That's When You Know

Some nights just make you realize how thankful you are for some people.
Some aren’t so good nights, like the night my friend hydroplaned off the road and into a tree, her car totaled, but she ended up with only a few scratches.
You stop and think, the car was totaled, but she wasn’t.
That’s when you know you’re thankful for someone.
Or the better nights, when you come home, your throat scratchy because you’ve been laughing all night.
You drive around town, get burritos bigger than your head, try on ugly dresses and forget everything for just a while.
That’s when you know you’re thankful for someone.
When you realize that one person has stuck by you for six years.
Has listened to you cry over boys, and cry because your family was being ripped apart.
When you call their mom, your mom and when you’ve practically adopted their younger siblings.
That’s when you know you have a true friend.
When you can call them at 3:47 and cry to them, and they’ll stay on the other line until you’ve calmed down.
Even if you’re crying over nothing.
When they’re the person you’d go to when something really shitty happened, and you just need someone to sit with.
That’s when you know you have a true friend.

To the Person Who Loves Me Next

To the person who loves me next.

Please don’t get angry when I call you crying because I can’t find the long side of my blanket, because my emotions get out of control and at the time, it’s a serious issue.

You have to understand that I don’t understand. My mind is small and closed and it takes a lot for me to understand even the simplest things and even when I do, I’ll still ask you questions.

I’m jealous. Maybe overly jealous at times, but I know there’s always someone better out there for you, and there will always be someone prettier and you can always love someone more, no matter how much you deny it.

I can’t help the fact that I don’t trust you completely, but in my defense, I don’t trust myself either. I’ve tricked my mind to believe things that I’m not even sure are true, and some of those things involve you.

I need constant reassurance, and I really am not just looking for attention, so when I say “You don’t really love me” don’t be offended. I just really don’t believe it. And honestly, the most you can do is try to reassure me as much as you can until I say it again.

I get lost in my head and I wonder what things are like in different countries and I tend to ask questions that I know you wouldn’t know the answer to.

To the person who loves me next. Know that I’m fragile, no matter the exterior I put up. Know that I’ll bring up names and call you names at the most absurd times. Know that I’ll push you away and I’ll say I hate you when you try to resist me, and I’ll beg for you to leave, but please don’t.

To the person who loves me next, I’m sorry

3 Months and 28 Days

I contemplated texting you for hours before I actually followed through.
It was our birthday, July 12, and we hadn’t spoken since we decided we weren’t meant for each other.
But I saw you on your story, you finally turned 18, like you’d been dreaming of.
So I did it.
I said happy birthday, thinking it wasn’t going to be much more than that, but of course it was going to be, it was never just a simple message with you.
We got back together on July 12, 2015, and here I am 3 months and 28 days later, crying in bed because you haven’t texted me in over 48 hours.
And I’m wondering what I did wrong.
And I’m wondering why we were brought back together.
And I’m wondering what the hell I was on when I sent you that message.
And I’m wondering if it was all a mistake.
If we were all a mistake.
But at this point I don’t think we can turn around.
Because I’m so invested, and I hope you are too.
You can’t just go back to normal after this.
It’s been 3 months and 28 days and my heart feels on fire, and my head is killing me, because I’m crying over you once again.

 

Addiction

Drug addiction doesn’t just effect the addict

People who do drugs can be good role models, not in the most common sense, but they can be. Sometimes it can be a role model of what not to do, but there are life lessons to be learned from a drug addicted person as I have experienced this myself.

While it was difficult, and I was young, there were still life lessons that were learned from it. Good and bad.
An addiction is an illness. They aren’t ‘junkies’ or ‘criminals’ or ‘trash’ most of the time, addicts are trying to better themselves, no matter how much people don’t want to believe that. People want to shut addicts away from society, pretend they don’t exist and that nobody loves them. Often times, people when they see a drug addict, they turn their nose up at them, instead of looking at them with caring eyes, thinking about what drove them to that point.

They aren’t trash.
They aren’t worthless.
They are loved.

They were drove to this point, or sometimes they just wanted the experience.

