unconditional love

First off, this is my second blog post in a two weeks time.....can we just have a little round of applause for myself right now? Holla at yo girl! Second off, this blog is going to be A LOT about Tony, so if you are not in the mood for lovey-dovey stuff.....sorry in advance.

So, with my blogs I like to have a title of the post and try and focus on that throughout the blog. I say try because I clearly have really bad ADD when I write blogs and I go all over the place...so it kind of helps me stay focused. Also, with my blogs, I like to do research on that subject before so I can find quotes, pictures, and other people's view points before I even start writing. I like to learn about other people and I like for my blogs to be relate-able and help other people in their lives, now I don't know if I will ever achieve that, but it is a nice dream right?

This blog is going to be all about unconditional love.....hence the reason why a lot of it will be about Tony. The proper definition of unconditional love is loving someone regardless of conditions. In other words, someone who loves a person no matter what they do, say, think, feel, look like, act like, or believe. Loving someone even if your needs of connection, certainty and significance aren't being met by them. Unconditional love means no-strings-attached to the love you give. You may or may not receive love back because that's not part of the deal. If you had to receive it back, that would be a condition. You love them without expecting anything at all in return. 

naturally, I have to have a pinterest quote to go along with this, because heaven knows I have them! 

I know I said in my last post how amazing Tony is and I am going to say it again, but I really mean it. This past year, I was not a nice person and I really lost myself and went against my morals that I have always believed in of being a good person. I did things that I am not proud of, things that I am ashamed of. They were things that are going to take a long time for me to forgive myself for. Here is a little run down for you of how my brain works, At lunch today I was making a couple doctors appointments and I had my day planner in front of me (yes, you read that right, I said DAY PLANNER. Old lady Tayler right here, still writes in a planner and doesn't use technology to keep track of my days. Chelby, I hope you giggled when you read day planner hahaha) Anyways, I was writing things down and I started looking through my planner, just trying to pass the time and I could not even look through things earlier than December 2014, It truly gave me a sick stomach and I just wanted to throw my planner away, so what does any girl do? Hop my little booty onto the internet and buy myself a new cute planner so I can burn this old one into millions of pieces. I wish it was that easy to do that to the year 2014 of my life....just delete it all from my memory and start over, but I shouldn't wish that because maybe we should look at all the good things the hellish year of 2014 has taught me. 

For starters, Tony and I have an amazing relationship right now. I feel like it is better than it ever has been. I don't want to say Tony and I ever had a bad relationship, because we didn't. I knew I was in love with Tony from the very first time he said Hello to me. He is my best friend and the person who I can talk to about, literally, anything, but we were young. We both were not ready for the "grown up" type of relationship that we are capable of now. Our communication is amazing, we are literally able to communicate about things that bother us or make us mad without fighting, we have never been able to do that before and it is amazing. We have both been in relationships with other people, as much as it hurts to think about him being with someone else....because trust me, It kills me. That girl is the sole reason why Tony and I ended up back together. So, as much as I want to and I do, in ways, hate her, I can't hate her....I actually have to thank her for being there when Tony needed her and her bringing him back to me. I only bring this up because it is a huge, huge step for me. I am a verrrrrrry jealous person. The old Tayler would be calling homegirl up and cussing her out any chance I got, but I am mature enough to realize that maybe using my words as my defense is not the right way to communicate things. Let's be real here, if I ever do see her in person with Tony I will probably squeeze his butt and kiss him and subtly make it known that he is with me always and forever. ;)   

I can honestly say that Tony and I do have an unconditional love. Any person that I know (myself included) would not give me the time of day after the year Tony had, but here we are, taking the steps that are needed to be married again. Tony and I did get a divorce and it is finalized as of the 20th of April. It is a really shitty feeling and it does make me really sad to say that, yes we are divorced, but looking at the bright side of things, We get a chance to start over and get a wedding that we both want and no one else and we get to just start over. As much fun as our marriage was, and it was it was amazing and incredible up until the last year, we get to leave that in the past and have a new, grown up marriage with our new selves. 

I think being in love is an amazing feeling. I never had thought about it before because I didn't really "need" too, but that is what made me get scared and freak out at the possibility of losing Tony to someone else and find other means so to speak. The beauty of being in an unconditional love is security. I know that Tony loves me and I don't have a question in my mind the love that he has for me. If two people go through hell and end up back together after all of that...how can you not believe in love and think it is a beautiful thing? I know that WHATEVER the rest of our lives have in store for us, we can make it through together. The future doesn't scare me anymore like it used too, trying to have a baby (far, far in the future) doesn't scare me, I am so secure in my relationship with Tony that I know we will be okay. Now y'all if this isn't unconditional love, I don't know what is. 

