What a Night...

Sometime within the next three days, the police will attempt to arrest T. By the end of the month, I might be married, and I STILL CAN'T FIND MY CONTACT CASE!!!!

I'm too tired to write anymore right now, and I can't believe tomorrow is ONLY Thursday!

-Mel

It's Over - CASO CERRADO!

Well, it's official. T and I are no longer together. It started again last night with me telling him how tired I am of everything and how I gave up on us and this relationship months ago to which he replied, "Well if you feel that way Mel, let me stop wasting your time. Let's just end it now." I think he thought his words would hurt me or shock me to "my senses", but I simply said, "OK." I quickly ended our conversation when he started saying that I couldn't be serious, but knew it wouldn't be that easy and I was right. At ten minutes to three o'clock this morning, I was woken up by a phone call from him. This morning was the amazing part though, he called me to make sure I was awake for work as he's done for over a year now, and said, "I can't wait 'til you see that I really have changed and this relationship gets better." HUH? I didn't know how to respond! Apparently, we HADN'T broken up after all! He called me again as I was walking to my office and I explained that I had done what I felt was best for us. At that point he realized I was serious and the anger began. It's now a bit after 9pm and I've spent the whole day taking and ignoring his calls. I've listened to so many voicemails that I've lost count, and I've told him repeatedly that 1. It's not another man, it's THE ONLY man (God), and 2. That I honestly don't think that I have to put any more thought into this decision than I already have. Some calls are the angry kind and those I end quickly. Some calls are sad, this hurts so much;how can you do this so easily calls. The remainder are promises of a better relationship. He promises to take me out and try new things and go to church every Sunday... I explained that he should do whatever he feels is necessary to improve himself, and to do it for himself and the baby and that I pray that he finds someone to make him happy. He's still insisting. I'm still praying for his peace.

Plan vs. Action

I knew what had to be done. I prayed and God gave me peace of mind. I opened my mouth to say the words and what came out wasn't right. I was arguing. That wasn't in the plan. I tried again... Still wrong. Now we were fighting about the past and all the underlying issues. Why couldn't I just do it? I remembered the last time and screamed at myself (inside my head) that there was no way I'd hurt either of us that way again! It needed to be done and it had to be done quickly before I could screw it up any more than I already had. I opened my mouth once more and said, "Listen, I'll call you later." I hung up and cried. I prayed and cried and asked God for the words. This was Sunday night... Today is Wednesday and it's still not done. For those of you who haven't figured out what in the world I'm going on about, I'm planning to end things with T.

I've been praying about it for weeks and I really feel that it's what's best for both of us. At first I thought it was his daughter's mother. Then I made my Facebook and MySpace private and allowed only IMs from people on my buddylist and the drama stopped. With the exception of one email, I haven't heard from her in weeks. Then I brought back the issue that we never did anything together. I complained daily that he didn't care about us and he was too comfortable. But (while the issue was never resolved) that wasn't it either.

The major thing is our faith issue. I have a delicate faith issue that I'm dealing with on my own and he didn't help at all. I still attend my non-denominational church and I'm even involved in the children's ministry and even recently signed up to help with the media ministry. But lately, I've also been more active with the young adult ministry from my Catholic church. It's very delicate for me because I've always considered myself to be Roman Catholic, even when I stopped attending Sunday Mass and let go of the young adult ministry. This actually should've been a good thing for T because if he'd said he didn't agree with the teaching of the Protestant church, I'd have fully accepted and even participated with him at a Catholic church, in fact, for the first few months that we were together, I'd attend weekly Sunday mass with him at a local parish. But no matter what dream he attempted to feed me, the truth will always come out. At some point, I guess he got tired of pretending and he stopped going to church. It wasn't all at once, but it seemed that almost every week, there was some reason or another why I'd have to go to church alone. Eventually I stopped asking and he stopped providing excuses. For me, god is first in my life. I can't imagine getting married to and having children with someone with whom I can't fully share my love of the Lord, and I just don't feel that I'd have that with T.

