Today was kind of a rough day. I got harassed at work for an hour over instant messenger by my Baptist aunt, who works in another state for the same place.  I wanted to cry. She said horrible things, but that wasn’t what really hurt. It was that someone so desperately wanted to destroy my happiness, that they couldn’t respect me enough to drop the agenda and leave me  in peace.

I had just announced my engagement on Facebook, and wrote our story in my blog post. My aunt felt it her duty to preach to me and reclaim me for God I guess, by being a complete jerk and a bully.  For most the day, I felt so distant and hurt.  My co workers and friends tried to help pick me up, but I was pretty sad.

Then I got home and my fiancée called, and we started talking about life and being there for each other and getting through our problems one step at a time, and taking a moment for some self-care when things are hard.  Then I went swimming with my friends from my former ward, and i meditated on each stroke my hand went into the water, and slowly peace came.

When I got home, My darling had texted me about our daughter, how she was sleeping, and how she missed me and my dog nick, and couldn’t wait for the four of us to be together again. My future wife has said starting at our second date that I would not be a step mom. I would be a mom. Period.  She didn’t  believe in step parents, you’re just a parent, they are just your kid. no need to be treated differently.  and she has taught her daughter that, and she’s started calling me mom.

It’s hard to believe that someone would call me mom. I’ve been alone and childless for most of my 34 years on this earth, and for years I felt like such a failure, like that wasn’t for me, like that couldn’t happen, and I didn’t think I wanted it to happen, because I didn’t want to be married to a man, and so my vocabulary and my dreams were full of  ‘couldn’t’ and ‘can’ts’

But there we were, one year after we met; one year after our first date, after we instantly clicked and started dating. There we were standing in my living room the beginnings of a family. In one year I went from an active pretty Mormony LDS girl, to a still believing in God but no longer a member of the LDS church, or a fan of religions, standing in my living room, with a God-fearing Lutheran Lesbian,  with my furbaby son (an adorable 9-year-old Jack Russel Terrier), and her 9 year old daughter  while she proposed to me, and I freaked out because I was going to propose to her in a couple of weeks and I had it all planned. The plan changed, and I said yes in an instant.

And then there we were again, four of us asleep on a sofa bed in my living room, because the 9 year olds were too nervous to sleep alone. One because it was a new place she had never been, and the other because there were too many exciting people around for a dog to ignore.

So today, when the hate was being poured on, and friends and  co workers came to my aid, and I fought back. I fought back for my little family.  And with each stroke in the swimming pool tonight, my new, fragile, still forming family brought me peace. I may be rejected. I may lose some family members and some friends, I may have lost pieces of the religion that has been such a part of my life. But my family, my family is anything but counterfeit It is the most real family I have ever been a part of. It is one of the most pleasing things to God, and myself, I have no doubts of that.

Together, we have helped each other start to live to our full potential, to be our best selves, and to be true to the God that we believe in, that has been such a part of our lives. My girlfriend texted me this evening and said “God is with us, I love you. A tiny miracle happened today, God sent his love, in our animals, in our daughter, in each other. He sent  our whole family for love, comfort and compassion, to let us know we are not alone.”

My future wife is a woman of deep faith, with deep love and trust for God,  despite the many times she has been hurt by those claiming religious authority and purpose. When she was 8, her dad and step mom subjected her to conversion therapy,  when her marriage to a man fell apart they disowned her.  when her church rejected her, she searched far and wide for another, where she could come and worship, and when she couldn’t find a place, she worshiped with her daughter at home.

Church stuff has been triggering for me since November. I can’t hear it without pain, except from her mouth. Daily she speaks of God and faith and miracles, and it gives me space for the God I still very much believe in to function in my life.  My little family is the biggest blessing and miracle of my life, and every other little thing and person, and place it cost me to find it has been worth it to me, because I have gone from feeling broken, and damaged to feeling empowered, loved and whole, and  I don’t think  I could ask for anything more.

When I preapared for our first date, one year ago, I didnt think this would go anywhere at all. And when things started to fall apart on us last December, I thought I had lost her and we were through.Sometimes though, when you least expect it, everything comes together in the most beautiful way, and much quicker than you would imagine.