They didn’t want this
They’ve heard ‘you’ll become addicted.’ But in the moment, none of that mattered. When you’re drove to the point where you hate your life so much that you’d risk it so much just to escape, the addiction doesn’t even matter.
Because the addiction isn’t the needle piercing their skin.
The addiction isn’t their nose burning
The addiction isn’t the burn of their lungs
The addiction is the escape.
Addicts have said they liked the way it felt. They liked the burn of the nose, throat or lungs. But they just like where it’s leading. They know that after the burn, their paradise comes. Where their heart doesn’t hurt. They don’t feel guilty. They forget.
They just want to forget.
They aren’t trash.
They aren’t worthless.
They are loved.

The Future

I think some of the best parts of life hurt the worst.

Relationships being the first thing I think of. It seems like every time we start a steady routine of being okay, I do something to fuck it up, and most of the time it’s not something I tell him. It’s not even something between us that fucks us up, its me. It’s all me, I get shit in my head and I start believing it. And I don’t know how to stop it.
I can’t do this anymore.
The distance is too much
I can’t handle this.
And every time I say that, I remind myself that it’s next month. And maybe I’m just living for December, maybe I’m pushing myself through just to see if it’s right. To see if we’re right. Or maybe I really do believe it’s meant to be for us.
I keep thinking that in 30ish days he’ll be here and I can see if it’s real.
I read this blog called TinyBuddha.com and what was posted, I don’t know, some time ago was the illusion of the future, and I’ll link it at the bottom, but it talked about the future being an illusion, something we’ve made up in our head. But as we live, the future comes to us. In two minutes, I’ll be further down the page, and that’s the future, and in two minutes, this will be the past. And in 30 days, that will be the future. And this will be the past.
If I don’t make myself happy now, I won’t be happy in 30 days, or even 300 days, because that’s not how it works.

The future doesn’t make us happy. We make us happy.

 

Why Do You Like Them?

Something I hear people say all the time is that they hate when they like someone and other people say “Ew, why would you like them?”

Since, I’ve gotten with him, that’s all I’ve heard. Negative. Negative. Negative.

He’s too old for you – he’s 18, I’m 16. Our birthdays are on the same day, we are exactly 2 years apart.

He lives too far away – Yes, the 1,000+ mile distance is a long ways, but really is the potential love of my life not worth it?

He’s going to leave soon – He’s starting basics for the Army in December, so yes, he will be leaving, but I respect the reason he’s leaving for.

 These are all things I’ve heard before, and continue to hear, plus ones not listed. I have friends I rant to specifically about him, but obviously other stuff too. We’ll call them Lindsey and Brittany. Well, Lindsey and Brittany only hear the bad things, because who really wants to listen to their friend say, “Oh my gosh, he’s so perfect! He’s so adorable! Look at this goodnight text he sent me last night!” Right? Nobody wants to listen to that, so I of course tell them only the bad. From day one Lindsey has said she “doesn’t like him” and “doesn’t understand why I would like someone like him”

Because sure, he has his faults. He’s kind of a jackass, he has more insecurities than I can count, he’s guarded, he’s been suffering with depression and anxiety for 5+ years, he’s dealt with prescription drug addiction, he drives way too fast on the freeway, he’s reckless and carefree, he’s insane and drives me insane.

But with each one of those faults there are 20 more reasons I love him.

He’s sweet, he’d do anything to protect the ones he loves, he’s protective, he’s so funny, etc. Etc. You’d rather hear the bad things than the good things I’m assuming.

The point is, don’t judge people and who they’re into.

Everything you have done, make up who you are currently, and somebody will love all of you. Your faults, your successes, your failures…all of it.

 

With me and my boyfriend, we’ve had our ups and downs. We’ve dealt with things separately that have affected our relationship negatively, and we’ve dealt with things together that have affected our relationship negatively. Nobody will have a perfect relationship, but I believe that if two people are meant to be with each other they’ll find a way back to each other.

July 12, 2015

Today I saw a picture of you and her. The thing that broke me the most was how cute you look together.

And maybe I’m over reacting, which is quite possible, but your smile looks so much brighter, and you and her look like a match made in heaven.

Maybe she’s why I’m not anywhere on your social media. Seeing you with her reminded me how disposable I am to you, and maybe that’s why you stopped saying ‘I love you’

What do I do when I see that?

How do I react?

I didn’t break down, and I didn’t cry. I sat on my bedroom floor just staring at your face and hers, I felt numb and confused. My hands were shaking uncontrollably, but tears didn’t come like they normally do.

