Love Your Life
Today, I celebrate a big milestone.
Two years of my getting free therapy from this blog.
I hope your bills aren’t in the mail.
In two years, so much has changed. When I first went through my breakup, I experienced a sadness more intense than I ever imagined possible. I sobbed, I mean really sobbed, for hours, days, weeks. To distract myself and get some emotions out, I started writing. Then I started dating – and writing about dating. Somewhere along the lines, I started healing. In the past two years, I have found so many good friends, heard so many inspiring stories, gotten so much great advice, and been touched by so many people, simply because of this blog. Even more than that, I have so much more joy in my life now.
The same week that I celebrate my two year anniversary of my blog, I learned that my ex fiancé is now officially married. At first, it hurt. I could feel a few hot tears well up in my eyes. Then I went to dinner and movies with my friends, and tried not to focus on it. By bedtime, I was joking about it. And now I mostly feel nothing about it. It’s a little weird. Must be what progress feels like.
With my sister’s baby quickly approaching, I’ve been thinking a lot about the life I want to give my children and the future I want to have. I look back at my relationship with my ex fiancé and I’m astounded. I know so much more of what I want out of life and love now. Looking back, I realize I was ignoring things that should have been non-negotiables. My ex fiancé and I had different views on so many things, including some topics that were very important to me. Now I ask myself, how did I almost marry someone who doesn’t share my core values? Why was I OK with raising children with a man who wanted to teach our children morals that I fundamentally disagreed with?
It’s funny how these things become so clear once it’s over.
Another moment when I realize I love my life: Coming home to my favorite flowers that Chef bought me. This is my favorite stage of the peony, just before it opens up completely.
Do you ever have moments of suddenly loving your life? I get so caught up in work, and the task list of the millions of things that I have to do, that sometimes I feel like I’m just going through the motions. Then, there are these little moments. Time stops and I suddenly realize: I love my life. I am so lucky. All that petty BS that was bothering me disappears, at least for a moment. Chef and I hug after an incredibly fun white water rafting trip. I see my sister try on a polka dot maternity dress (there is nothing like a pregnant woman in polka dots!). Something really good happens at work. I turn on the TV right as my favorite Friends episode starts. I finally buy that bow necklace I’ve wanted for years. I laugh really hard with my friends. I watch my nephews go tubing for the first time. I walk around my newly cleaned apartment. My mom hugs me and tells me she’s proud of me.
I have over-agonized about so many issues on this blog in the last two years, but I somehow neglected to mention something:
I really love my life.
I don’t know if I would have said that two years ago.
Thanks so much for a great two years.
Now it’s your turn to share: Tell me a moment you suddenly realized you loved your life.
Will you commit to try to appreciate these moments more often?
Copyright 2012. Simply Solo blog by Catherine Gryp. All Rights Reserved.
Simply Solo: Single girl starting over - follow the journey 
Goof girl 🙂
Wow that was Freudian lmao – good girl… Good with a D 😀
Peonies are one of my favorites, too. And I was just thinking about them this morning as I walked my dogs through my neighborhood on (probably) one of the last crisp mornings of spring when I realized that I, too, love my life. It usually hits me during the rare times when I stop thinking about everything I’ve done, didn’t do, and still have to do — and just enjoy being.
“Must be what progress feels like.”… Yes, ma’am. That is a boat load of progress 🙂
That was a great post, Catherine! Thank you very much for sharing it with with us, I found it so much inspiring. I have a delight moment of enjoying my own life sometimes too, when I take a car ride with my mom (she loves to drive), laughing out loud with my female colleagues after job and when I listen my little kitty purr over my lap.
My ex boyfriend (who never became a fiancé) is also getting married at June 30th with quite a nice and pretty girl he met almost at the same time he knew me, and when I first read about it on his FB page I confess I dropped a few tears (and swallowed a few Bacardis too). Now I don´t feel upset either, but I don´t know how I´m supposed to feel when the day comes. Unlike you, I don´t think feeling almost nothing is a progress – but I think not feeling ill or envious is really something!
God bless you and everything you do.
