We're on the right track!

I will still be getting married! :) its on hold right now but Kyle and I are ok again. We're working on things and it will be alright! :) thank the lord!

Is Love Enough?

There comes a point in every relationship we have with another human being where we have to ask ourselves, is love enough? Is love enough to look past faults and mistakes? Is love enough to bandage hurt feelings? Is love enough to bridge a communication gap? Is love enough to cross time away and unreachability? Is love enough?

For me, love is and always has been enough. There is one case where it was not. (see all unfortunate tales of Chris for that story). But all other times, if I love you or in some cases love myself, it is enough to keep on. Love was enough for me to continue with college when I hated my professor. Love was enough to get up the courage to seek out a job, now I have two. Love was enough when family is far away. Love is enough when Katie comes and goes like a Minnesota winter. Love is enough that I built a relationship with a family that wasn't mine, now I can't see my life without them. Love is enough when army calls for duty. Love is enough when time is full and a phone call is missed. Love is enough that I looked past rationality and decided to get married. Love is enough that I drove myself to the hospital when I cut open my head tonight. Love is enough that I won't give up without trying. Love is enough for me.

Loving Kyle is not easy. Our relationship had its honeymoon stage, but it has come and gone. We jumped quickly into shared finances and mutual space. We have signed a contract together for cell phones. We bought a bed together. Our lives are linked in tangible ways now. I've invested in this relationship. I threw my heart and soul into this relationship because I believed, and still do believe, that this is right. I feel right with Kyle. I know that at the end of the day, no matter how bad we fight or how much we've hurt, that love is enough. When I say I love you to Kyle, in a way, I am saying he is enough.

I feel like our relationship is enough and deserves to be treated as such. If that means putting our wedding on hold. Fine. If that means disregarding all the past discussions and disagreements and misunderstandings and communication hurdles. Fine. I love him enough that I will do my best to get back to a place where love is enough and above the crap life deals out. I love him enough that I want to get back to a place where the end of the day is met with joy and comfort in laying with the one I love, not fear of another fight. I feel like love is enough for me to move past my fears of kyle being away. I feel like love is enough that ten weeks is only a small bump in the path we live together. I feel love is enough that I want to try and I don't want to give up.

I don't know if love is enough for Kyle. I don't know if what I feel is enough is enough for him. I don't know if he will say love is enough. But if he doesn't, I can't change that. Yes I will be sad. I will feel lost and alone. I will have to drive 45 minutes to work and I will have to sleep in our bed alone (I get the bed. no discussion). We will have to establish the phone payment system. I will need to move my things into my parents. I will have to take off the engagement ring that reminds me that love is (was) enough. I will have to lose a second family. A future mother in law who has (after quite the trial) taken me in as a daughter. I will lose a sister that has been more like a sister to me than mine ever has. I will lose a puppy who cuddles with me when I'm sad. I will stand to lose so much. But if love isn't enough for him, it won't be enough for me.

I don't know what he stands to lose besides a bed. I don't know what else he would lose besides me. No one to do laundry or dishes. No one to keep the finances organized or to keep bills paid on time. No one to eat Denny's with at odd times of day. No one to hold at night. No one to share movies with. He will lose a companion. But if love isn't enough for him, it won't be enough for me.

Love is never easy. Love that is easy isn't real. I want to work through the issues and problems to come out stronger together. I want to fight for the love I feel. I want him to fight for the love we share. But if love isn't enough, he won't fight. If love isn't enough now, it never will be. If love isn't enough then I guess the time, however short, that we've spent together has to be enough. The memories of love have to be enough in love's absence. In time, love will grow again. If love isn't enough, Kyle has shown me that it is ok to ask for what you deserve and that love will grow where needed. If love isn't enough, I know in my heart that my love for Kyle will never fade. It will just become a love that once was. Like a tree that had potential to grow, but just got bogged down by too many vines, our love would have had potential, but the disagreement choked out the joy and without joy it will not grow.

So I pose the question. Is love enough? I only hope that with careful pruning and attentive care, that our tree can grow tall and strong and look back in its rings someday and see the time it struggled and watch the struggle turn into a future.

Is love enough?

Slowly getting better

I'm slowly getting better at this being an adult thing. It's not easy by any means, but I can do it. I'm tired constantly and with Kyle gone I can hardly sleep. I can't feel comfortable here again yet because our place is now inhabited by his mother too. Five people in a two bedroom apartment is insane. The only space I have that's just mine is my little 11x12 room. And even that is mine and Kyle's. My closet is in the hallway for pete's sake!

My calming force is gone when everything is in flux here. I can take care of myself, don't get me wrong, but he makes it so much easier.

Hard times

I can't sleep. I feel sick. I miss him like crazy. I need to pull myself together but I just am having such a hard time. I need him to hold me. I didn't realize how much that has been helping me. I just feel so alone.

It's only been like 14 hours...

Kyle has only been gone for 14 hours and I already wish he was home. The next two weeks are going to be long ones. I start my second job on tuesday. I work on Wednesday. I have more new job training on Thursday. I'm already feeling burdened and my calming force is gone. To top it all off, I crashed his car into a cement barrier today after dropping him at the airport which made life sooooo great. Not. But Kyle is a kind and loving man and was only concerned with my safety and making sure I was ok. I feel horrible, but nothing to be done at this moment. Thank goodness he has two cars.

I'm tired, but I don't want to crawl in our bed alone. It just feels so empty without him. Kahlua helps, but a dog can only do so much...

Hopefully keeping busy will help me.