About two months ago, I wanted to sit and have a conversation with my Pastor (at the non-denominational church) and then decided against it because I was nervous that he'd ask about my relationship! I knew he'd counsel me against continuing something that was bringing me down and I just didn't want to have to face the reality that he'd be right if he did. At this point, I began to realize how bad this was for me. I've learned that evil wants to remain hidden and that if it was a healthy relationship I shouldn't have had any issues with discussing it openly. I began to pray daily about what to do. I discussed it with a few of my closest friends and had mixed reactions. One said that I shouldn't end it if I had any doubts at all because I probably wouldn't get another chance. Another friend said that if I felt this was best for me and I felt that it was where God was leading me, then I should go ahead with ending it. And then about a week and a half ago, the smartest thing ever was said to me by "Kitty". I stood in her kitchen going back and forth with my thoughts and she said, "You need to go ahead and end it. You're unhappy and it's not fair to him if you already know in your heart that this isn't going anywhere. You're taking away from his chance to move on." And at that moment, I knew what needed to be done. I went home that night and prayed. I asked God to give me peace with my decision and I felt a physical difference in my body. It was like someone had just taken me into a giant comforting bear hug and I was finally able to relax.

Which brings us to my plan. I figured I should do it in person, but since I haven't seen him recently (a whole other story.) I finally decided to end things over the phone on Sunday after yet another argument about nothing and everything. Part two of the plan was to do it quickly and not be apologetic. Here we are days later and it's still in limbo. Another part of the plan as to stick to the facts and not bring up the past or any of the smaller issues. I'm currently batting zero guys. I know that it sounds stupid and unimportant in the face of the world's problems, but if you could pray for me to have the right words, I'd appreciate it immensely. Oh! And if you could pray for T to have peace in this, I'd appreciate that also!

Annoyed...

I'm sitting here in T's sister's house and I'm pretty annoyed. Are these the people who I want to spend the rest of my life with? Are these the people who I want as my children's relatives?

1. Constant cursing...
...I'm not saying that I don't ever curse, but does EVERY sentence really require profanity?
2. Smoking 10 feet away from the children...
...And then saying "Don't bring her over here, I'm smoking." HELLO!! You DO realize that your smoke can travel across the room, don't you?
3. Constantly calling T "Stupid" or "Retarded"...
...'nuff said
4. Not allowing T to take care of simple things for the princess...
...Need a diaper changed? Gimme her! Need a bottle? Gimme her! She barely whimpers because she's tired, hungry, or simply because she's a BABY??? GIMME HER!!! God forbid the man should even hold his own daughter for more than 30 seconds!

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Gotta go to the store... Be back...

Relationships Are An Interesting Species of Animal...

How can it be that one day I'm crying about the difficulties of maintaining a successful relationship and the next I feel an overwhelming sense of love for T? How can it be that when things are bad I feel like it couldn't possibly be any worse, but the good times... aah... they are oh so good...

If you follow my twitter, then you may have received my update about the "cancer of relationships". But interesting enough, I feel much better today, even though not much has changed since Sunday. All was quiet yesterday as far as the princess' mother is concerned, and nothing spectacular happened between T and I, but as I headed home from work last night, my heart felt SO full of love for him!

I'm praying for things to improve for us. I really do love him dearly, and I know that he loves me too. We've agreed to sit and have a serious talk about what each of us would like to see changed and agree on some specific actions that need to be taken for those changes to take place. We've agreed that this conversation won't be about saving each others' feelings (we won't be nasty to each other, but we also won't hold things inside either. My prayers for our conversation? That God put the best words into my mouth so that I explain everything that I'm feeling without being mean. That God lead us both to a better understanding of each other. That love be our driving force.

Thank God for Time!

Because I'm over my hours for this week, I got to sleep in a little later and come to work at 1pm today (always a blessing to rest a bit more, since I don't do so well during the night hours.) And even though I was super stressed about the article that I have to write for the organization's newsletter (in case you're wondering, it was supposed to be on my boss' desk by today) I no longer have to worry because I now have this weekend to work on it! So grateful for the extra time. Now I can hand something in that looks like an adult actually put it together! Yay!

Now I'm heading out to party in true holiday style! Tonight is my church Christmas party. Woot woot! Hopefully somebody else will take some good pics that I can snag from Facebook to show you guys! Chat with you mañana!!


P.S.-- I haven't told you guys about last weekend's drama with the baby's mother (gosh, I've really gotta work on everyone's blog names!) but just an update that he didn't go pick her up today (she supposedly has a virus, but I don't fully believe that) and we probably won't see her for her 1st birthday this Sunday (I had a feeling this would happen and it's why I suddenly stopped talking about the party, I didn't want to continue planning and then be disappointed in the end.) I'm not happy about it, but right now, even this couldn't knock the God-High that I have. CityLighters, I'll see you in a bit! And if you have a camera, make sure I'm smiling before you snap! Lol.