I’m so happy for you that you’ve found peace and joy again. Yes, hindsight is 20/20. You know the hug from you mom with the “proud of you” comment is huge. I would love to hear that from my mom. She’s never said that to me. I’m sure she has felt it but never said it. I could have used that after my divorce but I didn’t get it from either of my parents. But I’m supposed to be focusing on the positive now as per your request 🙂 The moment I wake up in the morning and see my love’s face, I love my life. I enjoy your blog thanks for sharing!
I think this is one of my favorite post ever my dear Catherine. What an evolution and journey these past two years have been. I feel so blessed to have been on this crazy ride with you! I have been and will continue to be here if you need me, for anything, especially to point out the “I am a f-ing itch” phrase that was mysteriously seen in the back of a photo :). I love you girlie!
Amazing post! I love my life too. It was a hard road to get to after a breakup, but I found a way like you- writing!
Catherine….congratulations on two years of free therapy!! And for sharing your wisdom, advice, insight and humor with the rest of us.
I am so proud of all you have accomplished (you keep hope alive for me) and so happy for all you have gained and found (referring to Chef mainly…the rest is just icing on the cake!).
Your ex….he is a part of the past that helped you shape this bright, shiny future and has helped you realize what you REALLY want in a potential life partner so I am going to say you felt the sting of old dreams giving way to new dreams.
And I too am loving my life…actually I have been loving life since my ex long before I knew I did, but I am just now realizing that waking up with no stress or worry over insecure supervisors or inadequate men is normal, that receiving acknowledgements for my kindnesses and compliments on good grooming efforts and dating etiquette is the norm and that I am doing the right thing even if no one else is….that is the way life is supposed to be, and I LOVE it. I realize it more often once I shut up the committee in my head (they are SO against any sort of change).
Wishing you even more success, great travels and celebrity elbow rubbing in the future!
Well, I’ve had several of these moments overthe years — but far more recently.
As you may (or may not) recall, I recently abandoned my job at the local newspaper to start my own business and work part time as a waitress. Honestly, I’m mostly working as a waitress. And, I kind of love it.
Not the work necessarily. Although it is far better than what I was doing at the Journal before I left.
Twice last week while at the restaurant — once while I was rolling silverware and listening to the line cooks tease the AC, and once while I was playing a little tag with a cute host — I was laughing out loud and just thought, “I’m so happy.”
But not just, I’m happy with this moment.” Although I was. It was also, “I’m happy with my life.”
Sure, I have things I want to accomplish and I’m working toward them a little bit at a time. But I am also really enjoying this. Spending time being “just” a waitress. (And a damned good one BTW.)
I’ve been reading a book a week, crochetting baby blankets for the local womens’ shelter, singing in church at least once a month and I’m slowly working my way further out of debt — like $50 bucks a weeks slowly.
I’m even writing from time to time (although not on my blog — bad, Crystal!). And I love the lack of responsibility of a waitress’s life along with the fact that I only have to work four days a week most weeks. (And I still have health insurance.)
Like I implied, it isn’t perfect and I’m always striving toward some thing different, something new, maybe you could even say something better. But right now, I love my life. And I love myself.
I’m glad you do too, Cath!
Hi Catherine,
This is my first comment on your blog. My ex and I broke up 3 months ago after 2 years of being together. I discovered your blog soon after and have read through your archives and followed you ever since! Congratulations on reaching 2 years and realizing that you love your life! I am also especially interested in your blog because you met your ex-fiancé when you were 18 and stayed with him for 7 years – I am 20 and also met my ex at 18 which makes me think I could be lucky to have gotten out of the relationship before it reached your level of seriousness and we were canceling our wedding!
Although it has been 3 months since my break-up, I’m still processing everything and am not completely over it. Some say i should have moved on already but it really is not that easy, and I have come to realize that people say this because my sadness makes THEM feel uncomfortable. I also believe it is much more healthy to process all your feelings and not try ‘bandaid’ solutions such as sleeping around, taking drugs, even dating too early or going on long holidays to avoid your emotions.
