First read...
Part 1 (Click HERE)
Part 2 (Click HERE)
Part 3 (Click HERE)
After graduation Chris
moved two hours away to Brunswick, GA for his very first job as a banker. I
stayed in Statesboro to finish school but everything was different without him.
Statesboro wasn't fun anymore and all I wanted to do was graduate. I would
still go out with my friends but he was always on mind.
On the weekends we
drove back and forth to see one another. I remember crying every Sunday night
because I knew it would be a week, or sometimes even two, before I got to see
him again. I thought, "Why couldn't we have met earlier in college? At
least then we would've had more time together before he graduated."
It wasn't long though
and Chris started working on his master’s degree. He was driving to Statesboro
for class two nights a week and after his classes got out he would always come
see me. I was so glad to get to see him but the new work load, driving two
nights a week and school was a new world. Honestly, I'm not real sure how he
managed it all. At the same time, I was entering my senior year of college.
Student teaching started and
boy did the workload increase. I was driving each day to my assigned school,
and staying up until two and three in the morning working on my lesson plan
units. Those two years were rough and we were both, for lack of a better
phrase, give out.
After two long years of
being apart, me finishing school and Chris working on his masters we both
finally graduated in the spring of 2008, and believe it or not, with honors. I just knew that now,
after graduation, things would get better and we would
be able to live our fairy tale. I could picture us getting married, buying a
house and starting a family. I mean, that's how it's supposed to happen right?
Not the case!
 |
| Georgia Southern Graduation May 2008- I had already started to put on weight by the time I graduated. I was weighing around 220 pounds here. |
I landed a job at a
great school BUT it was outside of Savannah and Chris was still in Brunswick. It
was thirty minutes closer to him, but still an hour and a half away. And to
make light of the situation, my first year of teaching was hard, really hard! I
was also poor. I'm not just saying that either. I was a college graduate and I
could barely pay my bills. I didn't have cable/internet, I never ran the
air/heat and if my car hadn't been paid for I wouldn't have made it. On top of
that, now not only did I miss Chris but I also missed my family.
One night, I sat on the
steps outside of my apartment and talked to my Mama for hours while balling my
eyes out. I begged her to let me come home and said if she would just let me I would
work at Dairy Queen, wait tables or whatever I had to do. I was so overwhelmed
and lonely but I had enough fight in me to know I couldn’t just quit. Only
thing is, after that night I slowly started to slip into depression. Each day I
would get home from work, binge eat for about an hour and then get in bed
around five in the afternoon. Within that first year of teaching I gained
around 50 pounds.
I have tears in my eyes
just thinking about it because I remember exactly how I felt...worthless! I was
miserable and as a result mine and Chris's relationship started to suffer.
There were times when I just didn't know if we were going to make it. There
were also times I didn’t even care what happened to me one way or another. I
knew that I needed help but I was way too prideful to
seek any.
Towards the end of that
first school year things started to get better and surprisingly something great happened.
Chris called me and said he had gotten an offer to work at a bank in middle
Georgia. I knew there was a teacher opening in that same area so I took the
chance and applied. Around March Chris took the offer, I interviewed for the
teaching position and by July we were both living in the same town. Things were finally starting to look up and little did I know all of the wonderful things God had in store for our relationship.
 |
| Summer 2009- Lake Sinclair in Milledgeville, GA Weighing in around 270 pounds |
To be continued…
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