Catching up.

I haven't wrote in a very very long time.

 Let me put things into a short list of whats happened in my life since I last wrote:

- I'm single (and have been since the beginning of March!)
- I finished grade 11! woot! and now I am onto grade 12! I'm trying to do 42 credit in one year! AH!
- I now have another nephew, his name is Zach, he was born on September 5!
- Lastly, I'm preparing to be in the temple celebration for the calgary Temple! Its crazy stuff!


So!  A lot has happened that didn't get put on that list but I know some people are going to be confused because my last post was all about how wonderful my ex boyfriend was, he is an amazing guy and we are still friends...most of the time :P It just got to a point where he was ready to move on with his life and so I had to let him go.  Like most girls I was bitter for a long while but now I'm happy with being myself and being single.  My Heavenly Father loves me the way I am, and I should too.  Cuauhti is now saving for school and preparing for his mission.  I support him whole heartedly :)

I'm starting to grow up, slowly but surely, its a scary thought.  I'll always be a kid, but maybe I will become a kid with insight! Who knows!!

So how did we meet?

I am Katie.  I’m sixteen years old.  I have bipolar disorder.  I have ADHD.  I have insomnia.  I have anxiety.  I have athsma.  I take pills every single night so that I can function, so that the world doesn’t crash down around me.  I’m an abuse victim.  I’ve been bullied my whole life.  I don’t wear makeup unless its a special occasion.  I don’t drink.  I don’t smoke.  I don’t do drugs.  I don’t swear.  I don’t even wear clothes that show my shoulders or anything above my knees.  I don’t have any friends at school that are anything besides that, because I don’t go out on the weekends and party, I stay home.  The few friends that are close to me lately have been disagreeing with me for voicing my opinion.  I’m so used to people tearing me down that I do it myself.  I look in the mirror and I insult myself.  I look at my body and call myself fat.  I look at my face and see eyes brows that I hate.  I look at my teeth that no matter how hard I brush them, never loose the yellow spots.  I look at my nails, that are short and stubby because I play violin.  I look at the skin on my hands and around my nose, that is dry and irritated from the exceema I suffer from.  I look at my stupid unmanageable mess of hair which is usually a frizz of inconsistent curls.  I look at see my nose, which when I was 12 changed shape when I was hospitalized with a sinus infection that leaked into my eye tissue causing the cartilage to change form.  I look at see my freckles which depending on the day either don't stand out enough for stand out too much.  I look at see my constantly chapped lips, no matter how much medication I put on them they remain dry and cracked.  I see the annoying mole beneath the left side of my mouth.  I see the deep dark circles beneath my eyes from lack of sleep from my insomnia.  I look at see the weird deformity type growths on my right hands fingers that have a white texturing look to them like a callus gone wild that I’ve always had.  When I look in the mirror all I see is my imperfections, I see all the ugliness.  When I’m put all together I don’t think I’m ugly, I think calling me pretty would be generous, but average is a better term. But that is only what is on my exterior.   On the inside is were I feel ugliest.  Inside of me is envy, jealousy, hatred, fear, anger, sadness, heartbreak, guilt, hollowness, and worst of all, that little nagging voice in the back of my head that always assures me that no one could ever love something as wretched and screwed up as me.  

As I was growing up I would fall easily and hard for pretty much any boy who was nice to me.  They of course, never liked me back.  I have always been one of the boys.  With my three older brothers, I fit in with boys better.  I would always cry that no one ever liked me, my Mom of course always said “you don’t need a boy to make you happy” and I always would reply “Yea...but it sure would help.”

It was nearly a year ago to the day actually.  I forget the exact date that I met him, but it was between the late end of november and the early days of december last year.  I had agreed to go to a get together at one of my friends houses with a bunch of people from our church.  When I met him I didn’t really bat much of an eye, he was cute, dark toned skin, black hair that was slightly mussed and brown eyes, and a girlfriend with him.  He spent most of the night outside with her and I didn’t see much of him, but when he was inside, he was either playing the piano or a guitar and singing along.  That is what had caught my eye, the singing.  My Mom was putting on a musical in our church community for all kids twelve to eighteen, but we were desperately short on boys, so I practically begged the boy, I could even remember his name at the time and certainly couldn’t pronounce it.  He was interested in the musical and said he would audition.  Fast forward to January and its times to start rehearsals.  Meanwhile, him and his girlfriend had broken up. The schedule it that every single friday night, the main choir would rehearse for at least an hour and than afterwords the small choir which was a selective choir with stronger singers in it that had an extra musical number in the play as well as extra verses in other songs would rehearse.  I was cast as a rather minor role, I had no more than seven lines, but I loved my role, I was a dancer as well, and was in the small choir, and also had a one verse solo at the beginning of one of the group numbers.  It was around this time I took my moms cast info list and found his number and name which I put in my phone and eventually learned to remember Cuauhti’s name.  He had been cast as a role slightly larger than mine, he was a rather important character, all though he didn’t have too many lines, he was in both the large and small choirs like I was, and was in the dance scene though he was not a dancer, and also, he had scored a five verse solo to a very difficult song.  We had lots of mutual friends and sometimes we would end up hanging out together in groups.  One night me and a few of my girlfriends, Mikayla, Savanna, and Becca were hanging out at Mikaylas house.  We decided we would make cookies for a bunch of our guy friends, and Cuauhti made his way onto the list.  When we arrived at his house, Becca phoned his cell and told him to come outside, and he did.  In a tiny pink apron with oven mitts on. He was so confused as to what was going on, it was probably one of the cutest things I had ever seen, he had us come briefly in so he could show us the song he had been learning on guitar.  He look off the oven mitts and slung a guitar over his apron and started playing the song “I’m still here” by John Reznik.  I love that song, I will admit I was swooning.  It got to a part where he forgot the lyrics and I started singing them, he looked up at me and smiled.  Thats when it hit me like a tidal wave, oh no, I like him. 

