Dear Alex, Happy Wedding Anniversary my amazing man...you still blow me away...

Our wedding anniversary.

16^th April 2012

Dear Alex,

Eight years ago today.

I tremble as I walk down the aisle, soul reaching out to your own, clutching the intensity of the fulfilled love I feel for the first time in my life.

‘Will you marry me?’ you ask, looking into my very self, four days after we met…without hesitation I reply ‘yes’. Three months later we tell people, conscious that people may dismiss it. Love at first sight, and a whirl wind romance that ensued, ten and a half years on, four kids, endless moves, one to a different country, and one back again after five and a half years, not foreseen. Eight years of marriage. Not for the things we had, but for the richness of life you gave me, I cannot thank you enough. For the gifts of our four half you, half me children, I can never breathe the right words.

For giving yourself, wholly to me, I am blessed. Your counsel, protection, love, admiration, respect, affection, I am forever grateful.

To say I admire you, is not close to the true emotion.

Life had something in store for you and I, our family. Something  difficult to come to terms with, even harder to live with. But the attitude you taught me, the example you set me over the years we have been together is the foundation laid for me to be the same for you now…due to your commitment, your love, your example, determination, I now want to be all that for you. I want to protect you, put a comforting arm around you, be a guide, offer advice and counsel in this, push you, motivate you and make you win, just as you did for me.

Affection was, from  you, something that many people would characterise you with, and everyday we lived, you never failed to grab me, caress me, cuddle me, offering tender affection whilst I often numbly went around the daily chores…the driving force behind the ‘never let the sun go down on your anger’ proverb. I looked to you for it all…and you, you gave it all.

I have never experienced happiness, fulfillment as you give me.

When, that infamous night you called me up out of the blue, a year after meeting once at a party, and you asked me out for a drink, I never knew that saying 'yes', and never driving back home again, would begin the avalanche of a love, a husband, a partner, a best friend, lover and father in a way that I have been privileged enough to experience.

I miss you, I miss the way you always called me your ‘angel’, the depth of your love for me burning into me whenever you looked at me, still able to make me blush by looking into my eyes ten years on…

I long for you, your embrace, your touch, your words. I long for my man, husband, partner, best friend. I crave your health, well being.

I know one day we will be us again, but I grieve everyday until we reach that day.

I will never give up, I believe in you, I believe in our love, I miss you so intensely every second of every day, unable to face memories of how it was before; head down, sheltering from the blinding blizzard of facing daily life without you, I persist. Knowing one day, we will be walking side-by-side, hand-in-hand again.

 Until that day my angel…I will miss you…

What can I truly say, Alex? Words take away from the love, devotion, admiration I feel so engulfed by, words do not suffice...they cannot even touch the surface of the magnitude of my feelings for you, the time we've passed, the times we've striven through, the times we continue to strive through. 

Opening my eyes to all we have got, reaching for hope, the strain of all we put in, opens further the eyes, to seeing. Seeing what we do have, and what you have given me, what we are blessed with, it takes my breath away. And, in spite of the grief we feel, the pain we're in, the longing  to be in one anothers' arms unquenchable, we have so much. And I am grateful for all that I do have, through you...Thank you.

When you start to practice at being grateful for things, wholly grateful for the smallest of things, not 'oh no, another trip to the shops for just eggs, two hours of kid preparation, getting dog in the car to achieve an insignificant task' but 'thank you God that I have these amazing kids to feed, that I have a car to take me to the shops to buy the eggs, thank you for shops...!' (maybe a silly example, but the principle) This change in attitude has shown me a world I didn't know existed. A world where just the next day, to be blessed enough to have it is so empowering, so awe inspiring, and I practice this attitude as a matter of routine. My world, as bleak and as lonely as it feels being with out you, is huge and full of blessings... Like I never knew, and I have only you and God to thank for it...

You, and the life you have given me, shown me, is filled with blessings, the kids and you being the ultimate...What more could I want? How can one man have done all this...ALL this for me? Thank you God for you, Alex...

Here’s to the next ten years,, I am so privileged to call you my husband, and the father of our children, thank you…

Me xxxxxxx