I met Michael when I was 16 years old. I had never had a boyfriend before, and was quite frankly more used to the boys picking on me than being interested in me. But he was, and I was immediately interested in him as well. We started dating, but only saw each other once or twice a week at our local robotics meetings or Friday nights when his parents would bring him to my house and my mom would drive him home. We talked all the time on the computer, and for about six months it was a very idealistic relationship. Or so I though…

And then everything went wrong. We had sex for the first time, but I quickly decided that I was not ready for the possibility of getting pregnant (because accidents DO happen) and I put a stop to it. Michael on the other hand seemed to me to be ALL ABOUT SEX. He got upset with me at times because I wouldn’t do it (and in his defense in this area, I did flip-flop back and forth several times), and we started fighting about pretty much everything. Throw his ex trying to get him back into the mix and life was stressful almost 24/7. Truthfully this should have been my sign to get out…but I was already in too deep. I had a very “can’t live without him” mentality about Michael, and so I stayed.

That’s the first time he cheated on me. With a girl named Amanda whose brother was on his cross country team. He called me up one night after school before robotics and told me he needed to talk to me. I wouldn’t let him drop it on the phone, so he confessed then and there rather than in person later that night at robotics.

I flipped shit. Truthfully, I had all the right reactions. I was horrified and heartbroken. I told him I never wanted to speak to him again and hung up on him. I didn’t go to robotics that night because the last thing I wanted to do was see his face. I made all the right choices that night, and yet I was unable to stick with them. Within a month, Michael and I were back together and back to somewhat normal (despite the fact that we still fought constantly).

Almost a year went by after the incident, with us going through periods of fighting and then not fighting and then fighting again. Then unexpectedly before a robotics competition, Michael was suspended from school. He told me it was for not taking in excuses for days that he’d missed. I took his word for it, but something in my gut didn’t feel right. Soon after the competition I began hearing rumors that Mike had been caught at school with a girl and that’s what he got in trouble for. When his best friend James let it slip about some things he’d seen, I was all but sure that the rumors were true.

So I confronted Michael about it. He became extremely upset over my accusation and we fought for weeks on the subject; him always defending his innocence. Eventually I let it go, telling myself that he wouldn’t fight me so hard about it if the rumors were true. I started beating myself up over doubting him, despite the fact that he’d given me an extremely good reason to be untrusting. I loved him, and wanted so badly to believe that he’d changed, so I forced myself to believe him, despite what my gut was telling me.

From that point on, the sick feeling in my stomach became a constant companion every time I felt like I was being lied to or wasn’t being told the whole story. Many times it was my mind overanalyzing things and getting caught up in “what ifs.” It didn’t help that I caught Mike in several smaller lies during this time period.

Hence, I became the snooper. Nothing was safe from my eyes….his phone, email, AIM conversations, etc. I looked at everything, and was extremely skilled at catching him in his lies without him ever suspecting that I’d gone through his personal things.This continued on through most of college, through our break-ups and getting back together.

Until one night during our Junior year. We got into an argument and something popped into my head and I ran with it. That horrible feeling in my gut came back and I demanded that he tell me why he got suspended from school. And that night the truth came out. All of the rumors were true. He’d been caught fooling around with a girl named Tina in his high school.

I lost my shit again. I’d spent almost 3 years beating myself up for not trusting him about the topic. I spent so many nights fighting my mind as it was telling me I’d been lied to. I’d given up so much of myself to try and fix this perceived problem with my personality…and it was all for nothing because in the end I was right.

This breakup was the worst of them all. Cops were involved at one point because I did not want him near me, talking to me, in my house to get his things, etc.. I even at one point strongly suggested to him that he find another college to finish his senior year at.

But of course, once again I couldn’t stick to my guns. I ended up rationalizing with myself that he’d been an open book to me for the past 3 years and that he hadn’t screwed up majorly in that time…maybe he really had changed. It was during this time that something pretty horrible happened to me, and Mike was the only one there for me (mainly because he’s the only on I would talk to about it). And the summer after what would have been our 6th anniversary (had we not broken up a million times) we were back together.

For the last two years, things were relatively okay with us. Except I’d developed this horrible evolution of my gut feeling. I was always “looking over my shoulder” and waiting for the next shoe to drop. I’d go through periods where I’d imagine the most horrible things and that horrible feeling would come back and somehow I’d believe they were really happing/going to happen just because I felt sick about it. Despite the fact that I knew in my mind all the situations were pretty much fabricated by me, based on some small thing I’d picked up like some girl saying something to Mike in a way that rubbed me wrong, I couldn’t get them out of my mind.