Heart On My Sleeve

I have always worn my heart on my sleeve. I get hurt easily and things crawl under my skin like it's not any trouble at all. Most of the time, I'm ok with it. I know I am emotions first and that is how I've always been. But sometimes, I just wish I could take things in without getting hurt. I've been struggling with Kyle's relationship to his family. We live with his sister and his mother is always around. Ana Bella and I patched up our relationship and I like how things are now. However, Kyle's relationship with his mom is a struggle for me. For him, they don't spend any time together. Yet she is over all the time. His relationship with her and his sister has been one where he would take them out and go on family dates. Time isn't spent together unless it's only them together. I'm close with my mom, yet I have adapted my relationship to accomodate for Kyle. Kyle hasn't seemed to do that in return. This has been causing such a fight between the two of us and I'm at my wits end. I want to feel comfortable with him and his family, but I can't because I will always be cut out for them to find time together. I don't understand why they need to be alone. I don't understand why Kyle feels the need to cut me out. I don't understand why this issue makes me want to rip my hair out and simultaneously punch his lights out (though I would never actually hurt him).

I don't understand why I feel so threatened by their time together. I'm not jealous because I know he will come back at the end of the night. I do feel excluded and that can be causing part of this difficulty, but it isn't that simple. I've racked my brain trying to figure out why I feel this way, but I just don't know.

Kyle babies his sister a lot. She is 6 months pregnant, the time for her to be babied is long past. I understand that from their past together, Kyle feels close to her and like her caregiver, but she is an adult and soon to be parent. She needs to get her shit together and Kyle needs to stop rewarding her bad behavior. When he took her to Walmart last night after she tried to walk there in the heat, he gave her exactly what she wanted. She wanted to get everyones attention all on her. She wanted to get someone to treat her like she's the queen of the world. Kyle did just that. He took her to Walmart and laughed and joked and had a merry time with her. Now she knows when she cries and runs off, he will come rescue her. This hurts me because every time he has to go catch her, and this happens a lot, he drops me. He says I am the number one thing in his life, and most of the time I believe him, but when he calls his sister babe and blows me off to take care of her, I don't really feel like he's honestly treating me like the number one. I swear to God, the next time he calls her "baby sister" or if he EVER calls her "babe" again, I will not hesitate to say, in front of whoever is there, that I am not comfortable with that. Because I'm not. I've told Kyle it makes me feel sick to my stomach when he calls her that. Something about the tone of voice makes me get this creepy incest vibe and I want to throw up.

I guess something that I think might explain the incest fear thing for me is that my siblings and I are not related by blood. It wasn't ever like unspoken that you don't date your blood. I would never date my siblings but the thought that it isn't completely incestuous always made me draw a line with my siblings. I never wanted to confuse Adam about girls and make him uncomfortable because his adopted sister was hot and in a sports bra in the house. For Kyle, that was his baby sister in a sports bra. He never looked at her that way because it was biologically and innately wrong. Their relationship is different and I don't understand. So when they are close like that and when they cuddle and go on "sibling date days" it weirds me out.

I also feel like I have such a hard time with this because I am more of the come home and relax type of person than spontaneously go out and do stuff. I'm not captain of the fun team. Kyle is. Most of the time, he brings me out of my comfort zone and we have a wonderful time, but my home is my safe and calm place. So when he comes home at night and I'm lazy and chill I can see that I wouldn't be the most fun person to spend time with. I feel threatened that his sister and his mom are more fun than me and he will want to spend all his time with them because I'm not as fun. It's a dumb fear, but a real fear.

I also worry that he is so similar to his sister and mom in attitude that my introversion will push him away. I am scared that he's going to marry me and then realize we're too different of people and leave me. I know he is scared that something is going to be too much for me and I'll leave. But the simple fact is, I won't ever leave. I am one of the most loyal and devoted people you will ever meet. He could break me into a thousand pieces and I would still stand by him. It isn't logical, but I really do love him.

He and I are opposites more often than we are the same. But that is also why we work so well. I love him with all my heart and I want to fix this so that I don't feel so bad every time he takes off to spend time away from me with them. I wish I could understand why sharing time isn't good enough for them. I wish I could understand why he won't stand up to his sister and tell her that he can't be her be all end all. I wish I could just blink and not even feel anger or pain when he talks so lovingly about his sister or mom. I wish I could be a better person and that this wasn't so hard for me. I most of all wish that he will continue being patient with me to allow me to overcome this. I just want to get back to a time when he comes home and we don't fight before bed. I feel like it's always my feelings getting hurt and me yelling for him not preventing it or not changing what is hurting me. Honestly, he rescues everyone else from their demons, why won't he rescue me from mine?

Growing Up Is Hard

I'm out on my own (for the most part) and it's hard. I'm constantly feeling broke and like I won't ever make enough money to pay back my student loans. I'm struggling to make ends meet. But really, I couldn't be happier. I am proud of myself for working hard to make things work. I am proud of the man standing by my side for never letting me down or ever worry that we won't make it. I am lucky to have a life where I can work and learn to be on my own without having ever been thrown out or left to find my own way. I sincerely thank the people who have helped me because they have let me see that you can make it even when times are tough.

Being a big kid now

So I am now the proud holder of my own phone plan. I have a job. I'm going to school. I'm planning a wedding. I'm helping my pregnant soon to be sister in law. I've patched things up with my future mother in law. My life is going pretty well. I don't want to rock the boat.

However, I am worried. I don't get many hours at my job. I need something else to help keep bills paid. When my student loans come in, I get a living expense so I can use some of that I hope to help until I get a real full time job. Luckily, I have an amazing man by my side to help and my family if I ever fell on my face. I feel blessed.

I never wanted the whirlwind life and now things have settled into a comfortable rhythm. Hopefully it stays this way for awhile.