Our Lips are Sealed

Am I the only one that though they said long as I see you? Yea I didn’t think so but I digress this post isn’t about my annoying habit of mishearing song lyrics. No ma’am today we’ll be discussing my annoying habit of under sharing.

Back in my very first post I mentioned that no one in my office knew that we were planning a wedding which probably left a lot you scratching your head! The reason for that friends is because I'm a notorious under sharer. You've heard of an over sharer well I'm the opposite.

The intimate details of my personal life are on a need to know basis and I very rarely offer up information about myself and my life to people I’ve barley meet. I’m the type of person that will sit with a coworker at lunch and listen to them share details of their weekend but when questioned about my weekend my response is usually a brief fine thank you. It’s a personality quirk that has often gotten me labeled as cold and unfriendly but those who know me best accept this quirk and understand that when I do confide in them and share details of my life it means I have 100% trust in them.

Now you’re probably thinking Cotton Candy you do realize this blog is public for anyone to read and what the shiz does this have to do with weddings? My answer to that is blogging provides a veil of anonymity that real life doesn’t, 100 people can read this blog and I never have to meet them or hear their opinion about our wedding, Our wedding day on the other hand will put a big ol’ spotlight on me and J and our (very) personal life.

Wedding by nature and especially DIY wedding like ours are meant to be a personal reflection of the couple and the best ceremonies are crafted to reflect the couple and provide guest an intimate glimpse into their lives together. See the problem? I’m a little anxious about not only being the center of attention on our wedding day but also putting Mister Cotton Candy and I relationship and private life out there for all to see. Lucky for me we've come up with some wedding day strategies to help ease my anxiety and make our day feel more personal us and our guests.

· Keep our guest list small. Every single person on our list is near and dear to us and have watched us grow together as a couple. Our guest list is currently hovering at about 65 and I couldn’t be happier with it.

· Have a first look. The first time J and I see each other on our wedding day will be just the 2 of us and our very stealth photographer. This moment will be just for us and it’s the part of the day that I’m looking forward to the most.

· Have a close friend officiate our wedding. My sister/MOH boyfriend of over 4 years has stepped up to the task of officiating our wedding so there won’t be any need for us to share details of our relationship with a stranger for our ceremony.

So tell me are you an information hoarder like myself, do you have an personality quirks reeling their ugly heads as you plan your wedding?

The New

Happy (belated) New Years! This year is what I like to think of as a landmark year for me and the misters, not only are we planning the biggest baddest party of our lives otherwise known as our wedding we are entering our 10^th year as a couple. Looking back over the past 9 years of our lives together I can’t help feeling nostalgic for the couple we once were and excited for the couple we are becoming and the life we are building together.

We’ve grown up together and as you all know growing up is never easy. Mister Cotton Candy and I originally became engaged in the summer of 2007. I was fresh out of college and 6 months into my first “real” job, after 7 years of dating getting engaged seemed like the logical next step. The wedding date was set for April of 2009 wedding planning was in full swing and life was good. Fast forward to the summer of 2008 and everything we had built as a couple began to crumble.

We were living together in his tiny 1 bedroom apartment and I was working a thank less job for little pay with a 2 hour plus commute both ways. Things became tense in our little world and I became resentful of the ties that I felt our relationship had on me. Slowly the person and the relationship I had turned to for comfort and support was begging to feel stifling and oppressive. I began to dread the future I saw ahead of us, I felt like I was losing control of my life and my future and everything inside of me screamed to get out.

Things finally came to a head for us one evening in October. I arrived home late after working overtime at my job to find mister Cotton Candy sitting alone in the dark he said we need to talk, he knew I had been unhappy for some time in our relationship and that it might be best if we called the wedding off and went our separate way. I will forever be grateful to him for having the courage to end our relationship at a time when I didn’t. I shudder to think of what our lives would be like now if we went through with the wedding and never addressed the issues that were crippling our relationship at the time.

In the weeks that followed our break up I moved out of our apartment and into my own place, gave notice at my job and although my heart was heavy I felt a great sense of freedom and relief. We maintained a strong friendship during our time apart as a couple. I had always believed that our friendship was the strongest part of our relationship while we were together and I was proven right during our many months apart.

Much to the confusion of our friends and family we continued to spend weekend together as friends enjoying all the things we once did before our relationship hit hard times. Without the pressures of our relationship and the impending wedding we were able to begin rebuilding the friendship that had always been at the core of our relationship and over time we began to address a lot of the unspoken issues that eventually lead to our breakup. With the distance that our break up created we were able to take freely about our past issues and we spent many evening pouring our hearts out to each other sharing our fears and pain from the past. We finally began to heal old wounds that had never had a chance to heal.

Time passed and then around the 2^nd anniversary of our engagement we took the step from friendship to more than friends. It was a natural progression for us but we moved with caution keeping our reunion on the down low until the following October. 1 year after our breakup were we both confused our renewed love for each other and our desire to take our new relationship to the next level. Sometime after we began talking about wedding again I began wearing my ring again and we began planning a wedding. In typical Mister and Miss Cotton Candy fashion no big second proposal no big announcement to our friends and family.

Looking back I truly believe that our time apart has not only made us stronger as a couple but reaffirmed our belief that we are with the person that we are truly meant to be with. Not only has the friendship that we shared grown stronger we have been able to come to terms with a lot of emotional muck from the last 10 years. This June I will be marrying my best friend and on that day I will go into our union knowing that our relationship is the strongest that it has ever been something that I wouldn’t be able to do our first time around.

Oh and just because I love the song and because it sums up everything I feel when I look back on the past couple of years-

Did you and your FI spend time apart before your engagement?