I started snooping again, and the shoe dropped.

The third time Mike “cheated” on me, he never actually got to perform the act. But to me, intent to cheat is just as bad as actually doing it. He basically told me flat out that if we didn’t break up for good, he’d stay with me, but he wanted someone else. Basically he was a coward and made me make the final decision, all while telling me that he wasn’t sure what he wanted (which was a blatant lie considering shortly after I finally gave in he made it very clear he knew exactly what he wanted).

After that I was lost. I spent 8 years of my life beating myself up, raking myself over the coals, and sacrificing the parts of my personality that were most important to me all to keep the man I loved in my life. Even though I am more than honest with myself now and will admit that for the last several years of our relationship, Mike was a habit and not my boyfriend.

I’ve come so far over the past 2 years….but 8 years extremely hard to just throw away when they did so much damage to you in the first place.

I’m still the girl who pays super close attention to everything and picks up on the smallest, insignificant things.
I’m still the girl whose mind takes those insignificant things and builds them up into mountains instead of mole hills.
I’m still the girl whose mind can make her physically ill over these perceived mountains.
I’m still the girl who has a hard time asking questions because before now she’s never gotten truthful answers.
I’m still the girl who isn’t used to being happy.
I’m still the girl who is waiting for the axe to drop every time I smile.
I’m still the girl who beats herself up for all of the above.

But I’m also…

The girl who doesn’t automatically distrust everything that everyone says to me.
The girl who began to see a future for herself despite not having a boyfriend or anyone to rely on (besides family of course).
The girl who didn’t give up and move back home despite being virtually alone and miserable 7 hours from anyone she cared about.
The girl who is more determined now than ever to beat her neurosis and learn to be happy without the “but what if.”

I was determined to kick these bad habits before I met Seto, but meeting him and subsequently falling in love with him made that determination even stronger.

I’ll be honest… It would be super easy for me just to let myself go and lose everything into my relationship with Seto. Get into a situation where he could literally walk right over me and I’d smile and take it (even though I know that’s something he would never do). But my relationship with him is so different than the one I had with Mike. I don’t need to lose myself to make things work. I don’t need to sacrifice my personality to keep him around or not cause fights (of course if there was something I did that truly bothered him and he had a good reason for why I should change something, of course I’d do it, but I don’t feel like I need to unwillingly throw away bits and pieces of myself anymore).

I don’t feel like I can’t stand on my own without him. Maybe thats a side-effect of building myself back up after Mike and recognizing where I went wrong, but it’s something that I’ve never had in a relationship. It was always either “perfect” or “devastation.” Of course I certainly don’t want to have to stand without him, or ever let him go, but if forced I know in my heart that I could. In a small way it’s comforting because it means that I’ve realized that I will always be Whitney and that Whitney will has a future no matter what.

Every minute that I spend with that man is precious to me. Because I’ve never connected with someone the way I feel that I connected with him. He understands me, he understands everything that I’ve written above and how it has all shaped me into the imperfect girl that he’s dating. He understands those imperfections and doesn’t hold them against me like so many others I know. I am thankful towards him for that because it means rather than frantically trying to suppress those parts of me until I can’t control them anymore and snap, I can be honest about it and we can talk (regardless of how bad I am at initiating said conversations).

I ‘dated’ a bit before I met Seto, and the common theme with all of the guys was that I was dating because it was what I was “supposed” to be doing. Even the ones I got along great with, I knew it wouldn’t last. The idea of having a future with a guy was basically a laughable subject to me. I was the girl who would never get married, never have a family, never do any of that because I was the girl who would never be willing to risk giving my heart to someone else again.

Seto, to me, is worth that risk; worth getting my heart ripped out a smashed a million times. And he is the only person I have ever met who I can say that about.

I don’t know what the future holds for me but I’m learning to accept the fact that, in large part, it’s going to be what I shape it into.

It all started on Sunday… I had the day off, so after sleeping in I spent a few hours just bumming around the house. During that time I decided I was extremely bored and should do something fun…like put on makeup. I rarely ever wear makeup, but I’ve always had fun doing it. So I spent about an hour getting a shower and getting myself “all dolled up.”

