The encounters finally stopped when I moved to Pensacola, FL. I decided to go to Bible college when I was 22, and totally change my surroundings. For two years, I traveled for mission trips to many different countries, strengthened my relationship with Jesus, and made strides with healing my wounded heart. I had to find a purpose for my life. It was a great time to get to know some new people and I made friends from all over the world.  A new chapter and surely, I would meet someone to start a life with. I thought of Ryder’s Dad all the time, and I always wondered how he was, but I had to put the thoughts and feelings in the back of my mind, or my heart would never let me move on. By this time, I had really mastered letting go, but Ryder’s Dad was always an open ended discussion with God. Why did things turn out like this?  I just learned to go on with life and make the most of it. I graduated from Bible college, in which I didn’t find the new love that I thought I would, and felt a strong pull to move back to Savannah.  I always wondered why God didn’t allow me to find a relationship in Bible college? I  began helping in my church with the singles ministry and started a new job in Dental Hygiene. I met my soon to be husband in the singles group and I thought this was it. The love that I had been searching for. Well, it was far from it. He ended up fighting addictions that supposedly he was free from when he became a Christian. From the beginning he was like a cancer in my life. My relationship with the Lord suffered and I started to become someone that I didn’t want to be. He was infecting me and all the peace and joy that I once had was slowly diminishing. He was so convincing and every time he would fall off the wagon, he would plead with me that this was just a stumble. He would explain that he wanted to live the Christian life,  but he would fall into temptation and how could I judge him for that? We all sin and stumble and because I was a Christian, I should forgive him. We had a baby and we were married for 9 months. Even though we divorced, we ended up staying together off and on because I was trying to not allow my son to grow up in a broken home. He would try to get me to marry him again, but I never had any peace about that. Somehow in my hopeful emotional state, I thought that I could change him, and he would be the father to my son,  the husband that I needed. It was a turbulent relationship that no one approved of. My family and friends constantly told me to leave him, but he possessed a tool to control me and that was my son. Now that I have a little more wisdom,  I know that God hates divorce, but staying together is not always the best thing to do, especially when you never should have been with that person to begin with. Just because a child is involved, staying with the person with abuse involved is not the right answer. Whether the abuse be verbal or physical or just the mere fact of abandonment by the person going to jail over and over, in which I was experiencing all three. How did I get here? How did my life turn out like this? He lied, cheated, and stole from me. I was used the entire time for his benefit. I had never darkened the doors of a jail cell yet I found myself in a relationship with someone who couldn’t stay out of trouble. I was once so outgoing, but the embarrassment of my life, kept me secluded. Who was I anymore? I wanted to be back to my self and back on track for what plans God had in store for me. My motto was “God can make plan B better than plan A was ever going to be” Even when we make mistakes, He can put all the pieces back together, and I would soon find out what that plan was. If my marriage would have been great, or at best normal, I would have never been available for plan B, or if I would have met a husband in Bible college, the rest of our story would have never happened. As I look back, God was always in control.

When I went through my divorce, my friends asked me to go out to celebrate. I had not been out on the town in years, but this night I felt like I needed to go. Well, guess who was there? I had not seen Ryder’s Dad in a few years, BUT THERE HE WAS! I couldn’t believe who I was seeing. What were the chances?  What was God really trying to show me. We were so excited to see each other. The feelings just flooded back and I was remembering that pure love that we had. Real love. He would never have put me through the horror that I had just been through. Why did it have to be this way? Why couldn’t we just be together? Why couldn’t I find this love with anyone else?  No matter what I did, I couldn’t get over him or find anyone to take his place. I just walked up and and hugged him. I wanted get away from everyone so we could talk. I wanted to catch up on all of the years that we had missed. I wanted to know if he was still unhappy or if life had turned around for him. We weren’t able to leave because we were with friends and the music was so loud that we couldn’t talk that much. All we really said to each other was,that what we had was real and the feelings never went away.He looked at me and told me that it WAS real and gave me that reassuring smile that he still loved me.  My heart was beating out of my chest.  We didn’t talk much because we were with other people, but it felt like a dream. Here we were again and nothing had changed but time. My friends decided to leave and go somewhere else. I hated to leave him, and he didn’t want me to leave either. We just hugged each other and said goodbye. Once again, I walked away from my destiny. I found out later that after I left, he was ready to go. His friend was not ready to leave because the night was young but he was not in the mood anymore, and he was messed up for a couple of weeks after that. What was it going to take for us? I never found out if he was happy or not and that’s what I wanted to hear most. I was happy to know that he still loved me and our history was not forgotten, but I just wanted him to be happy, even if it wasn’t with me. I loved him so much. And here we were again. I think that we were just missing all the signs. We were trying to do what was best for our children or what we thought was best.                                              A couple of years later, I ran into a mutual friend. I asked her how Ryder’s Dad was doing and how his marriage was going? I wanted to hear that he was fine, and that life had gone well for him, I wanted to know that I had made the right decision for him and that everything turned out okay.  The complete OPPOSITE. My heart just sank, and I somehow felt that this was my fault. If only I would have made the decision to stay with him when he was wanting to get out. We could have bypassed all of the turmoil that we both experienced. I thought I was doing the right thing by sacrificing my heart to keep another’s in tact. I found out soon after he married, his relationship was just as bad as mine had been. I wonder now how we both ended up with people completely opposite from us.  We were the responsible ones trying to hold our families together while in return we were being used and taken for granted. I didn’t know that he had reasons to be unhappy besides the fact that he wanted it to work out for us. He wanted to keep what was happening in his marriage hidden because he was embarrassed of his situation, and he didn’t know how to get out. Oh how I wished that he would have told me what was really happening. We would have just did what we had to do back then. Because my previous marriage was the way it was,  I knew exactly what he was going through. He stayed and tried to keep normalcy because of his kids and I was doing the same thing . During the years for both of us, there were good times, but the bad was so bad, that it trumped the good. At the time, I was still in and out of my own dysfunctional and abusive relationship. I allowed him in my life for my son’s sake, and I thought it would be better to have the family together rather than raise him as a single mom. It was years of the same abuse, lies, cheating, and abandonment. After talking to my friend that day, I felt so bad for Ryder’s Dad, and what he had gone through.  If I would have known, I would have never sent him home.  I thought to myself that if the chance presented itself again, if we ever came face to face, I would say yes. If it was God’s will, then it would happen on its own. I was a little curious to what he had portrayed about his life on face book, so I decided to send him a friend request. I wouldn’t  contact him, but I just wanted to see pictures and find out how he was doing. I sent him a friend request and he accepted. I never sent a message, but  I did save his phone number in my phone. I don’t even know why I did that ,but I guess it was fate leading me. One day, I received an instant message from him. He just asked how I was, and I asked how he was. We didn’t really get into any details besides that after my divorce, I was still living in a hellish relationship hoping for a change. The change wasn’t happening and I wasn’t happy. A couple of days later, I received another message from him, that his wife was the one who sent the first message, and that it wasn’t him. I decided to remove them both before any drama began to unfold. How did we let these years pass us and settle like we did? We ended up playing the martyr role,  sacrificing our hearts, and for what? For unbelievably dysfunctional marriages? I was all for saving marriages and keeping families together, but by this time, we both became victims needing to be saved.  Just like in our past, I left that up to fate, up to God.