i'm unsure how to put the words down that i want to in this post, so please, bear with me.
i've known of tony for almost 12 years. i've known him personally for almost 8. (almost 2 weeks to the day until that first conversation that started it all.) i've loved practically every moment. seriously. well...except maybe the 6 hours in labour...but even then, tony has memories from that experience that still have me laughing. tony has an amazing gift in finding the humor in pretty much every situation. he has incredible wit and the ability to make me believe anything.
i love that there is laughter in our house. i love that he loves me enough to try practically anything just to see a smile cross my face.
you see, for 2 1/2 of the past 8 years, it took a lot to make me laugh. not because i was keeping a straight face to see how much crazier my husband could get, but because i had sunk into a place that was so low, i just couldn't.
while i was pregnant with olivia i walked for three miles a day as long as i could to help manage my sadness. i remember feeling glimmers of true, knock your socks off, joy, but it was fleeting. before i knew it, i had sunk back down into a darkness so intense that i thought i was going to suffocate.
major life changes don't help i've heard...and lived. 2 babies in less then 2 years, 2 major moves in less time then it took for us to make said babies, re-adjusting to life in small, small town alberta, leaving dear friends behind and having to start over again and make new ones.
and tony held us all together as i was crumbling apart.
and he encouraged me as i made the phone call for help.
and he supported me when i was given the diagnosis of postpartum depression.
2 1/2 years. as i'm coming out from this side of it all, i'm amazed at tony's determination to find joy despite the heavy haze that was hanging over our family. while i was desparately trying and failing miserably to hold it all together, he became stronger. not just because he had too, but because he loved me.
i still have my days, my moments where i feel myself sinking, and i can see a look in his eyes of concern because it mirrors the worry in my own. but we are getting there, even if we take a couple steps back sometimes, we really are getting there. and not only are we taking these steps together, we're taking them with the One who designed us for each other long before we ever knew. i'm so thankful. so thankful, Jesus, that You choose me for tony.
and i'm thankful to you tony, for loving me the way you have, for truly living out *for better or for worse, in sickness and in health*. you are my greatest treasure.
i love you.