After I was done, I decided to send the above picture to my boyfriend along with the caption “sometimes I get bored and cosplay as a girl.” His reaction wasn’t what I expected, it was even better. He ended up telling me that we needed to go out to dinner, so we made plans to meet in Robinson and check out the KMart that’s going out of business and head to Outback.

It was an awesome night. Seto has always called me beautiful/pretty/cute/etc, but the whole night I would catch him staring at me out of the corner of his eye and a few times he just stopped and told me again how nice I looked. I still have quite a few issues with my body and my self-confidence, so him actually stopping and telling me how good I looked basically sent me over the moon. Just one more reminder of why I love him so much and am so happy that he found me.

Unfortunately my awesome story ends there. Apparently while everyone else was thrilled that I wore makeup, my body wasn’t. I woke up the next morning with 8 little pimple-like bumps on my forehead. I’ve never had an acne problem, so I didn’t really think much of it…I do occasionally get pimples here and there, no big deal. I put some of my Philosophy: On a Clear Day on it when I got up and before bed and didn’t think anything of it.

The next morning, those 8 little bumps had turned to more like 20 little bumps. I figured it was just a bad breakout, so I decided to go a little stronger and put some of my Mario Badescu acne treatment on them. And once again, overnight things got much worse to the point where on Wednesday morning my entire forehead was covered in bumps. Over the course of the day they started to get red, my skin started to get splotchy and it began to itch.

By Thursday morning I was desperate. My whole forehead itched and felt like it was on fire and all the bumps were bright red. I ended up going to Ulta and talking  to the staff there and they ended up recommending something called Juice Beauty: Organics to Clear Skin. Its a certified organic beauty line and this is their acne system. It’s supposed to be really good for sensitive skin and I could take it back within 60 days if I didn’t like it…so I decided to try it out. I used it Thursday and today, and I can already see an improvement. The bumps aren’t red anymore, they barely itch, and some of them have even gone away. I’m not saying this is my cure, but so far it seems to be working…still gotta give it some time.

But, with my head woes seemingly coming to an end, of course something else has to happen. Today before work I decided to head to the store and grab a soda and something I could snack on over the course of the night. But as I’m crossing the road to the building, I hear the sound of a car to my right, and turn my head just in time to get plowed into by a bright red Kia. An elderly woman had been driving down one of the parking aisles and didn’t even look before she turned out onto the road…running straight into me. THANKFULLY she can’t have been going more than 5-10 miles an hour and did notice me in time to slam on her breaks. Still, she hit the right side of me and knocked me down pretty hard. I’m not sure who was more shaken up in the end, me or her. But aside from a couple bruises and some minor aches, I seem to be okay. Provided my injuries do not worsen by tomorrow, I won’t be pressing charges against her. I just really hope that in the future, should she choose to continue driving, she is more careful and actually pays attention to where she’s going rather than staring off into the distance as she drives.

Isn’t my life eventful guys?

If there is one thing that I can say with 100% certainty, it’s that being sick absolutely sucks. I don’t have the greatest immune system, so you’d think I’d be used to illness by now… However I’ve been doing pretty well for the past six months or so; no sickness at all besides the normal allergy stuff I deal with every time the seasons start to change. But somehow, a week or so ago, I managed to come down with a case of the flu. And even over a week later, I still don’t feel completely back to normal.

I have absolutely no energy at all, which is a huge hassle considering the fact that I’ve had to close at work a lot this week. I did have Sunday and Monday off, but I spent both days not even moving from my bed because I just didn’t have the strength to get up. Tuesday I had the early shift and ended up coming home and sleeping for the rest of the day because I was so worn out from loading trucks (which truthfully requires very little manual labor on the part of the Home Delivery coworker). Now I’m on a closing stretch and can just feel myself getting more and more exhausted with every passing day.

I’m also pretty much failing in the ‘don’t get hurt’ department. I feel like I’ve managed to injure myself every single day this week in one way or another. Tuesday I bruised my shin with a cart, Wednesday I brush-burned my arm with the rough edge of a cardboard box, and Thursday I smashed my wrist off a door and it STILL hurts. Last night I told Seto that if I could make it through today and Saturday without getting hurt, I’d let myself buy the Hidden Arsenal 7 Yu-Gi-Oh! box we’ve been eyeing. Sure enough, within two hours of work today the lock on the supply cage jammed. In the process of trying to fix it, I managed to pinch the skin on one of my fingers and start bleeding everywhere.