So, my next little spill about unconditional love: Loving yourself! This is probably one of the hardest things for me to accept or even talk about right now, but I feel like it's good to open up and talk about. Clearly, I am an open book. I don't keep things to myself and I don't mind talking about the things that I have messed up on in my life. I have always learned best through experiences and I would love if my experiences helped other people as well. 

I have always had a hard time loving myself, hence why I made some of the choices that I have made in my life. I have always thought I wasn't funny enough, likable, skinny enough, or pretty enough. I have always felt a little out of place wherever I went or in whatever I did. I am SUPER shy when I first meet people and to some that comes off as me being bitchy, Personally I don't think I am a bitch and I don't ever want that to be my title....I mean, maybe I am wrong, maybe I am super bitchy. I don't know. All these things have made me look to find comfort in other people, not ever in myself. Either it was in friends, boys, distracting myself, I am not sure how to really explain it, but I never have depended on myself for anything, Which is a big reason why I made the choice to have an affair on Tony, distraction from the life and the place that I had put Tony and I in. It wasn't until I let go of my distractions and focused on just MYSELF for the first time ever that my happiness came to me. 

This was probably the hardest thing I have every done. It took a huge amount of courage to do that, To some people that seems silly, but to me it was probably the most ballsy move I have ever made. I had and wanted to let go of the "other guy". I had to let go of Tony in order for him to come back to me-I had to say okay, we will get divorced I will move out on my own and I will depend on just MYSELF. scariest. thing. ever. 

This quote means a lot to me, because if I hadn't gone through that struggle of loneliness I would have never known what a strong person I was capable of becoming and I would have never gotten this amazing happiness dropped into my lap out of no where. When I first left where I was living, I was a hot mess, I mean a hot effing mess. It was a split decision for me to leave and I didn't even know I was doing it until I was packing up my car and on the phone with Tony and him telling me that everything was going to be okay (Have I mentioned how amazing he is?) Next thing I knew, I was crying in my sisters arms and her telling me that everything was going to be okay. To this day, I don't think she knows how grateful I am for her being there. I drank a lot of alcohol for a couple of days after that because I was so scared....I mean luckily I have a good head on my shoulders because I could have easily fallen into a trap that would have been hard to get out of. After a few days of feeling sorry for myself and hating myself, I started going to counseling once a week and really doing things to just improve myself....I was not putting the focus on Tony and I and a relationship with him, we were talking, but I had thought I had ruined any chance for him and I. I spent the Christmas alone, the first Christmas I had spent alone since I was 16, and that was probably one of the hardest things I have done. I didn't have a New Year's kiss...It was just me. Lonely old me. I spent countless nights crying myself to sleep, not cute little cries, heavy deep sobbing UGLY cries. I spent a lot of time with my closest friends and they kept me grounded (Steph, Chelb, Jason, Alexes,and Jerika you guys are amazing. Thank you) but, mostly I was alone and focusing on forgiveness to myself and ways that I could be a better person. Next thing I knew Tony and I had a counseling session together and we decided to slowly start dating again, it started as once every month and then every two weeks and now we are at about once a week. 

If I didn't take that split second of courage, I would have never gotten the love of my life back and I wouldn't love myself. I still have my days that I do hate myself and hate the things that I have done, but the love that I have for myself is so much stronger than a couple "bad" days. I try to pick out things in myself that I do love, even if they are small, silly things....I have great hair that will pretty much do whatever I want it too at any given time and when I curl it a certain way it looks like a mermaid and I love that. I feel like I am a nice person and I love it when people say "Oh, I thought you were going to be a bitch and you totally proved me wrong." I try to be nice and I try so hard to not talk behind people's backs and to be friends with everyone and pick out good qualities in people. I love that I have a good work ethic and focus on my job. I love that I am moving into my OWN apartment next weekend and I have worked SO hard to get there. Some days it is a struggle to find the things that I love, but if you look around at life I am pretty sure you are able to find it! 

I may have a long way to go before I can say I unconditionally love myself and forgive myself, but I have the very best group of people behind me and the best guy by my side who loves me unconditionally and that is all I can ask for.  

peace and blessing y'all! 

xox-tay 

Questions

Here is a little known fact about me.....I constantly have a million and a half questions running through my mind at ANY given time.  They are super random and one question leads to another and another and another and 90% of the time I give myself a headache from thinking so much. Here is what my day looked like today.......

Why oh why did the nice, helpful doctor have to be, most likely, the scariest character in all time on American Horror story?!?

Bro....why you gotta play me like that?!? I trusted you to help my little reporter friend?! You go behind my back like that?!? Sorry for that awful spoiler alert....hopefully y'all already knew this awful piece of information.

