I'm All About This Married Life

Sometimes the fact that I'm married and running my own home still seems very surreal to me. And honestly, I think that is one of the most beautiful things about it.

I was always someone that had plans for everything in life and trust me, there was no steering away from said plans. (I'm a very stubborn person.) But getting married at 20 and living the army life certainly wasn't part of the plan. I always thought marriage was something that I'd do closer to my 30's. But you know what? I don't regret my decision at all, never have and never will. Not even for a second.

Lately I've found myself constantly in awe with the concept of marriage and just how wonderful it is. We wake up to and go to sleep with the same wonderful person every night. We have someone to take care of us when we're sick. We both have a confidante and can always share our deepest fears or concerns with no fear of judgement. Our best friend is literally with us every night, laughing with us, supporting us and learning more about us every day. And at the end of the day, we both have someone that is going through the exact same situations in life as we are and that person understands us on a level that we never could've imagined. The experience is unparalleled, to be going through one of life's toughest yet most amazing journeys with a person that you love and pledged to spend your life with.

Marriage to Kris hasn't been what I thought it was going to be like; it's even better.

-Chelsea

No More Pity Parties

I'm always preaching about living a positive lifestyle but I'm going to be honest, sometimes it's easier said than done. I really do try my best every day to see the silver lining in every situation but unfortunately, sometimes I find myself a guest at my own pity party.

But yesterday as I was sending a goodnight text to my husband, he sent me the most beautiful, romantic message that just absolutely made my heart soar. It really snapped me back to reality. The pity party was officially over.

No matter what life throws at me, I will always have my wonderful, loving husband that completes me. He can make me smile no matter what and make me feel like I'm the luckiest girl in the world; and having him reminds me that I am.

I love you, Kristopher. Thank you for choosing me. I'm forever grateful to have you in my life. Thank you for making me smile when I needed it most; you've always been good at that. I can't wait until you come home from the army and we can spend the rest of our lives making each other happy, face-to-face.

Blog Challenge, Day 1: My Life

While I was surfing through the internet tonight, I came across a page which presented a blog challenge. Instantly, I became very intrigued and looked into it. Being fairly new to blogs, I still have a lot to talk about before I run out of ideas. Nonetheless, I figured, why not? I'm always up for a challenge. I'll just see if I can do it and keep up with it. So, here at SoundsLikeChelseasLife, we're going to, well... learn about Chelsea's life. :)

So the challenge for the first day is to write your life's story in less than 250 words. I ramble a lot, so this should be quite difficult for me. Well, here goes nothing!

I was born in April in a very small town in the middle of nowhere and for most of my life, I loved living in a smaller community. I felt safe. I had very loving parents and they wanted more kids. Along came my wonderful little sister, Kelly, whom I wanted to mother, even though I was only four years old. I was very shy growing up and I became attached to my best friend. We were inseparable and his family became my second family. I always knew that I was different from everyone else and I struggled with that, especially when I was bullied throughout school. I turned to writing when I felt alone and fell in love with books at a very young age. I was especially into the Harry Potter books. I was also heavily involved in flag football at my local park, after being involved in a lot of other sports that I didn't enjoy as much. I ended up dating my best friend in an on-and-off relationship for a while. Eventually we grew apart, especially during our high school years because I went off to a magnet school. I eventually got a job at my local grocery store and met my husband. We broke up, got back together and 2 and a half years later, I'm an army wife. I love my job at one of the local restaurants and I run 2 blogs. Minus some details, that's basically my life in a nutshell.

249 words! I counted! Haha. I hope to one day disclose some more information to you all without getting too personal. I hope that you guys had fun learning a little bit more about me. I did enjoy this and I hope that the rest of the challenge proves to be fun as well. If you have not read my second blog, it is really new and I hope that it gets as much love and recognition from everyone as this one does, once it starts getting some momentum and more posts. It is called: youresuretodoimpossiblethings.blogspot.com. Check it out! I'd really appreciate it! Check out my new blog posts as I continue in this challenge! I hope that you all will check out day 2!

Sounds Like Life To Me

Tonight I Wanna Cry

Lately, I've been going through a lot of changes, which in turn, cause a lot of emotional distress. I've been feeling like even though I've already got a lot on my plate, things keep piling up and they just aren't stopping. I feel suffocated, as if there was this intense pressure on my chest which won't let me breathe. It's all extremely overwhelming and it's a lot to take on at such a young age. It's enough to make someone break. In fact, I did.

This whole separation and process of my husband going through boot camp has taken a heck of a toll on my emotions. I'm sure that it's taken even more of a toll on my husband; I can only imagine. But this entire time, I've been trying to be strong, not only for myself but for him, my family, his family, etc. It's a lot of pressure to remain composed when on the inside, I truly am going insane. There's all of this craziness going on inside of me and there is nowhere for it to escape; essentially, it's trapped.

