The Unlucky Rabbit

At the end of the month, I'm visiting my gynecologist... And I'm having her remove my IUD. We're going to start trying for a baby after the 5k in October. 🥹 I'm so nervous and excited... I can't believe I'm going to be pregnant by the end of the year. I'm going to be a Mom! We're going to start a family! I still can't believe it...

I never knew love like this existed. Truly. I thought I was in love before, but I was wrong. I was so wrong. This is love. This is what love is. He is my other half. We make each other better.

I wrote him another love letter tonight. He's quietly sleeping next to me, but I still can't stop thinking about him. ❤️

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"My dearest love,

I have a strange but heartfelt question for you: Have you ever been unhappy to receive a piece of cake?

On our birthdays, it arrives glowing with candles — the only lights in a darkened room. We close our eyes, make a wish, and blow out the flames, surrendering to the soft darkness where hope quietly lingers. Then we cut into that heavenly wish and share it piece by piece. We savor every bite, washing it down with cold milk, licking the last traces from our fingertips… Often forgetting the wish itself, because it has not yet come true.

Yet cake is also the quiet witness to love. A bride and groom clasp hands as they cut into it together, offering its sweetness to those who celebrate their joy. Perhaps that is why cake feels somewhat romantic to me.

We do not dream upon flour, eggs, sugar, and vanilla alone. We blend them tenderly, bake them with care, and adorn them with beauty. Only then do they become something worthy of a wish — something that lets us believe, if only for a moment.

And so it is with love.

Intelligence, humor, kindness, passion, and beauty… These things, when tasted alone, may delight but never truly satisfy. It is only when they are lovingly combined — when God blends them in one extraordinary person — that someone magical is born.

Now, every wish I make, I shall make upon you. I shall close my eyes, and in that same sweet darkness, you will stand before me — wonderful, kind, brilliant, handsome, hilarious, romantic, passionate, loyal, and irresistible. And every time I wish, you are there, like a candle cutting through the dark, keeping the light of my dreams alive.

With you, I remain a bright-eyed child at heart —carefree, hopeful, and endlessly in love.

I have never been in love like this before, where a man has made me adore the sound of my own name.

His little rabbit. His angel. His babygirl. His princess. His love. His future wife.

His. I am his, and that's my favorite title of all.

And as we lay there 30 minutes later, a tangle of sweat-sheened limbs, my mind slipped back to Earth.

"What time is it?? When do you have to leave??" I asked, realization and panic in my voice.

He chuckled. "I should have left 20 minutes ago."

"BABY!!"

"What?" He asked, planting a kiss to my neck. "You think I would miss this?" His fingertips played down my spine before settling in the dip of my lower back, squeezing me tight to him.

The way I *SQUEALED* and kicked my feet...

I love us. I love the romantic things he sends me, I love laughing with him, I love that he always calls me beautiful in every picture I send him.

Picture from before our date Saturday night. It was so incredibly hard to take this, let alone keep it, let alone post it here... But I'm trying. Therapy has been helpful, but honestly... Joel has been everything. He's been so understanding, so loving, so supportive. I feel seen and heard (that song he played for me a few weeks back was the most incredible gesture I've ever experienced), and I know he loves ME, not my body.

It's been three years. Every time I see a monarch butterfly or a koi fish, I think of you. I miss you every day.

You would be so proud of me. I can picture your smile and the way it would feel when you pulled me into a hug and kissed me on the head. Things have been so different without you.

I miss the way you'd rock out to great music. I miss camping trips. I miss your projects. I miss going for rides in the truck with you. Hell, I even miss the cigarette smoke, sometimes.

I got it. 🥰 Mythic Dimensius is down!

X-pac in two days!

Gym has been going well. Joel and Mike have been helping me get back on track. Protein shakes and creatine help a *lot.*

This is word for word perfection. Artreyu never understood.

He knows I've been struggling more with my body dysmorphia because I haven't been able to go to the gym. Last night, he went into my closet, picked out his favorite of my dresses, and asked me to wear it. I was confused and asked him why, but he just insisted. While I changed, he pulled up a song.

He started to talk. He told me he understands my struggles with my self image. He told me he knows how I see myself. He told me that he hears me, he understands, and that I am "the most beautiful woman in the world." He pressed play, and took me into his arms.

The song was about body dysmorphia. How you never like what you see. How you don't see what others see, what is really there. I've struggled with this for decades. I was always made fun of. I developed an eating disorder. I struggled to see myself as pretty. I genuinely saw/see myself as a disgusting creature, unlovable, and ugly.

Therapy has helped. The gym, admittedly, helps more. I don't see what other people see. But in the gym, the numbers don't lie. My body IS fit. It IS strong. It IS working. I'm pushing it, and the numbers cannot lie to me the way my head does.

I think back to Artreyu at times and how he didn't understand. Accused me of catfishing him. He saw me. I wrote his name on my body. But because I wasn't yet capable of giving him what he wanted, he threw me out. If I had gotten in front of him, he would have seen I was real, and it would have put my insecurities to rest when he didn't run away like my brain told me he would. But he didn't. He threw me out, accused me of lying.

I cried the entire time we danced. I just cried, head to his chest, and listened to the lyrics. They PERFECTLY embody what is in my head, and to have HIM show me a song I'd never heard that exactly mirrored my biggest struggle...

God gave him to me. God gave him to me.