Maybe because I’ve been expecting this for a while, there was another girl, it’s exactly what my friend’s dad said when he heard about you and I. He’s suspected this from the beginning, and yeah, I guess I did too.

July 12, 2015, that was when we made each other our focus. It’s when we both decided that we were all each other loved.

I guess I was the only one who knew the terms of our agreement, because it seems that you’ve found someone who you love more than I could.

And maybe I’m over reacting, which is quite possible, but you look happy with her, and if that’s so, forget me.

Move on, like you already have.
Forget what we had, or maybe we didn’t have anything and I just thought we had something.
Forget the ‘I love you’s and the ‘I never want to leave you’s
Forget what we are, and what we were.
Forget what we could’ve been.

November 3, 2015, the day I decided that I can’t handle it anymore, but I’m not going to go anywhere.

Vulnerability

I’ve been talking to this guy for a while, he’s a friend of mine. I think friends often make you find yourself discovering more of yourself for them. New friends ask questions, some more serious than others.

Where were you born?
Do you have any siblings?
What’s your favorite color?
Who is your role model?
What are you scared of?
They make you think of things we tend to push out of our head.
This friend of mine didn’t start out by asking any questions, he didn’t even start with a ‘hi’ or ‘hey’. This friend started out with a paragraph telling me I was beautiful. He kept repeating ‘wow’
This was a few months ago.
In between these past few months, we’ve gotten closer. This friend, lives in Canada, as I do not. And he has more life experience than I do myself, not by much, but by a few years, but he’s still a friend.
Some friends help you realize that blue is not your best color. Some help you pick up guys. Some help you dump guys. And some are just along for the ride.
But this friend,
He helped me realize how vulnerable I am, and how much I hate it. He helped me realize how tall I built these walls around myself. After only a day or so of talking, he pointed out my ‘deflection’ as he calls it. Basically if someone brings up something I don’t want to talk about, I deflect it. It’s a common thing with people these days. All of mine involve switching the conversation, sometimes back to the other person, sometimes to simply nonsense.
Since talking to him, my walls have been taken down a bit, he’s an amazing friend, and I’m so thankful for him. I catch myself deflecting now, as I couldn’t before. I also notice that I’m more comfortable around him than a lot of my very close friends.
Maybe it’s the distance that’s been put between us, that I can feel comfortable telling him things that took me a long time to tell my best friend.
I don’t know what’s up with me and long distance things, but I think you meet the best people who are far away.

 

A 587 hour walk

Sometimes I think you need to just step away, whether that be from friends, family or even yourself I think it’s important to have that space. That’s where I am right now. At this time in my life, I have a boyfriend, I’m in a long distance relationship with an amazing man that I can see myself spending the rest of my life with, but the distance has become overwhelming.

Anyone who has been in a long distance relationship can probably relate. Relate to the fact that some nights you need that person physically there more than others. While some of you may call long distance an hour drive, my long distance is:

1,865.8 miles.
587 hour walk.
27 hour drive.

For some people, long distance relationships are an absurd concept that should never be attempted, but for most people who have been involved in a long distance relationship know that it makes the relationship so much more real.

The truth of the matter is this, in a 'normal' relationship (i.e. one where you see each other every day [or close to] can hug and kiss each other, can drive to their house, and isn't a big thing if you decide to go see them) you don't need much effort. It's true, it's not hard to kiss and hug someone when you see them, or go hang out with them on the weekends, and cuddle and take naps together or even Netflix & Chill. It's not as complicated.
But, long distance relationships are a whole other story. Long distance relationships require even more effort because you don't see each other on the daily, sometimes not even close to the daily. It takes effort to text them and ask how their day is going, to snapchat them, call them, facetime them. It takes effort.

I'm not saying that other relationships don't take effort cause I know they do, but it's different when you can't just drive to their house and see them. It's different when you have to pack bags just to go see them.

Do you get what I’m saying? Maybe not.

This brings me back to my first point, I think it's important to take breaks, to step away, to just freaking breathe. To take an actual moment to breathe and just realize what is going on around you. But in some instances I don't think you can. I don't think every situation is the right situation to just step back when you feel the pressure. Sometimes you have to push it through, no matter how trapped you feel. Try your hardest to push it, until you know for sure that you can't do whatever that may be any longer.

Know your limits. Love until you can’t anymore, but never lose yourself.