As I'm walking around the mall tonight I wonder...do girls not have any idea that their bright pink thong is hanging out the back of their pants? Do they not feel a breeze? I wonder when Victoria's Secrets next panty party is...I can always use a new pink thong? Why did I get SO lucky ONE time in my life and get $100.00 on my secret reward card? Was that my one free Victoria's Secret pass into their secret reward world? Will that ever happen again? Ugh American Eagle sure has a shitton of cute stuff. Why do I feel like I need these shorts in every color?! Why is the summer style crop tops? I really need to start going to the gym, because I can't find clothes if I don't get skinny. When did I have so much self control to not buy a million things? When did Express have a cute effing thing around every corner?!? See how exhausting my brain is??

Anyways, the reason for that little tangent there is because in one of my random thought days, I got to thinking about my life. How do things happen the way they are supposed to happen? I found this amazing little quote one day:

I googled the word happenstance. The correct definition for this word according to the Internet (which we know it's correct because the Internet is alllllways right) it is: a circumstance that is due to chance. I thought it was super interesting and then the questions started pilling up again and I spent a whole night engaged in people's writings on blogs and psychology behind this idea, It really is so interesting people's thoughts on this concept. I've always been a "glass half full" kind of person, so I think that it is wonderful to "leave things to chance" even though it is a little bit scary.

Back in the day when I used to go to church we learned about how our life is planned depending on our choices, blah blah blah, I am not going to go into all of that. Along with my questions, I have a very strong imagination. So I think I've made it very clear that I believe is God and when I was younger I pictured God sitting at a desk for hours with a million timetables of my life...each time table represents a choice in my life and where my life will go depending on the choice I will make. Kind of silly I know, but I was young and that image has never changed. I do believe there is a plan for mine and everyone's life and that your life is based off of happenstance because you make all your decisions in life. Now I have made some bad decisions in my life, but I feel like every decision has put me in this amazing spot in my life.

I'm going to have a bragging moment here. I. Am. So. Lucky. Things with Tony are AMAZING right now. I feel like him and I had to fall apart to come back stronger than ever! We still have a long road ahead of us, for sure, but I wouldn't have it any other way. I made the decision to get out of the shitty place I had been this past year, and happenstance and God took charge of the rest and it's perfect. Not many people get to start over with the love of their life, but I do and it's an incredible feeling. We recently went to Oregon for Tony's birthday and it was honestly the most perfect trip EVER. I mean look that is beautiful place!

I don't think I will every begin to fathom the amount of deep, deep love there is between Tony and I. After this past year, I didn't think we would ever be able to make it back together, but Tony waited for me for over a year to get my head out of my ass and figure my shit out,  I mean, let's get real here. When I think about the person I was this past year this is what I think of:

(Can you tell I'm obsessed with American Horror Story for a minute?)

Fo real, scary though. Tony is really an amazing guy and I am so lucky. Every day I find out more amazing things about him and I fall more and more in love....and we aren't even living together right now. I can only imagine the things the future has to hold for us. I don't think I'll ever know what I did right in my life to get a love like the one that I have, Trust me, it's amazing. The most amazing and most cherished thing in my life, and I for one, will never take that for granted again! I could go on and on and on about Tony in this post, but #1 I don't wanna make y'all jealous and #2 that will just give me millions of other blogs to write ;)

Another question that has crossed my mind time and time again is why certain people come into your life. What are they there to teach you or what are you supposed to learn from them. I always brag about my amazing friends at Chuck, because let's be real. I love those guys more than anything. I recently started a new job though, at Select Health. I was TERRIFIED to leave Primary Children's and cut my hours back at Chuck. I was so confident in myself at Primaries and I loved those kids more than anything. At Chuck, I do my job pretty well and I really enjoy it, but I had to make decisions to  move on with my life and take that next step, So I had to get a full time job with a steady income and good benefits. So, that lead me here...I cried on my first day of work driving there. Weird, I know, but I had a little bit of a mental breakdown. I had to do a good job here because my life was depending on this income. I could only get an apartment if I had a steady job, Along with apartments comes bills, groceries, etc. I have been down this path before, but I always had Tony's money to supplement me, that is why I have never HAD to work a full time job. I always had that kushy pillow to fall back on. So here, I am all by my little ol' self.

Surprisingly, it is amazing. I love the people who I work with and my training class and I are great friends.

Aren't we cute?

I mean, I am not sure exactly why these 4 people came into my life when they did, but I am so thankful it makes this transition into this next "phase of my life" so to speak a lot easier to deal with.  

So, this leads me to where I am in my life today. I don't know exactly how I got to be so lucky and got the gift of unconditional love and how I got the gift of an amazing family and millions of amazing friendships. Maybe, its happenstance or being in the right place at the right time. Or maybe it's just the luck of the draw or its fate. I am not sure, but all I know is that I did have everything that ment something to me taken away in the past year and I will never stop thanking God for the plan of my life and I will never take it for granted again. So on that note, My love is unconditional...(sometimes I wish that blogs had the Emoji feature so you could realize I was starting to sing that song.) 

xoxo-tay