DH and I have a long history :)  It's fun to think back on it, even though I'm very long-winded w/ telling stories!

We met back in around 1999 or so at church.  He isn't from my area (a VERY small town), so of course I took notice of this new, HOT guy!  In my mind, he was PERFECT.  He seemed to be very godly, was very active in the church, laughed a lot, was so cute, and everyone loved him.  He was just someone that I admired and thought I had NO chance with at all.

Well, suddenly in the spring of 2000, his friend (also from church) is asking mom if she'd let me go out w/ him.  I was 17 and he was 25.  He ended up coming to the convenient store where I worked and asking me out.  I was astonished.  I had a rough life growing up and NO self-esteem at all.  I just KNEW that someone as awesome as him would NEVER really like me.  I thought there must be some huge mistake and that he was "just being nice" or something and couldn't really like me.  In short, I thought he was way too good for me.  So, I turned him down.  I found out later how incredibly shy he is and that he used to drive past that store trying to get up the nerve to come in there and ask me out in person. lol.

He called me once after that and I told him that my dad wasn't comfortable with me dating him b/c of our age difference.  So, that was that.  I ended up dating another guy, who I knew from school and who had been pursuing me, asking me out for over a year.  In my head, that was "safe" because this other guy wasn't better than me, and he clearly really did like me.  That was a DISASTER.  He turned out to be abusive and I was with him for 2 long years being a stupid, stupid girl! 

I *thought* that I loved him, until now when I know what love is.  In reality, he was so abusive and I already had such a low self-esteem that I was just incredibly emotionally dependent on him.  It was the hardest thing ever to get out of, but that's a whole other story!

Anyway, so I thought I was in love w/ this guy and at the time we were planning on getting married and everything.  But, the whole time, there was something inside me that wondered "what if" about Chad (dh).  Every time he pushed me for something I wasn't comfortable with or was mean to me I would catch myself wishing I had dated Chad, knowing that he never would have treated me that way and that he was/is truly a godly man.

Fast forward.  In the spring of 2002, I finally got out of the relationship w/ the other guy.  Chad and I started talking and kind of dating.  We were both SO shy and awkward and insecure that it was NOT a successful dating relationship.  We ended up breaking up after only like 3 months of half-hearted dating.  We got back together at the end of that year and the same thing happened.

I was heartbroken, because deep down, on a weird sort of level, I thought we were supposed to be together.  Finally we got back together at the end of 2003 and the rest is history.  We never were successful at dating b/c we were just so shy and insecure and awkward.  But, we each knew that we were committed to our faith and would be loving and committed toward each other, so we kind of took a leap of faith and got married in 2005 hoping that everything else would work itself out and it did.  We are madly in love with each other and have SO much fun with each other.  We have a wonderful marriage and it was all worth it :)

Sorry that was soooo long...