Don't You Dare Blow It

It's that time again. Marriage season. Not just wedding, but also engagement and anniversary season. I swear every time I get on Facebook I see another one of my friends got married or engaged. A couple of times I've scrolled through my feed to see two or three engagements practically in a row! Summer time is definitely mating season for us humans, there's no denying it.

First of all, I'm so, so excited for all of you who are newly married, celebrating your first, second, tenth anniversaries, and for all of you who just proposed or said yes. But please listen to (read?) what I'm about to say (write).

Don't blow it.

Look, I've been in love before. I know what it feels like to find (or think you've found) the one that you want to- and are planning to -spend the rest of eternity with. It is a freaking amazing feeling. You know why? Because no matter how many times single-you told yourself that you won't REALLY be a cat lady/hermit and that there really is SOMEBODY out there for you, you don't really realize just how much you absolutely didn't actually believe it until you've found it.

There is this sense of wonder. This sensational epiphany that "I didn't think that I would actually get here. But here I am." This feeling of "Someone actually loves me for me. They've seen my flaws, my quirks, my weaknesses, and they haven't run away screaming!" Holy goodness it is the BEST feeling in the world.

You're in a spot where you feel like you can take on the world as long as _____ is by your side. You'll get through any trial, any hardship, because he/she is there and he/she loves you more than anything. And you absolutely can!

But but but.

If that's going to work, you've BOTH got to be all in. And I can't speak for your S.O., but I'm not talking to them, I'm talking to you.

You need to be totally, completely, 100% honest, loyal, and committed to making this work. You have to fight harder than you've probably ever fought against Satan, because he's going to do his absolute best to ruin this for you.

I've shared bits of my story so far and I'm going to share some- and reiterate some -more here.

About a year ago, I got engaged. I didn't know that it was even possible for me to be so incredibly happy. I didn't know that it was possible for someone to fall in love with me despite my imperfections. But I was and there was! And I knew before we ever even started dating that my fiance had had a long, hard struggle with pornography. He got caught in the grasps of addiction at a young age and it took YEARS for him to get out of it. He worked really hard and finally reached sobriety. He got his eagle scout, served a mission, etc.

We discussed the possibility of issues popping up in our relationship/marriage due to his past addiction and I told him that if he did start to struggle, I wouldn't just up and leave him or anything. I would be right by his side, loving him, supporting him, and helping him to work through it. We would go to counseling together or do whatever it took to get through, and over, it. But only as long as he was completely, straightforwardly honest with me about it. Struggling with temptation? Gave in to temptation? Tell me. No secrets is all I'm asking and I promise you that I will fight for us.

Issues absolutely did arise in our relationship over time. We had talked through everything and thought that we were ready to face whatever struggles arose head on, but then mental/emotional/sexual abuse reared it's ugly head. That I was not prepared for.

We broke things off for a while. I told him that I was there for him as a friend, but nothing more. I didn't know if we could be anything more at that point and I told him so.

I had been doing everything that I could to make things work, but he hadn't been and until he did the same, I couldn't stay with him. I didn't even realize that I had been abused until after we broke things off, but there it is.

But after we broke up, he really seemed to be working so hard to overcome his struggles. He blamed depression for his actions (influenced by his previous addiction of course). He told me that he had been really struggling emotionally (which I could tell, but apparently he had been hiding the worst of his lows from me) and that he had finally decided to do something about it.

He went to a counselor, got on depression meds, met with our bishop, etc. He stopped abusing me and seemed to be going back to being the person that I had originally fallen in love with. I could see how hard he was trying to get better so that he could meet my 100% with his own.

Eventually we decided to be dating again and everything was completely different than the previous couple of months. I no longer felt like I was being abused anymore, though the scars from the previous abuse (metaphorical, not literal) had not quite healed.

We got re-engaged.

I didn't find out until over a month later that the day that he re-proposed was also the first day that he recorded me in the bathroom.

You see, about a month and a half after we got re-engaged, my fiance was arrested. A pinhole camera disguised as a towel hook was found in my college apartment bathroom. It had been placed there in the attempt of getting some footage of me going to the bathroom/getting in the shower. And it was placed there by my fiance. After everything that we had been through to try to get things together- and at the exact moment that it seemed like we finally had -he blew it.

BIG TIME.

After all of the counseling, doctor's, and bishop's appointments. After months of hardship, but seeming improvement, he was still lying. Still hiding. He didn't get better. He had just found a different way to satisfy his sexual addiction.

He didn't tell me anything. He acted like everything was great, like he was making major strides. He was not and had not.

Through my communications with the detective I learned that my fiance had hidden cameras not only in my bathroom, but also in my bedroom and in our vanity area. It was all focused on me. He was trying to get footage of me in every instance. I learned that he had first recorded me moments after asking me to be his eternal companion (for the second time). That's how far he had fallen.

People ask me if I regret dating him. If I regret getting back together with him. And I always tell them no. I don't regret it because it felt SO right at the time. I had prayed and fasted for months. Especially when the abuse started and after we broke things off and then decided to get back together. Obviously I wanted things to work out with him because I was in love with him, but I became very aware that it might be better if I just let him go.