Purity is the New Black!

Good morning friends! Well, I'll start by saying that I feel much better this morning spiritually than last night when I posted. I'm sure that the main reason is because I prayed so hard last night, and God never falls short on His promises (Yay God!)

But physically I'm not feeling so hot right now. I slept over at my boyfriend's house and apparently his bed is in desperate need of replacement, so my back is absolutely killing me right now.

This all leads me to my thankfulness post for today. Today, I'm glad to say that I'm thankful that God is keeping me pure. That's right ladies and gents, I'm saving myself for marriage. Let me back up a little. No, I'm not a virgin, although I wish I'd been smart enough to remain that way, but for many years, I had little to no self worth and looked to others to validate me including the belief that to be a "good" girlfriend I had certain obligations. I'm not sure exactly when that idea developed, though I do have some ideas as to why even though I don't recall anyone ever directly telling me that.

Then I came to the Lord, and one of the first changes to my life was the decision to attempt celibacy. In the beginning, it was a very religious decision, I felt that God didn't want me to and that I'd be making Him angry by having premarital sex. When that was my reasoning, it was a very difficult decision to stand by. With time and prayer though, my reasons changed. Today, I choose not to engage in sexual immorality because of myself and my own values. Today it's because I know that my body is something that I'd like to present to my husband as something special on our wedding night.

I'd also like to add that I'm thankful to have a boyfriend who respects my decision.

Have a great Saturday everyone!

It's "T" Time!

Thankfulness... Day 3...

Today is my sweetheart's birthday, so it's fitting that I should write today about why I'm thankful for him. Not long ago, I shared the story of how we got together, so you understand a little about our relationship already, but that's barely scratching the surface!

Despite our ups and downs, I have so much to be grateful for when it comes to T. He has been there for me in happy times (at my high school graduation he cheered as if I'd won the Nobel Prize!), in the difficult moments (like when I had a nervous breakdown and he came to pick me up then took me to and stayed with me in the hospital) and everything in between. I'm grateful that he manages to keep me humble, but never lets me put myself down and that in doing so, he's helped me to realize my self-worth. I'm grateful that he's helped me to see the importance of ignoring what everyone else thinks when reaching for my goals. I'm grateful that in many of my darkest moments, he brought a smile to my face. And that he helped me to understand that sometimes you just have to take out a few moments for silliness in your day or you'll go nuts!

I'm grateful for everything that the last 7 1/2 years has thrown our way (yup, even the not so happy moments!) and I pray that we get to spend the rest of our lives continuing to get to know and love each other more each day.

My Apologies...

I've kind of sucked as a blogger the last few days. In my defense though, it's been pretty busy. So let me catch you up...

Wednesday I had an interesting conversation with the princess's mother. She surprised me by sharing some personal info that I wasn't fully prepared for. All I can say is that I respect her honesty and am actually beginning to believe that she doesn't have alterior motives for trying to be my friend.

I spent Thanksgiving at the home of a friend from church and afterwards went out to the movies with a few of the people who were there. In case you're wondering, we saw "Slumdog Millionaire" and it was great! (Thanks Suzanne!)

Yesterday was T's court date in family court. I'm happy to announce that things went well. Here's the basics of the stipulations:
-Shared custody of the princess
-Child Support was finally agreed on
-T has visitation every weekend from 6pm on Friday to 6pm on Sunday. And they will be splitting Christmas and New Year's.
This means a lot for us. It means that T now has a steady schedule of when he'll be seeing the princess, and it's not really up for discussion. It means that T can stop worrying about this and can begin focusing on other important things (like really giving his life to Christ - he's asked me if he can go to church with me on Sunday!) It means that we really can throw the birthday party (invitations will go out this week.) It also means that I'll be introducing her to the blogosphere! All very exciting!

Throughout all of this, I've been loosely planning the party, and now will be going into party planning overdrive. Hope you'll join me!

Countdown to the Court...

Well I've already mentioned that things went through a rough patch between T and the baby's mother. Well maybe I should explain that it was more than a little rough. T has struggled to get a steady visitation schedule ever since the baby's mother found out that he was dating me again. Finally realizing that things weren't improving, T decided to take it to family court. The court date is scheduled for Friday the 28th and I'm nervous.