second biggest regret. Right now I am sitting here beating myself up over something that happened eight months ago, with no way to fix it, or at the very least apologize. I tell myself that I am really good at letting go and moving on. I thought I was until I woke up one day with this song stuck in my head on repeat. A song that reminds me everyday of how complicated I make everything. A song that reminds me of how stubborn, stupid, and neurotic I can be. A song that reminds me of this person everyday and how I wish, in this digital age, that I could find him and apologize for being such a huge unforgiving bitch. Tomorrow I will psychoanalyze that regret, tonight I will go to bed, with that song in my head.

Relieved, confused, and kinda scared

So I finally went to the doctor this week. I have been feeling like crap for the past few months, in all honestly I have felt like crap for the past 5 years. So I went fully expecting to hear what I always hear when I go to the doctor, "You are fine, you simply have anxiety." No, shit I have anxiety. At this point I am anxious about being anxious, then there is just this whole downward spiral. Anyway this time was different. I wasn't going to the the doctor simply for my anxiety, but because after all these years of trying to manage it, it seemed to be getting worse. So I go to this new doctor and after waiting an hour past my scheduled appointment, within five min of seeing him it was like the fog had lifted. There was a problem with my thyroid gland. What? I had web md'd myself a million times before and all my symptoms always came down to a handful of medical conditions, anxiety, depression, and a hormone/ thyroid problem. So color me shocked when it turns out that I may have been misdiagnosed for all of these years. Not one single doctor ever thought or mentioned the idea that I might not be depressed but that there might be a physical problem causing me to feel the way I have been feeling. A series of test had to be done and I won't get the official results for a couple more days, but he did find nodules on my thyroid. I don't want to get ahead of myself and wonder what will happen now. It is so sad because this condition could be really serious, but I was so relieved when I realized I am not crazy and someone was finally listening to ALL of my symptoms. I might have a long road that could include a biopsy, surgery, or a lifetime of pills, but it is like this weight was lifted off of my shoulders. It means that I am not this lazy failure who did not live up to their potential. I don't know exactly how long I have been dealing with this, I just know it was like a light switched off inside of me one day. I stopped being me. I was this version of me who was just trying to get through each and every day. I have had a decent life with some heartaches and setbacks, but I have Always been a fighter. I have Always forced my way through to get what I thought I deserved. One day I just stopped fighting. I was content with getting through each day by going through the motions. Occasionally, you could find spurts of the real me, if you looked hard enough. I miss me. I am so tired of being the girl with dreams, plans, and goals. I wanna be the girl that gets stuff done and does it beautifully. I can't get back any of the past five years and I don't know if I would change anything, but it is hard to not think about how things might be different. I don't know that this diagnosis will actually change anything. I still have a long road ahead of me, but I am gonna start fighting again. I know somewhere in the haze there is some fire left inside of me. I am not going to give up. I will be a fully functioning member of society. I will do great things. I will stop dreaming and start doing.