There were so many times after we broke things off that I felt like "I can't do this. I love him so much, but I CANNOT do this anymore. It's too much. This is too hard." But every time I felt that way would get this impression to stay with him, that everything would be okay. So I stayed and stayed and stayed and things seemed to get better and I was thrilled! Still wary, still nervous, but excited!

Obviously everything did not turn out okay. But it will. Not for me and my ex (clearly) but it will for me.

But the thing is, I think that Heavenly Father was giving my ex his best chance. It's like He was saying: "You can get married to this girl. You can be happy. It's not always going to be easy, but it WILL be worth it." My ex had the chance. And he blew it.

I don't regret getting back together with him because I felt strongly that I should. I don't doubt those promptings. Things could have worked out. But they didn't. But not because it couldn't have, but because he chose to make it not work. He chose to hide things from me and everything went to pot because of it.

So I'll say it again.

DO NOT BLOW IT.

Be honest. Be loyal.

Be loyal to your person. Be loyal to yourself and your beliefs. And most importantly be loyal to God because He's the one that will get you through this crazy life of yours in the end. Happily ever after is not possible without Him.

I picked out my engagement ring completely by myself while my (then) boyfriend was working out of state for five months. It's a simple solitaire, but it's definitely not typical. As you can see, the stone is a triangle. If you've never seen this before, I'll do my best to explain:

Picture a triangle, point up. The two points at the bottom represent you and your person. You're apart from each other until you move up to the last point. That point is Heavenly Father. As you both move towards Him, you also move closer to each other. HE is what is holding you to your love. Without Him, you're just two opposite points on a line.

It is an uphill climb, but every single thing in this world that is worth having always is!

Look, losing the one that you love- the one that makes you giddy, the one that you don't feel bad asking for help from, the one that loves you- is basically the worst feeling in the entire world.

I didn't lose my ex to death. I lost him to life. A life that was being lived in a lie. A life where he was following Satan more than he was following God. I can't compare my experience to that of losing your person to death, but I'm going to come right out and say it. While both are incomprehensibly terrible, I think that this is worse.

Because I also will likely never see him again. I also lost him while I was very happily in love with him. It was just as sudden. Just as unexpected. But I also am living with the knowledge that he wasn't who I thought that he was. I'm living with the knowledge that he's still out there. I'm living in this new reality where he is very much alive, but I have to stop thinking about him. Where I still care for him and it hurts so deeply because I loved him right and he didn't reciprocate. Where I know that this man that I was in love with is going to have a really hard life that he inflicted upon himself in so many ways.

So yes. This (for me) is the worst. I hate this and I still hurt and I'm back to feeling like I'll never find my actual person and I'm going to grow up to be a cat lady (even though my head keeps trying to assure me that that is not true). Being single is hard anyway, but now I'm single and have a TON more baggage than I even already had. I'm single and terrified of dating. Terrified of pushing people away because either I'm clinging too hard or that I'm being overly critical of them because I'm terrified of being hurt again.

I'm terrified of over-scrutinizing every single guy that I meet and writing him off because I'm worried about every single little thing that seems like it might not work out and I don't want to get attached only to have my heart broken again. I'm also terrified of glossing over things that actually are important because I don't want to be alone anymore. It all contradicts but it's all in there, floating around in my now super over-anxious brain.

And that sucks.

But I tell you what, I'd rather be single and terrified, single and hurting, than be with someone who pulls me down. I know that all of this horribleness is going to be worth it someday because I KNOW that Heavenly Father loves me. He loved me enough to pull me out of a relationship that had proven would not work (even if it hadn't been proven to me yet). He loved my ex enough to give him the chance to be happy, and He loves me enough to stop him before we actually tied the knot. My ex blew his chance, whether he realized it or not, and Heavenly Father wasn't going to put me through more hell than I was already going to have to go through once my ex was exposed.

So yeah, things could have worked with me ex but they didn't. But I know that Heavenly Father will help me to find someone that will make me even happier than my ex did. And honestly, that is really hard to picture, because he did make me very happy.

But I know that every single stinking, stupid, horrid thing that I'm going through right now will be oh so worth it because of opposition in all things. My ex blew it, which resulted in me going through some really tough crap. But the blessings coming will far outweigh the crap that I'm going through now as long as I stay faithful.

So I'd rather be single than be with someone who doesn't match my old engagement ring. I don't want to be a line. I don't want to be an acute angle either where I'm running to the Lord and he's just sitting there at the bottom. I want to be a triangle. I want to be with someone who is going to run towards Christ as fast as I try to. I want someone that is not going to blow it.

Be that person. Be a triangle with your spouse/future spouse. Be committed. Be loyal. Love that person with your whole freaking heart and don't you dare let them go. It's not always going to be as easy and feel as good as it does right now. Things aren't always going to be this happy. Trials will arise and weaknesses WILL be exploited by he who wants nothing more than for you to be as miserable as he is.

Luckily, you have someone WAY stronger on your side.

So stay strong and don't you dare blow it.