Now, you may be thinking that I could just talk to a friend about this. I wish that were true. By nature, I'm very introverted and shy, so I have trouble keeping strong connections with my friends. I tend to latch onto one friend at a time, until that friend either decides to leave or we drift apart. I'm very loyal, so I tend to stay with one friend as long as possible; I never leave if it's avoidable.

This way of life has worked for me up until now. The problem is, now that I've latched onto Kris as my one friend and he's gone, I have no one else to go to. Nobody makes me calm down like he does, nobody understands me like he does and nobody listens to me like he does. I could dump all of my feelings on my family (and I did today) but it isn't fair to them. They've got their own lives and their own problems. They need me to be strong. (I'm sure that it helps with their sanity as well.)

So today, I broke. My emotions just took over and I lost every ounce of control that I had left. I cried and cried and cried. I haven't received any letters from Kris yet and it's been a month, the hardest month of my life. I also can't remember the last time that I talked to him on the phone. He was my person; he still is.

I felt so guilty for crying because he is sacrificing a lot more than me. Strangely enough, that doesn't make me feel much better because this is a selfish time in my life. I want him home. I want him here with me. The problem is, I know that's impossible and I know that this has been his dream since before I met him. I knew this was coming, it was just a matter of time. I just completely underestimated how hard this was going to be. Don't get me wrong, I knew it was going to be hard. I just didn't understand how hard.

So after I got my cry out of my system, I booked my flight and my hotel reservation for his graduation ceremony this August. I'm counting down the days and it makes it seem much more attainable now. I have something to look forward to and I feel better after letting out all of that pent-up emotion. Sometimes, a cry is what you really need because you are no longer holding onto that negative energy or the stress. You just have to let it out sometimes. There's absolutely nothing wrong with it. Emotions remind us that we're human and they keep us connected to the world.

Life gets hard sometimes and we are sometimes dealt things that we think that we can't handle but we can overcome anything that we are willing to try. We just have to dig deep. It just takes some heart, some effort and some strength. I know that I will get through this because of those things and so will he. It's okay to cry and I have to remember that. I'm sure that I'll be doing a lot more crying through this journey and that it will be full of many adventures and ups and downs but hey... it sounds like life to me.

Yearning

                                                            After our first kiss. :)

Today while I was at work, a whole bunch of people from the navy came in to eat. It's a special that the restaurant does once a month for them, so they all come in at once. There must have been at least 50 of them. I'm still new at work, so the sight was something very odd for me. Everyone else was so used to it that it didn't phase them. It didn't bother me though; it just made me sad.

Of course, everyone was in full uniform. Now, my husband isn't in the Navy but it made me think of him even more. I think about him all the time but it's so hard to be strong. It's hard not to break down and cry every second of every day. But I've never seen my husband in uniform because he went to boot camp after we got married and we've been separated ever since.

The thought of seeing my husband dressed like that one day is what got to me and made me tear up. The next time that I see him, he will be in full army uniform. I am so incredibly proud of him and who is he becoming while he is away. That's what has been able to get me through this.

Not gonna lie, even though I know that my husband isn't in the navy, a small part of me was hoping that he would walk through that door and surprise me. Hey, a girl can dream. Even though I know that's impossible, it's hard to think with your head and not your heart sometimes, especially with something as emotionally trying as this.

So I know that it's not smart to drive yourself nuts over something that you can't have but I couldn't help it. I kept yearning for him to come and see me and I yearn for him to be with me every night. Today makes it three weeks exactly that he's been away. So that means only seven more weeks until graduation. I wish that I could say that everything has been getting better with time but I'd be lying. If he was only staying away for those 10 weeks, then it would be a lot easier; but because he is leaving for another 9 months after that, it doesn't help much.

But every time someone asks me about him or what he is doing, they all think that it's so cool and that he is so lucky to have the job that he has. So it makes me forget, for a brief second, about the sadness and it turns back into pride. This has been the toughest thing that I've had to do and everything I see or do reminds me of him. But I have to get through it. I have to. There is no other choice.

If he is going through all of this, the least that I can do is be strong for him. It just hurt so badly today to see a sea of military uniforms and know that my husband being there wasn't an option, or even a possibility. I just wish that I could stop yearning for the impossible and be as strong as I want to be for the both of us. It's easier said than done but the same goes for a lot of other things and hey... it sounds like life to me.

Memorial Day!

I´m sure that if you looked at your calendar today, you have probably noticed that today is Memorial Day! Today is a day that we set aside on our calendar to honor, respect and think about the people that have sacrificed so much or even their lives for their service to their country.