For the next week I managed to talk myself out of it, but we were already becoming such good friends, we texted each other all the time and we could just be honest with each other.  He could make me laugh and smile like no one else could.  He honestly became my best friend.  I fell harder for him each day, and every friday I would fall even harder when I saw him in person and we would hang out and just talk about anything and everything.  I learnt about his past that he had recovered from, the past of drug addictions, a need for alcohol, his abusive father, his unhappy mother, and his crazy family with his four little sisters and little brother.  In return, he learnt about me being sexually abused as a little girl, he listened to my insecurities, and would comfort me.  Of course though, he had a new girlfriend that he had got near the beginning of the play that went to his school.  I was far to scared to make a move, so I was miserably in love with my best friend.  I thought out a million ways in my head to tell him how I cared about him, but I never had the guts to say it.  I didn’t tell any of my friends, I thought I was being so secretive, but it turns out everyone knew because apparently I looked at him like a lovesick puppy.  So months and months of rehearsals go by and I keep falling harder and harder for him, I would spend every moment with him I could, we would talk about everything from school, to family, to his girlfriend, to my nightmares.  We had each other, and i kept trying to tell myself that that was enough to just be friends with this amazing boy, but there was that part of me that couldn’t accept just remaining in the friend zone.  One night after rehearsal at the play we went and jumped in puddles, we got completely drenched, we were muddy and wet and laughing and I knew that if I didn’t tell you I would regret it.  But I didn’t know how to exactly say it, “Hey Cuauhti, so um I really like you, could you dump your girlfriend who you like so much and go out with me instead?” yea no. I wasn’t going to do that.  So I kept trying to keep it inside.  The show finally rolled around in May, somehow I got hooped into helping with makeup with the boys, when Cuauhti got to me I was so flustered.  I was so close to his face, I was holding it and biting my lip trying to concentrate but all I could think about was kissing him.  I tried to keep up a witty banter with him through out the ordeal, but came across in my mind and stupid and weird, but he laughed at all the right times and still made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.  Every time before I the spot light would come up on me I would look back to were Cuauhti was, he would encouragingly nod, giving me the strength to sing, and in return, I would do the same sitting down in the band pit when he sung his solo, even though I knew he couldn’t see me.  The play had four show dates, and at the end of the third night, one of Cuauhtis friends pulled me aside and told me something I didn’t believe.  He told me that Cuauhti likes me.  At first I was mad, I told Santiago to not tell lies that Cuauhti had a girlfriend he was crazy about, and that boys like Cuauhti, didn’t like girls like me, but Santi insisted.  For some reason I finally believed him and race into the gym and jumped into my brother Matthew's arms and squealed really high pitched “He likes me!!!!!!”  and I twirled around in circles and ran off into the bathroom were I tried to calm myself down.  The next night, I finally decided to tell him, I had wrote it out in a note on his Ipod, but chickened out and deleted it.  He begged me to write whatever I had deleted again, and I did.  Then I ran away and hid in the mic room.  The mic guys became my therapists, I told them everything, all my feelings about Cuauhti, how scared I was that I had screwed up our friendship and about all the things I loved about him.  I didn’t know that Cuauhti was sitting, right outside of the mic room, listening to every word that I spoke.  For the rest of the night I stayed in the mic room, they wouldn’t let Cuauhti in to see me just like I had asked, so it became my little safe haven.  After the final bows though, I finally got the guts to go over to Cuauhti, however his girlfriend was in the crowd, and he went to talk to her instead of me.  Okay so I’m going to gloss over this next part that includes me crying in my car for about forty-five minutes and skip to the part where I went back inside to find my ipod.  It wasn’t were I had left it in the mic room, thats when someone told me, Cuauhti had it.  He was holding my Ipod hostage until I would talk to him.  I was so mad, I never wanted to see him again, I felt like my heart had been ripped out.  But finally he found me, I had been trying to pretend I was okay by dancing around with a few friends in the green room when he found me. “Can I talk to you?” he asked, I ignored him and tried to keep dancing, “Katie please” he said and I tried to walk away but he grabbed my wrist and pulled me back, I started hitting his chest trying to get away but instead ended up hugging him.  He tried to explain to me that he liked me too, but that he also liked his girlfriend, finally my mother showed up, I took my ipod and left.  I was so upset at life.  I hated him, I hated her, and I hated myself.  I don’t know when it was that it turned around.  But the first concrete memory I have is when we ended up swimming in Arbor lake, our friends thought we were insane when we jumped in, It was still May and it was freezing!  We were both in our clothes and I couldn’t even swim, but he wrapped his arms around me.  Nothing had really changed, we were still best friends, but now...there was something else.  He dumped his girlfriend.  He asked me out.  Everyone said it wouldn’t last.  Well its been over six months.  Everyday we have our struggles, but we work them out, he is one of my best friends.  I wouldn’t trade him for anything in the entire world.