So I am instead seeing a counsellor, living my life normally not making any drastic changes and really working through my thoughts and emotions. Because above all, I owe it to myself to not take baggage into my next relationship, unlike my ex who brought a large amount into ours.
Reading your blog shows me progress happens, and time really does heal all wounds 🙂 you’re truly inspiring and I hope you remember that even after 2 years you’re still touching other peoples lives everyday 🙂 You’re also giving free therapy to us!
I also forgot to mention that I havent had any ‘loving life’ moments recently but I have before (both with & without my ex). So I know that a time will come soon and I will experience these moments again 🙂
Congratulations on creating this blog and turning it into what it is; a healing place not only for yourself but for others. I don’t know exactly how we crossed blog paths, but I am so glad we did. Your blog is a source of great inspiration and you have done a great thing here in tracking your journey of recovery and triumph.
Congratulations on surviving, and on re-claiming your life. You deserve nothing less than to live a life you love tremendously.
Great post, Catherine! I’m really happy for you and how far you’ve come in the past 2 years. It really makes you think – everything does happen the way it’s supposed to. I can’t wait to see the great things ahead for you – whether you decide they will include Chef or not, I know you’ll find happiness!
Congratulations Catherine! That’s huge change in just a couple of years and its amazing the way these things sometimes work out. As you say at the time you were about to marry someone with different core values so who knows what might have happened in the long run. Whilst it hurt like hell at the time hopefully the decision made was fundamentally the right one!
You are a star and I can’t wait to read more on your road to good times!
Congratulations!!! Keep it up!!!! 😀
I really like this post, because you’ve made me think of a moment in which I realized I love my life.
There was a day last summer, during my solo road trip across the country, that I was driving through Montana. I crested a hill and spread out before me, for hundreds of miles in every direction, was nothing but a vast, empty expanse of prairie. I got goosebumps and thought about how cool it was that I was having this adventure, experiencing America in a way I had only dreamed possible. Nothing and nobody was holding me back, and I loved it. A little while later I pulled off a deserted side road and walked through a field dotted with wildflowers. The sun was beating down upon my skin, the cicadas were singing, and I was otherwise utterly and completely alone. I felt, in that moment, a kinship with the earth and the sky that must have been similar to what Native Americans sometimes experience. And in that moment, I thought to myself, I love my life.
What’s incredible is, in the year since, things have only gotten better.
Enjoy this journey, Catherine. Here’s to many more happy discoveries.
Congratulations on two years! Wow, time really flies! I’ve really enjoyed reading your blog through that time, so I’m glad it’s been good for you too. I don’t come to the blog world so often now but it was very helpful for me for a while too and I’m still glad it’s out there.
This is the first post I’ve read, and I really liked it. I think in our day-to-day living we hear so much about the pain we go through in a breakup, but we heal quietly. I’m excited to see this is what being healed looks like. Good for you.
I haven’t been on here in a while cause I too have been enjoying my life and I know for certain I wouldn’t have said that 2 years ago as my marriage was ending. It has been a long 2 years for me as well, as I am sure for a lot of your readers. But, I am so happy now, not just because I am in a healthy and loving relationship and I have beautiful children, but now I am choosing myself and focusing on going after what I need to be a good healthy person…physically, mentally, spiritually…etc instead of worrying what others think and being miserable trying to fool myself and everyone that I am happy. I am not taking anything for granted. Life is precious and I am so thankful to have a 2nd chance. Also, side note….I noticed you do not write that much anymore…just your simply solo Tuesday spotlights…..hope that is only temporary…..enjoy YOUR writing too.
2newbeginnings,
Thank you so much for sharing an update on your life. It sounds like you are doing really well. A lot of the things you said about your life is how I feel too. I’m just focusing on myself and doing what makes me happy. Who knew it could be so simple. And as far as not writing, I miss writing but I’ve also been really busy lately (it’s explained in my post from today). I hope to get back into it soon, but I also want to enjoy the summer and not put too much pressure on myself. Sometimes I felt like I was too busy writing about my life, analyzing my life, or thinking of things I should be doing to write about… that I wasn’t actually LIVING my life. Working on the balance. 🙂 I miss chatting with you though!