Forever Love.

I want to apologize in advance. This post is very long and not very well written. It is messy and jumbled. But that's how it is in my head. 

I recently read a blog post that my step brother wrote about divorce. It was his experience with it and how it has affected him. It really got me thinking about my own experience with having divorced parents.

I want to start off saying that I absolutely LOVE and adore my mom. She is one of my best friends and I always wanted to be just like her when I grew up. She did an amazing job of raising 5 kids as a single mom. I also love my dad and am happy that he is apart of my life. My step mom is amazing and I couldnt ask for a better one. I feel SO blessed to have her apart of my life! My step dad is pretty great too! Growing up we didnt get along... but now that I have a family of my own we do a lot more. And I am thankful for him. I dont want anyone to get the wrong idea about this post. I am simply just going to write about MY personal thoughts and experience with it. I dont want to hurt any ones feelings or anything. That is not my intentions of writing this. I always have felt blessed that I get to have two moms and two dads! Broken at times.. but still blessed!

My parents divorced when I was about a year old so I have no memory of them being together. To me that was just "normal" to have split up parents, spending every other weekend at my dads. When I was young I never really liked to go to my dads house. Mainly because a lot of the times we went there I would end up in tears. And my dad hated crying. He would tell us "stop crying or else I'll give you something to cry about". So I always had to hide it if I would cry. One of the reasons I would cry is because my older brother Tanner and older sister Kiley would always tell me that I was adopted whenever we'd go to my dads. They told me that my name used to be Amber (I now hate that name...) I was the only one with blonde hair and blue eyes so sometimes I actually thought that maybe I WAS adopted. I always thought I had a twin out there too so in my little head and when I was silly enough to believe them I thought that maybe my "mom" didnt want to have twins so she gave one up. Me. BUT that is not true. I am not adopted. My name was not Amber. And my siblings were just being meanie heads. Anyway, our typical weekends with my dad (that I remember anyway) would consist of going to the dollar store after he picked us up and letting us pick out a toy or a treat. Then we would go back to his little duplex and hang out. We were always doing fun things. I remember him taking us roller skating, bowling, or out to eat. But sometimes it wasnt always fun. My oldest brother Trevor lived with my dad and they didnt always get along very well. A few times I remember going to my dads for the weekend and they would get in huge fights. Physical fights. It always scared me so bad! My dad would always end up calling the police. One of the times I was real little. I think it was around my birthday because I remember taking my new little doll that I had just gotten to my dads. When they started fighting and it got bad Kiley took us into the back bedroom. The cops came and we all had to talk to them. They gave me a little teddy bear but that didnt help me not be afraid. Another time was after my dad remarried and they got in one of their huge fights. My stepsister Angela, that is the same age as me, and I were watching a movie when it started. This one was the scariest yet. The cops came. We had to testify again. I was used to it. Which is kind of sad for a little kid to have to be used to.
Growing up I was always afraid of my dad. He wasn't abusive or anything. He had a temper but that was about it. I knew he loved us. I felt loved. I was just scared of him. I was scared of a lot of people actually.  I was a really shy kid. I never even said one word to my kindergarten teacher all year. When I was five to the age of eight things happened to me that no child should ever have to go through. I wont give details, and I am actually embarrassed just writing this, but because of what happened to me it helped shape who and how I was and now am today. I think that was a major part of why I was afraid of him. I was afraid to be myself. I wish that I wasn't that way. I would make my little brother ask my dad for things, like a Popsicle or whatever, just because I was too afraid to ask. 

I was 100% a mommys girl. I was a home body. I got homesick really easy. When I was 6 my mom married a man. I dont remember much about him, only that he was tall, had a big nose and wore glasses. They were only married a year and then divorced. We then moved to Kaysville when I was 8. And she married my now stepdad, Mike, when I was 9. Its crazy to think that he has been apart of my life longer than he hasnt.. Anyway, none of my siblings liked him much either. We used to call him our "Evil Stepdad" (sorry Mike! haha) Living with him was hard. He liked discipline, my mom was more soft and loving and let things slide a lot. He never really took on the father figure role for us. And since we didnt live with my dad he never was around to punish us either. So it was all on my mom.

As a teenager I was very rebellious. No one knows half the things I've done. And I'm not about to say anything either. hahaha But I am thankful for my mom. I put her through so much. Sorry mom. But she always would tell me "There isnt anything that you can do that will make me stop loving you." And she has lived by that and has showed me first hand. I have come home with multiple piercings, belly button ring, and even a tattoo! And she loved me through it all. Even when I was a total brat to her. But it was exactly what I needed of her. We are now so close! I feel bad for all that I put her through. I just had a lot of growing up to do. I needed to find myself. Caleb has been a huge impact in my life and has helped me grow into the person I am today.

When I was in Junior High I always wanted to be a Daddys Girl. But I felt that I was being robbed of having a dad. Dont get me wrong. My dad was great. He is the most supportive guy ever. He made it to all of my everything, dance competitions, soccer games, church activities that were daddy daughter things. He made it to all of my siblings things too. After we moved to Kaysville, he was an hour away in Logan but that never held him back. Like I said, he was great. But since I never really lived with him I didnt feel very close with him. I knew I'd always have his support in what ever I wanted to do in life but I wanted more.  I did have a hard time going to my dads in Jr high and High school. None of my friends had divorced parents so I didn't want to have to leave for the weekend and miss out on what they were doing.

My dad remarried when I was ten to the most wonderful woman ever. I am so glad that he found her! I feel like I was able to get closer to my dad and his new wife, Anita, after they got married because she had a daughter my age and we quickly became the best of friends. It was so much fun going to my dads after that! I would look forward to going. We later grew apart after I got married and it makes me sad.

Both of my combined families are wonderful! I am so happy that they are all apart of my life. My own siblings are all pretty close and I love it. I am closer to some of my step siblings more than others but I do love them all. That being said, its kind of crazy whenever we get together for family things. Sometimes I just wish that there werent so many of us so that we could all be a close knit family. But that will never happen... we just continue to grow with all these cute babies coming into the family! I love it. I really do. Its just hard now to please everyone. We have three families to see, plus our own little family now. Its hard splitting up all the holidays and traveling so much. It makes me so happy to see that Tanner and Kiley have found such great spouses to make and spend their lives with. They are great examples to me.

It makes me so grateful for what I have with Caleb. Caleb's parents are amazing. They raised him to treat his wife, which I am lucky enough to be, with respect and like a queen. I have never seen another couple more in love. And I know that their love is a forever kind of love. The kind of love that I want. That is the kind of love that I know I will have with Caleb. I am so thankful that his parents are such a good example for us and that we can learn from my parents. I don't ever want to get a divorce. Sometimes I struggle with things and just jump to that option when we are going through a hard trial, but that is not the answer and I need to work on that! I struggle with letting Caleb in. Its hard for me because I never had a good example of a mother and father parenting before. It was always just my mom. I never really saw much affection it was always more contention in the home. I now know it takes two when you are married. Two to love, two to raise the kids, two to be there for each other. I want to be a good example of forever love to my own kids. Emery is already becoming a little daddy's girl and I love it. It melts my heart.

This is not how I thought this post would turn out. I thought I'd say it all differently but I guess this is how it came out! I apologize again for it being a crazy jumbled mess of a post!