Dealing with breakups

This title is slightly misleading, don't worry, I didn't break up with my boyfriend, however one of my bestfriends and hers did.  They both are very special people to me but when put together the two of them were horrible.  They didn't trust eachother, they were both flirts and the relationship was riddled with holes as if it were swiss cheese.  Another thing is that a part of my own relationship with my boyfriend has hinged on our friends relationship, because she is my best friend, and he is his.  In the past we have tried getting the two back together but now we have decided its best they are split.  Why?  Because they bring eachother down.  I don't mean morally or anything, but emotionally.  They both believe they are putting there all into their relationship but it isnt working, so they blame the other person.  Its not uncommon for teenagers to be like this I hear, I am told my boyfriend and I are extremely uncommon with the fact we dont blame things on eachother.  But with dealing with my friends breaking up, I have been called to help out my best friend.  I've tried sending her inspirational little quotes, I made her a video, I text her like twentyfour seven always letting her know I love her, but I know she is still hurting, break ups suck.  Right now she is at the stage were she believes that its her fault the relationship didn't work, she believes it was because she wasnt "enough" for him.  Thats when I went all preachy.  I told her she was the most beautiful girl I had ever known, and that she was a divine daughter of God, and that if he didn't treat her that way, then he did not deserve to even be in her life.  I don't know if what I said had much impact on her, but it did on me, because I realized that I am a lot like her, that I blame myself for things, like how my old friendship went bad with my last boyfriend (I talk about him in a previous post) I have always just shrugged off the compliments that my boyfriend gives me, because i think he has to because he is dating me, but he sees something I can't see in the mirror.  He sees me, a daughter of God.

Moving on with life when your stuck on the past

I don't know where this entry is going to go, I guess its more to let my mind wander.  For the past two almost three years, I have had a friend.  At some points in my life he was more than a friend, but I devoted all my time to making him happy, I wanted more than anything for him to love me and care about me and to be happy with just having me being me.  But I was never ever enough to him.  He would like me for maybe a month max, before he would go find a prettier girl, or a girl who wasn't as quirky and blunt as I was.  He would tell me it was my fault things went wrong in his life, and that he wished he hadn't met me.  But other days he would be all buddy buddy, and we were best friends.  But what I realized last night, when he "accidently" hit me across the face, was that he doesn't love me.  I don't even mean in a lovey dovey way.  I mean that he legitly does not care for me in anyway, he hates me.  For the past few months, every since I've had a boyfriend, he has gotten more abrasive and hurtful in the things he says, but I kept trying, he was one of my bestfriends, and I figured I owed it to him to stick it out.  What I realized last night is that I don't owe him anything.  Everyone week I stand and say the young womans anthem "We are Daughters of our heavenly father, who loves us and we love him."  If I am truly a daughter of God, I don't deserve to be treated as if I were trash.  Someone recently told me that I had other people in my life, this person gestured to a picnic table, where almost all my friends were hanging out at.  They asked me what I wanted, I didn't understand the question until later.  What I want is to be happy, and as long as I force myself to remain in the friendship which tears down my selfworth, I am not going to be.  I don't know how I'm going to do this, but I pray that maybe one day, me and him can be friends again, after we have both grown up a bit.  Until then, I pray that I can become a better person, and that he finds happiness in life, as I intend to.