I have quite a few people in my family that have served in the military, so this holiday and ones like it, such as Veteran´s Day, have always warranted a lot of much-deserved respect from me and my other family members. This year, however, that respect is getting magnified. Off the top of my head, I can think of 5 people in my family that have served in the military. I´m sure that there are tons of others that I don´t even know about or remember. It´s always something that I´ve been very proud to say about my family, that I have military lineage. What more noble profession is there than to serve your country?

This year though, the tables have turned. Three of those 5 people that I mentioned earlier, I never even met. They were my great-uncles Don and Ron and my Grandpa Jack. They all passed away years before I was born. Still, I was proud to be a part of their lineage. The other people live very far away and I don´t see or hear from them very often. So, even though the respect and admiration has always been there for them, it´s been less personal because I never got to see their sacrifices first-hand.

If you have read any of my previous blog posts, you know that my husband is currently away at boot camp and will be gone for about another 10 weeks. For me, I still don´t think that the concept of him being in the military has completely sunk in yet. But with all of the love that has been given for the military on things like Facebook or on television commercials, it really started to sink into my brain. Although my husband being in the U.S. Army still is a foreign concept, I feel so much pride when I tell people about his sacrifices and what he is being put through.

Now, I am not only witnessing the sacrifices that someone in the armed forces has to go through and deal with, I am a part of them. I´m a small part but a part nonetheless. It really puts things into perspective. Anyone can say that joining the navy, the marines, the army or any military branch is hard and worth respecting; it´s another thing to see those sacrifices first-hand and deal with the heartache of waiting for your soldier to come home safely. Then and only then can you really understand.

So now I think about a day like this, Memorial Day, and realize that after he graduates and he really starts his army career, this holiday will be for people like him and his friends. I am not a religious woman but I am praying to the universe that no matter what he will be safe and not have to ever go into any sort of a war situation. That is the only thing that I can think of that I truly wouldn´t be able to handle.

But even though he hasn´t been through any sort of war situation yet, he still deserves all of the respect and support in the world for himself and for everyone else with him at boot camp right now. So despite what a lot of people think, it is not National Barbecue Day. I know that I feel as if I´m going through my own personal hell right now, so I can only imagine what every other military family whose sons, daughters, fathers, mothers, etc, must be feeling, knowing that their loved-ones are in places like Iraq and that they aren´t safe like my husband is.

I heard a saying earlier today that really spoke to me, ¨We are the home of the free because of the brave.¨ Remember the brave men and women who gave up their families, their home, their safety, their comfort and in so many cases, their lives, so that you could wake up every morning and go to work, the beach or Disneyland. It doesn´t matter how you choose to spend your time. Just know that a lot people sacrificed a lot so that you could enjoy each and every day of your life to the fullest potential. Remember that, because everyday life isn´t perfect but you are free because of the military´s sacrifices and they never asked for anything in return.

There is nothing that I want more right now than to have my husband home but he needs to do this and we will both have to sacrifice some more time apart so that he can serve his country. It still continues to be hard but hey... sounds like life to me.

Bittersweet

                             This picture completely captures our personalities. :)

As I have mentioned in my previous posts, May 12th was my wedding day! Kris and I got married at 5:30 p.m. and it felt like the day was going by extremely slow! I was just so excited to get the party started that it literally felt like the longest day of my life. I was going crazy for most of the day because of my excitement but my family had to constantly remind me to wind down so I wouldn´t lose all of my energy for the reception.

However, as my excitement was very prominent throughout the day, so was my sadness. The realization that my baby would be leaving me 8 days later really hit me. The entire process had been bittersweet to say the least. The closer the wedding got, the closer it was for his time to leave. It made me feel bad for wishing that the day would take longer to get here but I just wanted him with me.

The day was as amazing as it could have been. We had paid for an outdoor ceremony at this gorgeous venue but it did not work out because there was a thunderstorm. However, there was a covered area at the other end of the venue and we ended up using that instead. It ended up working really well because instead of doing what most people do, which is walking only towards the officiant and their fiance, I walked to all of my guests as well.

The ceremony was held on an elevated stage and our entire families were circled around us, listening intently to our vows and crying. The fact that they were all so touched made me feel really special and loved. I also loved that while I was walking toward everyone, I could see all of their tears. I had already felt so unbelievably beautiful in my dress but seeing our families drop their jaws when they saw me was the icing on the cake.

I had to try so hard not to cry during the ceremony and it all went by very quickly. People had been telling me for weeks how nervous I was going to be that day and to be honest, I didn´t feel that. I loved Kris and I knew that I wanted to be with him forever. I said yes to his proposal and I´d been planning this wedding for months. I knew that this day was coming, so why would I be nervous? Honestly, I was more nervous about our first dance.

