TRUST

I'm sure I don't need to remind anyone that without trust there is really nothing.
If you can't trust your partner to the core of your soul, in my opinion you just have nothing. So many times in my life I have felt that knot in the middle of my gut, you know the one, the one that keeps you up at night, the knot that makes you physically sick. It's our inner voice telling us that something is wrong, no matter what another person is telling you to derail the consequences of their deceit, that little voice and that knot in your gut seems to always know the truth.

I had gone through five such years with Bob, never being able to fully trust that he would stay sober. That's why when ever he asked me to marry him I would always tell him "Someday". My gut told me it was not the time for such flights of fancy, I learned to trust that voice.

But this time things really were different. Everyday was filled with the knowledge that things would be OK even if we had the morning bad moods, before coffee or the little argument about whatever. My gut knew it was OK, we were only human. I also knew to the core of my soul that Bob was going to remain sober. I don't know why God removed the fear I once had of him relapsing, but he did. I no longer feared that.

I have recently been watching the video "The Secret" and I am reminded that I have lived that way for many many years. My thoughts became my truth. I knew from the moment I laid eyes on him that I would marry Bob, and I knew from the moment that he told me he had a drinking problem that it would all be resolved one day.
I never believed it would take him five years to reach this point, but he did finally get and stay sober, and I was sure it was going to last. I also knew that we could have a happy, normal life together, and we did for many years.

Positive thinking on both our parts kept us grounded on our path and our commitment to our relationship. We made it happen, then one day I started to feel really sick. It wasn't like anything I had ever felt before. It seemed like I could literally taste the smog from the traffic.

We were living in an apartment on Olympic Blvd. and I thought because it was extremely hot that June that maybe I was just sick from the heat. I was vomiting which I never did so I went to the Doctor.

I wasn't sick at all, I was pregnant. That in itself was really a miracle. I had just miscarried our child before Bob's last journey into his private hell, and the doctor told me that I would probably never conceive again. I was actually using birth control at the time so being pregnant was the last thing that I was expecting.

Bob on the other hand, just kept telling me that all his prayers were answered.
He promised the man upstairs that if he gave him a second chance at a family, perhaps give him a son so that he could be a great dad and take him to the ball games like he went to while in Kansas, that he would stay sober.The nun had kept telling him to pray and his prayers would be answered. I never saw him so committed to staying sober, and I had now been with him for over five years.

When we told our family the first thing that Dad did was tell us to start looking for a new place to live. He would help us buy a house or a condo so that we could bring this child into the world in a new home. Everything just seemed to fall into place. We looked all over town and finally found a beautiful condo in Santa Monica, right across the street from the ocean. It was so great for Bob, he loved being near the ocean and it really was close to where he grew up. He was putting his life back together. It was a fairy tale and we kept saying, "If it's easy it's meant to be."

I don't know how Dad managed it but by the time we actually saw the condo and brought Dad to see it, he had arrange all the financing for us to buy it. Now if that's not the "Secret" being put into action I don't know what was. I had no credit to speak of or a job for that matter and neither did Bob. But here we were with the help of Dad moving in to a new place. All within the first three months of my pregnancy.

We moved in and I was really sicker than a dog for those first three months and then the scare of our lives happened. Bob had to rush me to the hospital in the middle of the night. It seems I had lost our baby. It was close to three in the morning and the doctor told us that there was a 90% chance that I had already miscarried, but he scheduled an ultra sound in the morning just to be sure. It was the longest and saddest night of our lives. We were devastated, but we clung on to a faint thread of hope. In my soul I just refused to believe I had lost our baby and so did Bob

Morning came and I was wheeled into the ultra sound room. I will never forget the sight of our son on the screen. There he was. His little hands up near his face, maybe even sucking his thumb. I did not lose him he was alive. Another Miracle.

Our prayers were more than being answered. Bob was keeping his commitment to God and God was answering his prayers. I will never look at this as anything other than a gift from above and I'm not particularly spiritual or I should say I wasn't at that time of my life.

It was not going to be an easy pregnancy and as a matter of fact the following month I was told that I would have to remain in partial bed rest for the duration. I was more than happy to comply. I would do whatever it took to keep this child.
When we found out for sure through the amniocentesis that we were having a boy we decided to name him Matthew, which mean gift from God, and so he is.

I started knitting what turned out to be the smallest baby blanket on earth. I guess I just didn't have the talent for it, but it sure helped to pass the time away.
All I could do was go to the doctor, go to the dentist and knit or watch TV. I did not cook or clean anything during that time.

Bob would either make me scrambled eggs for breakfast or take me out and dinner was always delivered or eaten out. Up until today I still have an aversion to scrambled eggs. I never used to eat breakfast, but I had to then to have a healthy baby, so Bob made me eat and it's the only thing he could cook that I would eat in the morning.

It was a very surreal time for us. We bought our first video camera and started to document just how enormous I was getting. It brought us so much closer together and we had a lot of laughs and we were grateful for everything in our lives. In AA Bob was told that the miracle's were just around the corner, all he had to do was stay sober to get them and we knew that it was true. We did not falter from that belief.

His daughter's mom was also having a baby. This poor girl was an only child for nine years and now she was going to have two new siblings within 5 months of each other. That's an entirely different topic.