- Katie

Confronting friends

Lately I was a party, where almost everyone was mormon, but my guy friends were acting really inappropriate.  I'm not going to go into details but it was beyond inappropriate, its been getting worse for months and month how they all act, so I removed myself from the situation and went and cried.  I started talking to a few of my girlfriends and they also shared my concern, we had tried getting them to stop acting the way they did before but it just had escalated it, they think its funny or attractive or something, but its anything but.  My boyfriend finally noticed I was upset, and I told him what happened, I finally told him that I was going to tell the stake president about what was happening, because it had to stop.  Then the boys started acting inappropriate once more and my temper got the best of me, and I told them that they needed to stop how they were acting and that tomorrow I would be telling the stake president the things they were doing.  They thought it was amusing and laughed it off, but finally they grasped that I was serious.  It has been one of the hardest things in my life to do, standing up to my best friends and telling them I was going to turn them in.  I sat and cried in a corner and pleaded with God for strength because I knew I had done the right thing, but I had gone about the wrong way trying to accomplish it.  My boyfriend came to find me and sat with me, he told me how proud he was of me for sticking up for whats right regardless of the consequences, that he knew that he needed to be a better influence or something along those lines, I was completely baffled.  I had not done this to be an "example".  But a few of the boys have talked to me since, and told me that they agreed they had gone too far, they appologized to me and told me they were going to stop.  I don't know if I was some sort of catalyst to making them stop behaving that way, but I am thankful that they still speak to me after I yelled at them.  My temper is something I need to work on, but in this case...I suppose it got the job done.

- Katie

How I lost my Father

On September 6th of 2011, my Dad finally took his last breath.  It had been a quick and sudden death with very little warning.  We had spent out summer out at our cabin and had a amazing time, his back hurt a bit, but that wasn't unusual so we wrote it off, however he started getting really sick.  We went home a day early, slept, and then the next morning when he wasn't any better, in fact he was worse, my Mom took him into the hospital.  A few hours later, me and my brother Alex got a call, we had to come to the hospital fast.  Me and Alex headed and met our grandparents and other two brothers there along with a few other extended family members.  We were told that my Dads bowels were dying and they were going to go into surgery, and that it was risky.  They allowed us some time alone with him before he went into the surgery though, he had his parents, his wife, his three sons, and his baby girl around his bedside, he was tired and hurting, but told us how much he loved us.  Through my tears I asked him to tell me one final bedtime story, its called the schnigginfritz, it was a story he had made up back when my older brothers had been little, because he would tuck us into bed each night and tell us a story, but some nights he would be too tired to read one, so he created one.  After he told us the story, he gave his wedding band to Alex and said "Take good care of that, I'll be wanting it back" and gave me his engineering ring.  With his very little strength he gave me a hug as I left the room, the last words I know my Father heard me say were "See you in a few hours Dad".   I did see him in a few hours, just not in the way I had thought.  The surgery had not been successful, they couldn't find any live bowel tissue, but they left him open, saying they would try operating again.  They tried once more a day or so later, but again there was no live tissue, they tried one final time before the announced it was futile, that my Daddy could not live.  I couldn't be there when they turned off the life support, it was too hard.  I was at home, talking to my boyfriend on the phone how scared I was when my Aunt Karen told me that it happened, that he was gone.  In that moment I had never felt so alone.  Nothing made sense, I was so angry with life, that God could take away my Daddy from me when I still needed him, I was even mad at my Dad for leaving me, even though I knew it wasn't his choice.  Everyone else was still at the hospital other than my aunt Karen and I, so we just cried together.  Losing my Dad was not in the plans for my life, but I remembered a talk that had been given at EFY, it had been the thursday night, my cousin had actually been the session director, he called up a boy named Jaden, Who told us about the death of his brother which had happened right before EFY, and how much the atonement meant to him.  It didn't just mean we were forgiven of our sins, it meant we were worthy to enter heaven, and that one day we would be able to see those who we had lost.  Steve (my cousin) had called me earlier that week and talked to me about it.  I cried so hard, I missed my Dad, and I did not understand what was happening, but I knew if anyone deserved to go to heaven, that it was my Dad.  I miss him more than anything, and I still don't understand why he had to go, but I know he is in heaven, My Dad was and is my hero, I will always be his little girl, one day, I will be with him again, until then, I will continue to pray for the strength to continue.

- Katie

So I am starting this "BLOG"

Hi,
My name is Katie and I'm a sixteen year old girl, I'm a member of the church of jesus christ of latter day saints, and I'm proud to be.  I have decided to make a blog about my day to day life, the things I feel, the things I think.  Mostly this is for my own good, but if I can strengthen others along the way, then I will feel extremely blessed.  This blog will be covering a lot of stuff.  Dealing with highschool, the death of my father, financial troubles, quarrels with siblings, dating, entertainment, pretty much anything and how I try to keep my life clean in the sight of my heavenly father.  If your reading this, than you should know I have a testimony of the true restored gospel of Jesus Christ, I have never done a blog or anything like it before so this is going to be a lot of trial and error but I'm going to try anyways.  Talk to you soon!

- Katie