The Story of Us (Shadowz and Blade) (Another repost)

This post will explain who we are as a couple. Again I took it from an old blog, and decided that I would put it here for others to read as that blog is no longer around. It will explain the man I share my life with. The man I call my best friend, my husband, the other half that completes me totally.

This is not your typical love story. This story may not make sense to a lot of people, but those that have gotten to know me over the years know this man here I call Blade in Second Life is my real life partner as well. We are not legally married by a piece of paper, but when you have a history and a love like ours, who really needs that piece of paper? He is 10 years older then me, but that does not bother us. He is also an African American Male who grew up in the 70’s and 80’s.  We both grew up very different, but yet we are the same. I met this man back in the year of 1988 somewhere around there and he was already an adult, not going to say he acted it, but he was fun to be around back then. He helped me a lot as a pre-teen because I came from the classic broken home, and I knew he didn’t from how we talked. He had a good family, a mother and father that loved him dearly, siblings the works. He was also with someone and had children of his own with this woman, but I didn’t look at him like that back then. He was just a friend I had that would not treat me like a kid, or like what I felt and thought didn’t matter.

He was put into my life to show me that not all people were evil as I had previously thought. I told him of the abuse I suffered at hands of a neighbor, the mental abuse my parents put me through as they went through their divorce, and each and every time he would ask me how I was holding up. Which he knew I was lying because I didn’t like sharing my feelings, but he let me get away with it and we would always hang out in the park right out in the open, and naturally my father accused him of the worse, and would say to me, “You do not know that man, and you do not know what he is capable of.” Which I’d just roll my eyes and walk away saying, “Yeah, okay whatever Tom.” My father didn’t care that I called him by his real name. Still that didn’t matter to me about Blade, he was a friend to me, and I would not betray a friendship because my father was being a dick. We’d meet pretty much every weekend in the park and sit there talking for a few hours until the local police would say, “You know your father is looking for you.” , which prompted me to ride my bike back home where I’d get an earful, and I just rolled my eyes. I had a tough time listening to someone that was there but didn’t want to be there. Our friendship stay right there for a good long time, all because I didn’t think like that at one time. I didn’t look at him as a love interest, hell to be perfectly honest I didn’t think I’d ever get bit by that love bug to be honest. I was more interested in having friends, then love interests. This went on for a good 2 years until my father decided he didn’t want to be dad anymore, and didn’t want me. For a few months I bounced between my aunts, great-grandmother, grandmother, until finally in December of 1989 when my father decided to dump me on my mothers doorstep. I was upset because my father had tore me from someone that understood me, and was there for me, and I didn’t know what to do , so I started running away on weekends, anything to keep the pain in check.

It was a weekend before I had knew that my mother, her boyfriend (who later became her husband, and her sister) were trying to figure out what was wrong with me. They didn’t know how to deal with me, so I ran away one weekend and found out where he was living and made a visit to his apartment in the projects, granted his girlfriend at the time didn’t take to a young girl showing up on his doorstep looking for him, and we ended up walking down to the river where I told him where I had been, what had happened and I told him that I thought something was up with my mother and her family because they didn’t know how to deal with me, and I voiced the fear that was going to happen. I was going to be sent away and I didn’t know how long I’d be gone. He told me no matter what we’d always be friends, and that he cared about my well being and if I could write him a letter once things were settled down, and I did just that after 6 months. Granted his girlfriend wrote me a letter back saying I had better stay away from her man, or she’d kill me. Which I laughed at it cause I didn’t think of him like that during that time. I just wanted the friend I had in him. I was still wrapped up in my own problems and trying to please everyone around me by taking the medication they wanted me on, tried to date a kid I went to school with, that was when I first started thinking of anything serious, but yet when I wouldn’t put out, and that ass tried to rape me, I stopped right there. I no longer showed an interest in being with anyone. If this was what I thought love was suppose to be. I didn’t want any damn parts of it. I had already had enough hurt and pain in my life that I just did not want anymore.  Yeah I had a few bad-boys interested in me, but I friend-zoned them fast, and never realized I was doing that.

