Lifetime Review.

I've gone through many stages of life. Infancy and toddler-hood I don't really remember. I remember bits and pieces of early childhood, from age 4 to about 10.
I went through the junior high phase when I had to be popular. It was during that time that I was introduced to pop culture and fashion. I was successfully popular for one summer.
Then I went through the homeschooler phase. I grew more introverted and enjoyed most of my solitude. I was very involved with music and Pathfinders, and I found myself in what I imagined was love with another homeschooler. I was best friends with his sister and mother. I spent every weekend at their house. We built projects for Pathfinders, he taught me how to fight with a stick (as if that's a terribly important life skill...), and I learned that "friends" didn't always mean just "friends." However enamored I fancied myself, I see how detrimental that relationship was to my ebbing self esteem. I wanted to believe the best, so I did, choosing to ignore what would be the beginning of a series of life changing events.
Then there was the Bolivian stage. What had started as a vacation turned into a year long escapade. I resisted the uprooting intitally, and then embraced it. I suddenly had freedom to come and go as I pleased. People, particularly of the male variety, drifted easily in and out of my life. I still held the majority of my confidence and innocence, and displayed it proudly. Shortly after the move, I again fell into "love." I was vulnerable enough to miss any warning signs, which there were a few of. But of all the other relationships in my life, with one huge exception, this had been the least flawed. Never the less, I was extremely naive and once things began to progress, I flung myself into a depression that didn't truly break until years later.
Then there was the Sam stage of my life. During this time, I reached all time lows that I never imagined I could. I experienced things that are unnatural to humans. I considered suicide many, many times, and came close to executing such plans on more than one occassion. I was never more alone in life. I felt abandoned by everyone, by God, left to be devoured by someone else's depraved passions. Yet I still clung to shreds of innocence. Despite my feelings of being completely alone, I refused to let my heart believe that I truly was or to give up hope entirely.
And then there was the first Jared stage. He stepped in, when we barely knew each other, and pulled me out of my living hell. Retrospectively, we had a relationship with so many odds against us, but it was never something we noticed. If our relationship had been with anyone else but us, it would've never lasted. With so much opposition from my parents, my problematic past, less than admirable friends who supplied additional pressures, few people would've been willing to look past it all. But somehow, not only did we survive, we thrived. Our first year together was incredibly tumultuous, but incredible none the less.
Then there was the second Jared stage. We found out I was pregnant. Words can't explain the levels of stress I felt. It was excrutiating. The months leading up to our wedding were some of the most difficult of my life. The morning sickness on top of all the emotional stress was simply unbearable.
And then there was the third stage. I never had an "aha" moment, realizing the difference between dating and marriage. This feeling had nothing to do with sex, but more our emotional connection. The first few months were incredibly emotional, for both of us. New facts about each other came up that we hadn't known before. Things that proved to be deeply painful and hard to forget were difficult to go through, but deepened our emotional bond.
And now, we are at a new stage. Our daugher, Kaila Evalette, has been born. So many new things do we have to adjust to now.