I found myself within him

" Holding hands is a promise to one another, just for a moment the two of you don’t have to face the word alone " - From Quote on diary.me

This what I always hoped to find in a partner I would choose to give myself to. For me, it just happen later in life and a way I never thought it would. 

It all started three years ago, when I starting a journey to find who I was as an adult with Cerebral Palsy. I was told from a friend if you type "Cerebral Palsy" in Facebook seach, you would find a whole world on Facebook of different groups for people with Cerebral Palsy. After doing this for awhile I got the idea of starting my own Facebook group with the things I knew about Cerebral Palsy and the things I wanted to know. 

As I was doing some research, I came across a story on mycpchild.org It was a story about a man with Cerebral Palsy that was deaf. The story hit me like a bolt of lightning and something stirred inside as I read about Jack Runser. With all the odds up against him, he overcame his CP, to pursue his dreams of becoming a bodybuilder. Reading this just put some kind of spell or whatever on me, like at the beginning of some cheesy Hallmark movie. 

Three months later, I a new person asked to join my group, which I allowed. We started talking and I felt this attraction to him almost immediately, but I needed to go slow because I’m an adult now and loved what I was doing with the group, so didn’t want to jeopardize that in any way.

 

We started out slow, he asked if he could send me some articles about him - I said yes and gave him my email and he sent them. As I was reading one of his stories, it never dawned on me (until a few hours later thinking about the story) that this person that I was talking to was somehow familiar…I had read something about him before. I concentrated on remembering and then I went back and looked at mycpchild.com. There it was! The story I had just read, (the same one I read three months before) the story that gave me that "hallmark movie spell" feeling. 

For the first few weeks I kept pushing it away and going back because I’m never a person to follow my heart. ( Jack, is a person that follows his heart in everything he does, I’m more cynical because of who I am and the hurt that I experienced when I did follow my heart) I also never thought I would go for anyone with Cerebral Palsy let alone someone who was deaf as well.

After about a month of talking online, we called each other on the phone. That was very new to me because although I was talking to Jack, we had a third thing between us and it wasn’t the computer. It was the phone interpreter. ( most likely a woman voice). Trying to get to know someone of opposite sex through a female is very weird. 

Months later it was time to make a decision. We thought if is this was going to be more then pen pals we should make plans to actually meet, so after the holiday season of 2016 we started to make those plans (Jack can come and go whenever he wants, I however still live my parents). 

Living with my parents added a whole new dimension as I had to get their permission. They didn’t want there little girl to get hurt but they also were afraid to open up our home to someone I met on the internet (my father being a cop, sees the world through a cop’s eyes). After many talks with Jack and with my parents we all agreed that it was a green light to move forward with meeting each other.

We made plans for end of March for a four day weekend, with some conditions from my parents. He could not sleep at the house because we truly only knew each other from the internet, we couldn’t a 100% alone the first day or two until we all got to know each other better.

Jack had taken a 15-20 hour Greyhound bus from where he lived to where I lived.

All this stuff seams juvenile, I know but when you have disability (for me everything has to go step by step or else I will go off the deep end, because I have done that before in my life. In someways having any kind of disability, means we are more sheltered than others. That causes immaturity and social awkwardness in some ways. I know with me, this is true when it comes to relationships with the opposite sex). I wanted this to be my chance to prove to myself that I could do something as an adult. The weekend went well, though I felt like a teenager, because really I never got to be a teenager in that way before. 

Everything I hoped for came true. We stayed true to who we were, from what we we talked about. Since then, he comes for a visit every six months. As much as I would like to travel to him, my disability won’t allow my right now. Because we take things slow and step by step it can be hard but because of who I am and my anxiety and imagination (that can get away from me), I accepted that have to take things like this slowly, it makes so much easier to do so because Jack is wonderful because he sees that in me. 

For both Jack and I, we can be opposite in some way and similar in other ways. We are a great balance for each other because, on one hand, I slow him down when he wants to go head on with things and he pulls me out of my comfort zone. Since that first meeting, he has stayed at the house and we go away alone together. It is a whole different thing when we are alone because we have to work off each others’ strengths and weaknesses: he’s my legs and I’m his ears!

The one thing that I have learned from Jack, is that the picture that I had of what I thought a relationship should be (my criteria) was not accurate. I have learned there was never a blue print or event a dream that you can make up. When you meet the one you are meant to be with, you just go with what best for you as a couple - those things that that make you one and makes your imperfections seem perfect. 

I love you with all my heart Jack!