Against all odds

Ryder and I recently celebrated another anniversary on June 4th. :)

21 years ago I met the love of my live in a nasty trailer, in a small town, that I happened to be in because I was trying to escape from my horrible home life. It didn't start out a very pretty love story. I was a lost and broken fifteen year old. Sad to my very core. Angry. This boy walked in with big beautiful eyes and a swagger. Full of attitude and himself.  There was something about him that spoke to me on such a deep level. I couldn't even fully understand it. I was hooked. Like a drug. Which isn't a good way to start anything. ;) Turns out that underneath all that swagger was a young and hurting man. Two very broken people trying to make things work. We had a very turbulent start and were on and off for the first few years, mostly off. He left me for a while and it broke my heart so bad that I didn't think I would ever get over it. Probably wouldn't have. But that time apart led to me coming around to loving myself and learning to value who I was, after hitting rock bottom. And I mean rock bottom, shattered to pieces, and slowly gluing myself back together again. I got onto my own two feet, moved away from that small town, got two jobs to support myself and after living in my car, and on the couches or floors of some very sweet souls that went out of their way to keep me afloat and off the streets I finally got my own studio apartment at nineteen. I was living in the same area as his mom, I had moved to be closer to his brother who I had tried to take care of since he was born. Whole different story. When I moved there Ryder was living in a different state and I didn't know if I would ever see him again. But turns out his mother eventually told him I was around and he dropped everything he had going on in that state and moved back. We slowly ended up getting back together, although I had my doubts at first on if it was the best choice for me or not. Mostly because his leaving the first time had hurt so bad. I wasn't sure I was strong enough or brave enough to open myself up again. There was no denying that I was still strongly attracted to him though. Thankfully this time around things were different, because I had started my road to recovery, healing myself from the hurts of my childhood and learning to love myself. Which we all know we need to love ourselves in order to truly love others. Ryder had grown and changed as well. That's not to say everything was smooth sailing, two very hurt people carry a lot of baggage and past hurts come up when you least expect it. But the nice thing about baggage is that you can slowly unpack if you want to. ;) It's been a long road with lots of ups and downs. But at the very core of it we love each other, and have clung to each other for strength in our darkest moments. We have built each other up and have accomplished together what I don't think we ever could have done alone. We are truly a team. When we got engaged we decided to change our last name together. To start all over with a fresh family tree. It's one of the best choices we've ever made. It truly felt like breaking the chains once and for all. 

Our wedding day 2005

This happened to be our tenth wedding anniversary. I look forward to what the next ten years hold for us. I truly feel so blessed to have this man by my side and I'm so glad that even in the rough spots we decided to cling together and grow instead of break apart. There is something that keeps Ryder and I tightly bound together against all odds and for that I am so truly thankful. He is my one and only and I'm still so madly in love with him. It's a deep love now, not the love of a broken teenager. A deep love that comes from all the things we've shared together, and from facing hard moments together and coming out on the other end, still together. Got to have those down to truly appreciate the ups. :)