When my female cousins started getting interested in boys, and make up, hair, clothes, etc. I was left out in a lot of things, because I had no interest in them. Family would say, “Ohh she’s going to be a late bloomer.”, Which I just turned around and looked at them and said, “Don’t get your damn hopes up.” . I was still too drugged up on anti-depressants, anti-psychotics, etc that love and an idea of a relationship just did not interest me. After I was returned back to my mother, I started acting up again, wanting to be taken away from her, and the family. I was so tired of being stabbed in my back, lied to my face, etc. That I just want to screw up my mothers life like she had done to me when she decided that she no longer wanted my father, course at the time it was like she tossed me too, so I wanted to make her suffer so I acted up, trying to do everything I could to get taken from her, and all the while I wondered how my best friend was doing. It was then she told me that while I was in the hospital that they took him the magistrate and he was ordered to stay away from me until I was 18 years old. Something that would be far from possible. Everyone always thought the worse of him, and belittled him, from his age, to his skin color, and here I stood against the grain and fought them all. I fought our friendship, I fought for my right to be friends with whoever the hell I wanted to be friends with.

Then sometime around 1993-1994 I found him again, this time he was single, and he had lost his children to the system due to his mistakes in the past. He was drug free, but to some that did not matter. The age still bothered everyone but us, then the shit we’d get from being an interracial couple to our ages being so different.  Yet that was the time I finally realized that I was madly in love with him. I knew I wasn’t his first, but I would be something more and something special to him. In February of 1995 Child protection and my mother agreed to emancipate me because they knew for the rest of that year I’d just keep running away to be with him, plus I was pregnant with his child, my first , his 3rd-4th child. He was 27 going on 28, and I was 17 going on 18. My father wanted to try and have a relationship with me since I was now an adult, and he liked adults better than kids, but he didn’t want anything to do with Blade still. Regardless so to keep the peace Blade would disappear when my father would pop up. My mother and her husband eventually learned to tolerate him. Still everyone had a comment about him. From being told, “You could do so much better than him.”, all the way down to , “Why him? ” , questions that people still sometimes ask me today. Then after our oldest was born, I told him I didn’t want her to not have a sibling, that I wouldn’t want to feel like I was robbing her of a life with a sibling. He smiled and kissed my forehead and said, “Well then we’ll work on giving her a brother or sister.”, and that is how the 2nd one came to us. In October of 1996 I gave birth to our 2nd child, and we had a good home, he was working full time, and being daddy as well as a loving, supportive boyfriend, who later asked me to marry him.

Then in 1998 our lives were flipped upside down, and we started a 2 year battle that well honestly wore us both out, and we had some heated words after a decision was made about our parental rights. We had asked the county to give us back the girls, or take the rights as it was no longer fair to them nor us as their parents to keep running around in circles. So in Oct of 2000 he came in from court that day, and we got into one last argument that eventually lead us apart for 13 years. He said some words, I said some words and we parted ways. All the while I still carried a love for this man, and everyone tried telling me it was because he was the father of my children, and I lied to them and myself and said that was it, but I knew deep down inside it was something more. So for 13 years I went back to trying to please everyone else around me, tried to start my life over, and all the while something in my heart was missing. I thought it was our girls, but it wasn’t. Well they were missing, but there was just something more. Then when I heard he had asked his current girlfriend for her hand in marriage, my heart sank, and I decided to move away from all the pain, but that lasted only 9 months when I had to come back. When I came back I was in my mid twenties and had no desire to be in a relationship again. Then I met William who forced his way into my life, I thought I was in love with him, but when in reality I wasn’t. He was just something to please the family because he was 7 years older than me, and white. So from 2005-2010 I stayed, even though I was not happy. Then when he left November 19,2010 in the middle of the night I felt a sense of relief come over me. I started improving my life for me, yeah I held a lot of the pain inside, and wanted to die a time or two. But that was when I started spending more and more time with my Pit bull Sammie and learned to be a human being through her again. I spent my life like that for next 3 years. I tried to date, but only online where it was just easy to walk away after a while. Had some fake their death, fake going to jail, etc. It was just that a game to me, that after a while I got tired of playing.

