We’ve grown up together and as you all know growing up is never easy. J and I originally became engaged in the summer of 2007. I was fresh out of college and 6 months into my first “real” job, after 7 years of dating getting engaged seemed like the logical next step. The wedding date was set for April of 2009 wedding planning was in full swing and life was good. Fast forward to the summer of 2008 and everything we had built as a couple began to crumble.
J and I were living together in his tiny 1 bedroom apartment and I was working a thank less job for little pay with a 2 hour plus commute both ways. Things became tense in our little world and I became resentful of the ties that I felt our relationship had on me. Slowly the person and the relationship I had turned to for comfort and support was begging to feel stifling and oppressive. I began to dread the future I saw ahead of us, I felt like I was losing control of my life and my future and everything inside of me screamed to get out.
Things finally came to a head for us one evening in October. I arrived home late after working overtime at my job to find J sitting alone in the dark he said we need to talk, he knew I had been unhappy for some time in our relationship and that it might be best if we called the wedding off and went our separate way. I will forever be grateful to J for having the courage to end our relationship at a time when I didn’t. I shudder to think of what our lives would be like now if we went through with the wedding and never addressed the issues that were crippling our relationship at the time.
In the weeks that followed our break up I moved out of J apartment and into my own place, gave notice at my job and although my heart was heavy I felt a great sense of freedom and relief. J and I maintained a strong friendship during our time apart as a couple. I had always believed that our friendship was the strongest part of our relationship while we were together and I was proven right during our many months apart.
Much to the confusion of our friends and family we continued to spend weekend together as friends enjoying all the things we once did before our relationship hit hard times. Without the pressures of our relationship and the impending wedding J and I were able to begin rebuilding the friendship that had always been at the core of our relationship and over time we began to address a lot of the unspoken issues that eventually lead to our breakup. With the distance that our break up created we were able to take freely about our past issues and we spent many evening pouring our hearts out to each other sharing our fears and pain from the past. We finally began to heal old wounds that had never had a chance to heal.
Time passed and then around the 2nd anniversary of our engagement J and I took the step from friendship to more than friends. It was a natural progression for us but we moved with caution keeping our reunion on the down low until the following October. 1 year after our breakup were we both confused our renewed love for each other and our desire to take our new relationship to the next level. Sometime after we began talking about wedding again and in typical J and Vee fashion I began wearing my ring again and we began planning a wedding. No big second proposal no big announcement to our friends and family.
Looking back I truly believe that our time apart has not only made us stronger as a couple but reaffirmed our belief that we are with the person that we are truly meant to be with. Not only has the friendship that we shared grown stronger we have been able to come to terms with a lot of emotional muck from the last 10 years. This June I will be marrying my best friend and on that day I will go into our union knowing that our relationship is the strongest that it has ever been something that I wouldn’t be able to do our first time around.
Oh and just because I love the song and because it sums up everything I feel when I look back on the past couple of years-
Did you and your FI spend time apart before your engagement?
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