Love Conquers All

The love of your Best Friend

The moment I knew Michael was going to be the person I would love for the rest of my life is when we first started dating and he told me that I was a woman that deserved to be loved. As soon as we started talking to each other I knew that Michael was cut from a different cloth. The biggest attribute about him was his kind heart. He has the kind of heart that shines through his eyes when he smiles. I quickly realized that he was one of the most genuine souls that I have ever met. 

Michael is the type of person that helps when he sees people that are need, whether that be buying food for someone that is hungry, helping a woman carry her heavy groceries, or buying his Dad a new truck so that he would have something safe and reliable to drive around.  He always treats people with the utmost respect and never makes anyone feel less than what they are. I love that he is accepting of all walks of life. Gender, race, culture, religion, sexual identity or preference does not stand in the way of him getting to know who someone truly is. 

There is much that I have learned about life, love, and myself by being with this man. When you are with someone that is right for you, life doesn't change. You do. You change how you see your life and what you see as important and valuable. Michael changed my perception on life because I knew that I wanted to build a life with him. 

We have challenged each other throughout our relationship. I pushed him to his boundaries and he pushed right back. There were times when all we did was fight and drive each other crazy, though for whatever reason, we never gave up on each other. We always came back to the drawing board and tried to figure out what was wrong and what we could do to help each other and our relationship. That is the thing about life and love that we don't get a lot of lessons on, life and love are not perfect. They are not meant to be. Life and love are meant to challenge you, push you, and help you to grow. It took me awhile to realize that relationships are not all about the love letters, the passion, and the connection. It's not about being crazy about that one person, or giving all that you are to make that person feel loved. Its about working together, communicating, treating each other with respect, honoring the other person's life and where they come from, and knowing how to grow and walk together. 

When people look at Michael and I and say, "You guys are the perfect couple!" 

I smile and I reply, "Trust me, it's a work in progress." 

I am comforted in knowing that Michael and I will always have things to work on in our relationship because it reminds me that we are individuals and if there are not things to work on in our relationship than that means that we are not growing as a couple. The more that we grow, the closer we become. Life will throw us obstacles, and I know that sometimes it will be hard because we've had hard obstacles to overcome already, but I see how we have worked out things together and I know that our love and our life together will stand strong because we believe in it. 

When I talked to my Grandparents about their marriages each of them said the same thing,

"It takes work." 

When Michael and I got married, on the day of our wedding everyone kept asking us if we were nervous. 

"Are you nervous?"

"How are you feeling?"

"This is it you know!"

My thought process was, if I'm nervous about marrying this man, I'm in the wrong relationship. The day of our wedding I felt so calm and relaxed. I felt happy and content. I felt reassured that I was marrying the best man in the world. I was going to marry my best friend. 

Michael is not only my husband, he is my best friend. He is the one person that knows me through and through. He has seen me at my strongest and my weakest points. He has seen the worst and best sides of me, my temper and my love. My jealousy and my insecurity. Through everything he has only loved me more. Just as I have loved him more through his faults. We changed ourselves by loving each other unconditionally, and by encouraging each other's dreams. To never knock each other down, but to help ourselves be strong by believing in each other. 

When this skin disease was dragging me down, Michael showed as much strength as he could in me. Even though I knew that he was frustrated to see me in pain all the time and wishing that he could take it away in an instant. Through all of this he has been nothing but patient and loving with me. Always knowing just what to do and say to make me feel better about my circumstance. 

When my face was really bad, I was feeling sorry for myself one day, wanting it to all go away. I would stare at pictures of myself, wondering if I was ever going to look the same again. 

Not a moment later, I caught Michael staring at me with that goofy smile of his. 

"What?" I asked slightly annoyed. 

He smiled, "I just love you is all."

"Yeah, you love me and my gross face?"

He laughed. "Babe, I don't see the sores on your face, I just see you."

That was all it took. I didn't feel so bad anymore. 

When I was back home, I told my Aunty Lorna how great Michael has been through everything and how I didn't know what I'd do without him. She tapped her wedding band with her finger and said through a smile and misty eyes, "That's what this is all about. Through good and bad, sickness and health." 

Things have changed since I have been diagnosed with my skin disease. Michael and I can't wrestle and play with each other like we use to. We couldn't sleep in the same bed as each other. We haven't been able to cuddle. We haven't been able to hike or go biking around the city. Our tickling matches have been replaced with taping up my bandages. With all the 'can't's you would think that things would be hard on our relationship right now. Though it is the exact opposite. We laugh. We talk. We go on our little walks, even if it is not very far or  that we have to go really slow,  if anything walking slowly has allowed us to really appreciate the time we have together. We've developed new weekend traditions, like going out for breakfast on Sunday mornings, drinking coffee and eating pancakes making each other laugh. I know that I am blessed to have Michael as my husband, not only because of the amazing and wonderful person that he is, but because we are perfect for each other. 

 My body is slowly starting to get better, and I can see the light at the end of what seemed to be such a dark shadow. I know that I didn't do this alone, through all the stumbling and crying and frustration of being in the dark, Michael was right beside me, holding my hand and telling me that we were going to get through this. 

Yes, the love of your best friend is something special and different. It is a person that falls in love with the idea of you, was attracted to you by your attributes and gets to know you through your faults, and at the end of it all chooses to love you unconditionally. It is the person that sees you the way you will never be able to see yourself, beautiful and imperfect, and yet perfectly made just for them. 

"Never in front of you, or ever behind you. Always beside you."

"Look, in my opinion, the best thing you can do is find a person who loves you for exactly what you are. Good mood, bad mood, ugly, pretty, handsome, what have you, the right person is still going to think the sun shines out your ass. That's the kind of person that's worth sticking with." -JUNO