Then in April of 2013 I ran into him again, and I started smiling, and remembering what it was that I was missing. I was missing my best friend, the person that would make me question my sanity a time or two. The man I honestly fell in love with years ago. The man that would help me better myself all the while bettering himself as well. The man that would not fix my broken heart, but hold it in its pieces and not abuse it. We would start dating and I’d start staying the weekends with him and his friends/roommates. All the while they’d ask me, “What can you give him that a woman his own age can’t?” , My answer would come to piss them off big time, because I gave him a sense of him being able to be himself, to be free to do what he wanted, when he wanted, and utter trust, even though I knew that would be the hardest for me since humanity had proven to me again and again not to trust people. It was during one of our day times meets that we first kissed again and it was that kiss that took my breath away, and I knew I wanted to try again with him. He was the ex that was not suppose to be an ex. He was the one I was meant to be with, he was the one that made life seem so simple when it was complicated. He still does that to this day even with our ups and downs. While so many spend their lives looking for the one I met my one all those years ago and never really knew it until we were reunited. Granted my parents even though now I’m grown, still don’t care for his man, but you know what I’m done with their approval. My heart and mind approve and that is all that matters. We talked during those months we were getting to know each other again because I had grown up and changed , and so had he. He went down a dark road on drug addiction, and was no longer afraid to admit it to others. He was also clean now and was struggling to stay clean in his situation he was in. So I made him promise me something that no matter how hard life got, how defeated he felt at times, that he would come to me and we’d help battle this ugly demon that plagues so many men and women in our day an age.

Now many did not think I could do it. They didn’t want to give me credit because I was younger than him, and even though I had never done illegal drugs, I knew the pull of addiction. I am a recovering alcoholic that can now drink in moderation. At one time I could not say that. Now I can, and I strive for him to be the man he wants to be, the man he feels I deserve in this life. I’m not saying our life is perfect but it’s perfect for us. We are there for each other in our times of need and that is what matters the most in this life. Being there for each other. He has seen me at my worse, and deserves my best. These last 5 years though have been about us and only us. We’ve put our past into the past, and started working on a future that no one but us can truly understand. Yeah we talk about our girls, and I talk to him about his other children, and how proud of them we are, because we are proud parents.

Then in 2015 he went above and beyond anything. He knew I was a dog lover, and I had miss Sammie in my life, so towards the end of July he found us a puppy that was abused. She had escaped a place she was living inside a cage, and ran to a friend of his. This woman asked around if anyone knew who the puppy belonged too, and he said No, but if no one claimed her, he would take her. He told me about her, and I asked what was wrong, and he said she was a stray that would probably land in the pound. I told him, “Nope, she’s coming to live her, and have a good life.” , a few days later he called and told me she was not claimed, and that as soon as the woman that had her, and brought her into town, she would be coming to live with us, and for me to find her a new name. Later that day he brought her home, and let her into our apartment and I was asleep, but when I woke up I saw her face and fell in love with her. I then asked her what I should name her, I started going down a list of names for her, and settled on Raven when her ears perked up and that was when we got Raven and how she would forever change our lives. I could no longer have children, so we decided to have a cat and a dog, but sadly our cat, Shadow, did not want to accept Raven, so we found her a farm to go chase mice, and have a better life then we could give her. She ended up excelling out there on that farm, and it was the best decision we could have done. It was not fair to either one of them, no matter how much I wanted them to get a long, Shadow just didn’t trust Raven enough, even though Raven wanted to be her friend.

A few months later I had to make a heart breaking decision on Sammie who was living at my mother’s house. I had found out she had cancer, and was in a lot of pain. So in October of 2015 I made the difficult decision and put Sammie to sleep to end her suffering. That night both Blade and Raven stayed at my side during the time I mourned the loss of Sammie. Each day I think of Sammie and thank her for showing me the way back to Blade, and for showing me how to let another dog into my life and give her the same kind of love and life that Raven now has.  These last few years have been a trying time for Blade and I, but we’ve been making it, we moved into a better apartment, and our love has grown stronger, and more powerful. We’ve had some hard times in the past, by him spending a few weeks to a few days in county jail, and in the end it only pushed us forward to each other and let our love grow stronger and more powerful for each other. So now there is the story of Us, Shadow and Blade, even though we have used our Second Life Avatars to show us as a couple, the story behind us is real, and does not mean it’s not true. It’s just second life was the best place for us to showcase our love.