So yeah…

Go me.

Considering it has been such a long time since I’ve been regularly posting, I decided that maybe it would be a good idea to do one big update post as opposed to trying to throw bits and pieces of my life into various updates and potentially forgetting things I wanted to say.

Truthfully I’ve reached a point where I’ve realized that when it comes to my life, I’d much rather be out there living it than in here talking about it. That’s a complete 180 degree turn from how I used to be. I’m still going to try and post as much as possible, but I’m also starting to face the idea that perhaps my time as a “personal blogger” is coming to an end. I’m sure in a week I won’t feel that way, but nobody knows where things will go from here; though, I’m sure excited to find out.

And so without further ado, welcome to the longest post I’ve written in probably a year. State of the Whitters!

Friends
On the friendship front, I’ve actually been doing pretty well lately. I finally met some people in Pittsburgh that I truly consider my friends (and not just people I work with or go to school with or only talk to online or only see occasionally). I’ve been doing my best to hang out with them as often as possible outside of work, but obviously that’s a bit hard because we all have crappy schedules. Even so, we talk and text all the time and I love these guys so much! They’re my little piece of sanity in this crazy crazy life.

As you can also tell from my last entry, I got to see some of my friends from home as well. Dessa and Pam came down to visit for a couple days and I miss them already now that they’re gone. But it was an awesome couple days, including the best part which I didn’t blog about: Dessa proposing to Pam on top of Mt. Washington. It was adorable and despite what she says, she had no clue he was going to do it. Kyle and I, on the other hand, knew exactly when it was gonna happen since we got to be a part of the whole process. Dessa kept us updated the whole time while he was buying the ring, having it sized, deciding where to do it, etc. I’m so happy for them it isn’t even funny!

I’m also making even more friends online (due to playing more multiplayer games, which I’ll talk about a bit later). Some people don’t really consider “online” friends to be real friends, but I do. One of my online friends (which I met through Seto) is even going to be having a layover in Pittsburgh on his way to New York City in April and we’re going to hang out! I love pretty much all of my online friends. But despite the new friends I’ve gained, I’ve also lost a few due to a new resolution of mine. I decided to get myself out of friendships where I know that the other person isn’t interested in putting any effort into the relationship (both online and “IRL” friendships). Friendship isn’t one-sided, and I don’t need those types of people in my life anymore.

Family
Unfortunately, I haven’t seen my family in almost three months. I knew what I was getting myself into when I moved to Pittsburgh, but every once in a while it creeps up on me how far away I really am. Even though it’s not like we’re on opposite sides of the country, I can’t just up and go visit my mom on a whim…and she’s in the same boat. Visits take planning, requesting days off work, and a lot of driving, which neither of us are really keen on (especially when it usually ends up being something like 14 hours of driving in a 72 hour period).

I’ve been trying to convine my mom to come down and visit, but it’s just too hard to plan something like that in the winter. At any second it can go from being 75 and sunny to 20 and snowing…especially in Pittsburgh. I wouldn’t want her to get stuck down here and have to miss work; or even worse: get stuck out in a storm traveling to or from. I’m sure they’ll make the trip sooner or later (since they’re dying to meet Seto)…or I’ll have to schedule a few days off and make the trip up to see them.

Love
Things with Seto are great. It’s honestly hard for me to talk about him without starting to gush, but I’ll try.

Had the first nice Valentine’s Day that I’ve had in two years thanks to him. We didn’t do anything crazy special, but he took me out to dinner and stayed the night. It was just nice having him here because I definitely don’t get to see him nearly as much as I’d like to (due to us both having pretty busy and often conflicting schedules).

But this is the happiest I’ve been in a long time, and for that I am extremely thankful.

Work
Work is the same as ever. Things business-wise have slowed down considerably (as they do around this time every year) and it has led to some pretty boring days. Especially since I’m no longer a cashier and not every customer ends up scheduling Home Delivery. Sometimes I’ll go an entire 7-8 hour shift and only have two or three customers. Sometimes it’s a real struggle trying to find things to keep occupied with. Luckily I’ve been trained in pretty much every single area of Customer Service, so I can help out with returns, cash lanes, Smaland, etc. to pass the time. There’s also a possible opportunity coming up for me at work, but I don’t really have that much information on it yet so I cant talk about it. If it pans out, it’ll be awesome though.

