The first thing about us is that we met online. Both of us were very skeptical of online romance and neither of us expected to find a life partner when we signed up for the dating site. We started exchanging messages in February of 2007. I put off meeting him because meeting guys off dating sites just wasn’t something I ever saw myself doing. But by Easter I had run out of excuses and agreed to meet him. We met for the first time at Pad Thai (now Asian 1) on April 11th, 2007. I got in his truck with him and drove to a town 30 miles away with no cell phone, not my brightest moment, but thankfully he was not an axe murderer and our first date was quite enjoyable.
The rest, as they say, “is history”. The first few weeks are a blur, we went on a couple dates, he came to have lunch with me at work every day- he “courted” me, courted us really- read Genesee stories, was so sweet with her, brought and cooked us dinners, sent me cute texts/emails throughout the following days, it was everything a romance should be. Then one day, scarily soon, he just kind of didn’t go home. And then we had “the talk”- you know, the one about being exclusive, and then all of a sudden we were talking about getting a place together. June 1st, 2007, not even two months after we first met, we moved into our first condo together- “our” first place.
The first year was hard. Really hard. He was recovering from an 8 year relationship and had trust issues, commitment issues and a host of emotional baggage from his past. I was recovering from an abusive relationship, had trust issues, and anger management problems along with a laundry list of baggage myself. Neither of us had ever really had a chance to find ourselves or be single in our adult life and both of us were completely lost with no idea how to have a healthy relationship. We fought, a lot. I kicked him out about once a week. He gambled too much, drank too much, I was too needy, it wasn’t pretty. Right around our 1 year anniversary we broke up. It was nasty. We broke our lease, he left immediately, I pulled the bed into the living room because I couldn’t bear to sleep in the room we had shared, I drank- too much. I cried. I checked out for three days. I didn’t go to work, I dropped my daughter off at my parents. I wallowed. He dealt with things differently; he got a new girlfriend. But despite our different ways of dealing with the break-up, neither of us was happy. And I felt like I needed someone, needed to make up for choosing so poorly the first time, that I owed it to my daughter to provide her with a dad since her biological one had deserted us. The breakup lasted a couple weeks, then we started talking again, and soon we were back together. Now, to backtrack a bit, we said “I love you” very quickly when we first got together, well everything was quick lol. But truly “loving” someone takes time. It takes work. It takes getting to know someone with all their flaws and still loving them. So while we “loved” each other that first year, it was a different kind of love. More naïve, less mature. Within 3 weeks the new girlfriend was out of the picture and we were back together, we felt invested, and weren’t ready to give up. So we decided to try harder.
That year for my birthday (May) Al gave me a ring and popped the question. The ring was mail ordered by us together, but he did try to keep it as much of a surprise as possible, so he didn’t tell me when it arrived in the mail. In the end he had to turn off the lights in our room to actually “propose” because he was so nervous.
Suddenly I was 23 and engaged to be married for the second time and I would become a step-mother to two young girls. Over that summer we moved into our next place and I started a new job- it was a lot of change. Then, that fall, right before school would start for school age children (Genesee was only 3 at the time), we got a bomb dropped on us. Up until then, his two girls had lived with their mother a couple hours away visiting us every other weekend. But in August of 2008, his ex told us that due to her situation and housing, she needed us to take the girls full time- right away. At the time, they were almost 4 and 6 and Kaity, the oldest was going into first grade. We were thrilled because we felt it was best for the girls as we had a more stable life and housing situation. But, it was also a huge change. We had just signed a lease on a two bedroom condo so to say it was cramped is an understatement. It all happened really fast and then all of a sudden I really felt the “step-mom” part of things. Before it was just a visit every other weekend, now it was different- my role was different. Now it was real. I can only imagine that is what a mother with multiples feels like, it’s just so different to go from 1 kid to 3, or (I would imagine) 2 to 5 or 0 to 3- whatever- it’s just so totally different to gain two children at once. Somehow we made it through that first year, all of us together and it felt like we started to really become a family. It was hard, but rewarding. By this time Genesee was calling Al “Dad” and the girls started calling me “Mom”. It felt good, I always felt like it was my destiny to be a mother and wife. I felt a little like I was playing house, since I was still just a kid myself, but it gradually began to feel natural.
We planned to get married the following summer but money continued to be tight and planning fell by the wayside. In January of 2009 Al and I lost our jobs within two weeks of each other. It was a really ugly time. We sold our movie collection, we sold our furniture, we did everything we could just to pay the bills.
We saw our wedding plans getting pushed farther and farther into the future because of money and we knew we would likely lose our condo before we could find jobs and get caught up on the bills we had been steadily falling behind on. Then we made a decision; we would elope! We booked a crazy cheap Vegas deal- it was under $500 for the airfare and hotel- my parents bought me a dress, and we flew to Vegas. We went to the courthouse and got our license and then went to the first chapel we found and got married. All of a sudden I was married! Again…. it was anti-climatic- I’d been here before, right? When we got back, reality really set in; we couldn’t afford our place or both car payments and there were no job prospects on the horizon for either of us. With heavy hearts we did what no grown-up wants to do- we moved in with my parents. All five of us. That year was very tough- for all of us. The kids felt it too. We were all miserable. We also had to let one of our vehicles go so my freedom that I had so fiercely worked for as a teen, evaporated.
The following spring I finally landed a good job. I made the commute from my parent’s home in Deming all the way to Blaine and we started saving up to get our own place again. We were so ready! Then in August Al got a job. With both of us working again and a promotion on the horizon for me, we moved into a house of our own. It was twice the size of our tiny two bedroom condo and it had a fenced yard too. We were all happy. The two little girls started kindergarten that fall and Kaity started second grade. Things felt “normal” again.
But something was missing. We had the three girls, but not one child that was biological ours together. It took us five years, but we finally had decided it was time to add to the family. I got pregnant in fall of 2011 and after a fairly uneventful pregnancy, gave birth to Elijah Max on June 13, 2012. It felt like we were complete. The girls adored him and watching Al be a father to a BABY was a new experience for me. In comparison to the first time around, it seemed pretty perfect. During that pregnancy he would kiss my belly, rub my feet, he went to doctor appointments with me, got me all the crazy food cravings- it was everything my first pregnancy was not.
The Uncategorized Life 