June 28th will be 9 years with Cisco. Nine years. That's a long time. I didn't think that this relationship would have lasted this long. I didn't think that it would last 1, I was surprised when that rolled around. So now every year its an amazing feat as far as I am concerned. I love him so much and he tells me the same, which I do believe. We have gotten into some heated arguments over the years, and I think the most obvious is marriage. I have always found it so difficult to talk to my friends about the subject because as a female the obvious questions that you ask your friends are, "It's been a couple of years and he still hasn't asked, what do I do?" Most answers are to leave, make an ultimatum, or just deal with it and ultimately be ok with it. I have had to do the latter, not because I want to but because I don't really have any choice unless I want to leave, and that isn't really much of an option right now.
I have always thought that my situation with this relationship always sucked when it came from getting dating advice from friends or family. Normally it's easy to get from people because someone has been in the same situation that you may be in at the moment and it's easy to get the advice. I have never been able to do that because I don't know anyone that has dated a widow. So all the advice that I have received over the years has been thrown straight into the circular file. So I am a lone sheep looking for guidance, swimming the unknown waters the best I can. I've come a long way on my own, all of it a learning experience. I can't say all of it was a good one, but a learning experience all the same. An example would have been that when we first got together I was so naive, I guess that I thought that it was normal or ok to be hidden away from the world when you are dating someone who was married before. It was understandable for us in a way because we worked together, but the same followed suit when we were out of work too. I didn't meet any family, except his brother and Olivia. No one else could know about me. I wondered why for the longest time and then put my foot down one night. That was it, I had it. If we were together then we were together and if he didn't want to let me see the light of day then he didn't need to be dating me any longer. That lasted for quite a while, I think a little over a year. I honestly don't know anyone that would put up with that, so I'm pretty proud of myself for doing so.
Dealing with the mood swings, depression, indecisiveness on our relationship, breaking up, getting back together, living there for weekends or weeks at a time, but not wanting to "move in" together. I have done it all. I hope someone comes to me with advice some day. I should write a book actually. I guess after a while it just takes a toll on you and you wonder what your place is in the relationship. I have wondered that so much.
I wondered that a lot recently. I believe in God, I believe that when you are facing judgement God will look at you and look at your life and will decide where you belong. I would hope that I will be allowed to go into heaven. I would hope that all the good things that I have done in my life will cancel out the bad and especially me staying in a relationship where the man I love doesn't have an interest in marrying me. I will tell you that I wonder how much of him not wanting to marry me has to do with me or with his issues at hand. I am beginning to not care anymore, not about him not wanting to marry me (I will always care about that) just about the reasons that he doesn't want to. It really sucks to know that I am not the one. To know that I am second best. To know that when I go to heaven I won't be with him. He will be with her. It really sucks and makes me so deeply hurt and sad that sometimes I don't know what to do but to close up. To know that if he had a choice it wouldn't be me. I think that is why when he tells me how much he loves me and cares for me I don't believe him, I know that he does, but I always wonder why. Not because I carried his child, not because we grew as adults and learned about life together. There are other reasons and I just wonder sometimes if they are just as good. I would hope so. I want to get married. I want to have the man I love look at me and I want to know that I am the only one. To be so sick inside and not want to go on living if something horrible were to happen to me. Maybe Cisco does feel that way about me, but I just don't know it. If he does then I would feel better a little, but it still wouldn't justify him not wanting to marry me. I just don't understand. I try to be ok with it all the time, but sometimes it's just hard, really hard.
I think that I am in just one of those funks right now, I've been feeling it for a couple of weeks now and it's not going away. Maybe taking Cisco up on his dare (of writing how exactly I feel) will make me feel better, or maybe it's just my turn to tell my side of the story. There is tons more, but I don't think I have it in me to write more right now.
~M