Still keeping my eyes open for web jobs though, and always am willing to do freelance!

Weight Loss
This is one area where I have to admit that I fell off the bandwagon. I haven’t gained any weight, but I haven’t lost any in the past couple weeks either. I’ve also been eating like crap and my body is definitely feeling it. I’ve felt pretty much like crap for the past few days and I know it has to be at least partially due to my shitty diet and the fact that I haven’t been exercising lately either. So it’s time to kick my butt back into gear and start actually trying again.

I’ve got about 15 more pounds to lose to reach my “20lbs by April 15th” goal, and I definitely thing it’s doable. Especially if I really work at it. One of the biggest things I need to do is stop eating at work. The food is too expensive and basically all crap (since the only things I actually like are the chicken tenders, mac & cheese and mashed potatoes)…so not eating there with be healthier and cheaper for me. Instead I’m gonna try and start taking my meals or waiting until I get out of work to eat dinner.

Gaming
I think I officially have the worst gaming ADD ever. I’m currently part way through, playing, or have just started at least 10 different games. Every time I really start to get into one someone ends up suggesting another game and I try it out only to get hooked and forget about the original game.

I also almost ended up getting back into World of Warcraft but luckily dodged that bullet. Though it really didn’t matter in the end because my friend’s Red and Az got me hooked on another MMO, DC Universe Online. At least that one is free to play (unless you want to pay for extra stuff), so it’s not quite as bad as WoW. Though as Seto told me last night “the lesser of two evils is still evil” to which I say “so says the boy who plays TOR in 6-8 hr marathon stretches =P”

Life in General
Like I said before, I’m in a really good place with my life right now. I have awesome friends, an amazing boyfriends, and more things to do than there are hours in the day. I just need to keep pushing towards my goals and keep trying to improve the parts of my life that aren’t 100% where I’d like them to be and I should be just fine.

If the first two months have been any indication…it’s going to be an amazing year.

It has definitely been too long.

Spent the last few days having an absolute blast with a couple of my friends, Dessa and Pam, from back home. They came down Friday morning and stayed with Kyle and I until Sunday.

We didn’t do too much on Friday except run to IKEA. They wanted to do some shopping and I needed to get some replacement parts for Kyle’s bed that decided to start falling apart (the first and only time I’ve ever had an issue with an IKEA product). Then we went to Mad Mex and met up with our friends K and N for dinner. Ended up drinking a *little* bit too much and Pam ended up having to drive us home. The food was great and the drinks were even better, so it was worth it!

Saturday we headed to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History. I’ve never been there before and while history really isn’t my “thing” it was pretty cool. Or well, at least the dinosaurs were cool! Afterwards we went to Phipps Conservatory & Botanical Gardens, another place that I’d never been. At first I was a bit worried because typically me and plant life do not get along at all…but I was fine. And the flowers were absolutely gorgeous! Though I really want to go back in the summer time now, when everything outdoors (especially the Japanese Courtyard Garden) are in full bloom.

Afterwards we headed back to the house and Seto joined up with us to head out to dinner. Pam, like me, is a huge fan of The Big Bang Theory, so we decided to take her to Cheesecake Factory since she’d never been there. Well if you know anything about Cheesecake Factory, you know that going there on a weekend night is not recommended (especially because they don’t take reservations). We ended up having to wait two hours for a table. Thankfully this one is attached to a mall so we spent some time in LLBean and then walked around a bit before we could finally be seated. The food was worth it though, especially the cheesecake!

Once dinner was over we all came back to the house and played Cards Against Humanity for a little while. Even though it was Seto’s first time playing, he jumped right in and picked it up quickly. And thus I learned that my boyfriend can have an extremely dirty mind when he wants to. Ended up being insane amounts of fun!

Sunday morning we got up late and headed to Quaker Steak and Lube for brunch. I havent had wings in so long, and they were delicious. We ended up heading back to the house and watching a movie before Pam and Dessa headed home. I dont think they were even in their car yet and Kyle and I were both back in bed napping. I still haven’t caught up on all the sleep I missed.

All in all the weekend was amazing. I got to see my friends, they got to meet Seto, and I really hope that we can all do it again really soon! Or maybe I can convince Seto to visit home with me so he can see how the “hick” half lives!

And below the cut you will find an ABCs meme thingy that I stole from Angie. …continue reading “Long Weekend”