Kris and I are not dancers at all and we had secretly choreographed part of our dance. Our first dance as husband and wife was ¨So Close" by Jon McLoughlin. The song starts out slow, gets fast and then goes back to slow. So Kris and I thought that it would be fun to choreograph the fast part of the dance. During our photo-shoot, it was hard to lift my dress off of the ground, so I became extremely anxious when it was time for our dance because there was a lift involved.

 However, the dance went off smoothly and perfectly and everyone let out a surprised expression as Kris and I sashayed across the dance floor and I was hoisted into the air. It was one of the most amazing moments of our wedding because we felt so accomplished and proud of ourselves for all of that hard work, which proved to be quite a big success.

Kris and I both don´t like to party and are not used to being the center of attention. So when the wedding was happening, it was the most foreign thing in the world to us when everyone´s eyes were glued to us. But we embraced it and we danced and partied more than we ever had. We let loose and we didn´t care about anything except having a good time and being together.

I had spent months planning this wedding and was stressing out the smallest details for a long time because so many people were shoving their opinions in my face. People were telling me what I was doing wrong and how I was ¨supposed to¨ do things. It was like they thought that there was some rule book for how every single wedding should be planned. This annoyed me to no end because I had never wanted a big wedding. I was not the 6-year-old little girl that loved playing dress up with her mommy´s veil and envisioned getting married with 10 bridesmaids and a chocolate fountain. I wanted to elope. So this whole process was bittersweet because when I started this planning event, I couldn´t even enjoy it.

The thing is, I wanted advice and I needed help. But the people that I didn´t want advice from, ended up being the only ones that wanted to give it. Everyone that was telling me what to do or giving me ¨advice¨ fell into one of two categories: 1. Old School/Traditional or 2. Control Freak. People were trying to tell me how to decorate, where to put my cake, what songs I should dance to, where I should have the wedding, blah blah blah...

When I didn´t take their opinions, everyone got angry. But the thing is, I didn´t have to listen to them and they struggled with that concept. They chose to give me their opinions and I chose not to use them. It was as simple as that and I didn´t need a guilt trip because MY wedding wasn´t ¨their way.¨ I had enough stress as it was.

The thing that people didn´t understand was that most of their ¨advice¨ was unsolicited and therefore, unwanted. I didn´t want a hall. I didn´t want 10 bridesmaids. I didn´t want fancy invitations. People were even trying to tell me when I should have kids and how many I should have, which is definitely a conversation that is between my husband and I. Most of these people didn´t understand that they were not even originally invited because we were going to elope! Yet they felt that their opinions needed to be heard. This is where it got tricky.

I am, by nature, a people-pleaser. I want to do whatever it takes to make other people happy, even if it is at the expense of my own happiness. So that made it extremely difficult to plan a wedding because I was worried if people would like the food, if they would like the music, if they would like the cake and the list went on and on and on.... Very quickly, this wedding became something that was not fun to plan anymore and it felt like a chore. I am not a traditional bride by any means. (Kris and I wore Disney Mickey Mouse ears to our reception for crying out loud.) Therefore, I wasn´t happy when people were trying to force me to use their traditional ideas. But as soon as I realized that this day was mine and Kris´ and I stopped caring about pleasing anyone but us, it became fun again and I gained that sassy ¨I don´t care what you want¨ attitude.

What people need to realize is that I don´t care if you didn´t like my dress. You are not going to be the one that has to look at it in a wedding album 20 years from now and be proud of it. I don´t care if you didn´t like the cake. If you don´t like it, don´t eat it. You get the point. But May 12th is my day to look back on when I´m older and say, ¨That was the best day of my life." And it was.

But now is the hard part. At 11 a.m. on Monday morning, my baby goes down to the hotel where he will be staying at and gets the last-minute details worked out and on Tuesday, he leaves for Oklahoma. It will definitely be the hardest 2 months of my life. After that, he goes away for 9 months of training and I still can´t go with him.

To top it all off, I was sick for 80 percent of our honeymoon. I´ve been spending all of this time and energy trying to give him the most amazing last few weeks and I have not been able to give him everything that I think that he deserves. And now he´s leaving. My other half, my best friend, my husband. He is my rock, my strength and the one that I´m meant to spend my life making him smile. This time without him is going to be difficult but it´s his dream. I wouldn´t be a good wife if I didn´t let him chase his dreams and follow him. I support him, I love him and I want him to be the best Kris that he can be.

It´s just hard to imagine my mornings without hearing, ¨Good morning beautiful." We have only been married for a few days and I am not even used to being called his wife yet. But the time will be over before I know it and we can start our new life together with security and protection for us and our future kids. All of this craziness is about to start all over again, only just after we got a short break (our honeymoon) but it´s all an unpredictable journey and it´s bittersweet. But hey.... sounds like life to me.