Finding Unconditional Love

I saw the cupid quest on squidoo and have decided to share my story with you.

As a child I lived the ex-pat life in Brunei a beautiful tropical island off the coast of Borneo. My father, a marine architect had a partnership out there. It was truly a fantastic life.

The only problem was that there was no schooling at the time for europeans over the age of 11 so all the 11+ children were shipped back to their origins and attended boarding school. So, my big brother, all of a sudden was absent. I went to the local school. My life was spent swimming, going to school, swimming, going home. It was a little lonely, well until the end of term when suddenly there was a huge influx of children all back from boarding school.

One of them was Rob, we became friends from the moment we met, as he loved life just as much as me, we would swim together, ride motorbikes on the beach together, sit together. You name it we were together. At that tender age I fell in love with this hugely charismatic, funny, gentle, strong boy. I never told him as he was 4 years older than me and when you are young that is a HUGE age difference.

Life went on, and his family eventually left Brunei, I made sure to get all contact details as by now I was a teenager and knew I loved this man, still he never knew. We kept in touch, I wrote to him. He phoned me. Then it trailed off, by now he was living with someone and I had gone to college.

I had lost Rob. Then I found my address book and found his mothers number, YES she answered and gave me his contact details, so once again we were in touch, laughing and joking and just being in bliss at having each others friendship again. By this time I was working and living with my then fiancee I arranged to go and see Rob, 3 days to go, he dissappeared. I could not find him for love nor money. Years and years passed, I searched and searched but never found him.

In the meantime I got married to a man I thought loved me. We had a 20 year period of basically ignoring each other. I would go to work, come home look after the children, he would go to work, go to the pub, come back, go to our room and play on his x-box. At the time I thought this was normal until 2008 when, I realised things were wrong. I was not happy, at all. I was lonely and it hit me that my drinking had become less of a relaxant and more of a nightly habit. Inside I was screaming for something, I just did not know what it was.

I took up exercise, well I say took up, it more like became an addiction. I lost 3 stone and gained one hell of a lot of confidence. But, I was still drinking.

Then one night as I sat by my computer on 'Facebook' vainly staring at the screen desperately hoping for some human interaction, it happened. A friend request, a friend request from Rob! As you can imagine it did not take long to reply! I was over the moon.

I got his telephone number and called him the next day with my opening gambit of, "well you did say you would phone me back, it has only been 14 years!". Once again we hit it off straight away, I laughed like I hadn't laughed in years. We talked for hours and hours. He then sent me an email that changed my life.

The gist of it was "Dear Cathi, I am writing this because I have to. Please do not be shocked, it will not change our friendship, I will always be here for you. Cathi I love you. I have loved you all my life, just never told you. Now you know, I am not sure how you will take this. I will understand if you think it freaky and never talk to me again. I just trust in the fact that you will understand. Forever Yours Rob"

At first I WAS shocked, this is the man I had loved all my life, but, I was still married. True my marriage was not on the rocks more on the precipice of a titanic drop. I guess when you husband gets drunk and says the line "I have never loved you in 20 years" you kind of know its time to bail. I phoned Rob and we talked and talked, I explained what was going on with my marriage, he tried to help me save it. He did not run in, and grab me away, he actually gave me all the advice he could in order to repair the irreparable. It was a phone call that my eldest daughter made that put the final push to my back on the precipice. She had made a stupid call to him, and I had told her to phone up and apologise, this was when my husband asked to speak to him, they had chatted in the past. He stood in front of me, his back to me and said to Rob "my marriage to Cathi is over". My husband actually told Rob before he told me!

After this this my marriage became a dangerous place to be, after being threatened with a knife I decided enough was enough. I phoned Rob and told him, I also told him I loved him, I had always loved him. We were both in heaven and hell at the same time, he was in the middle of the same problems as me, his partner had told him she hated him and wanted him to leave. At this point we had decided that we wanted to be together but it was a difficult time. One night after another incident with my husband being drunk and threatening me Rob advised me to stop drinking as I was in danger and had to be on my guard. He wasn't the first person to notice this.

It was that night as I sat in front of the computer (again) hoping that Rob would come on line, that I had what I can only describe as an out of body experience, no not a drunk as a skunk experience as I am sure some might think, there was a definite difference. (trust me by now I knew!)

As I sat there, half drunk, wine bottle at my side I left my body. I found myself standing behind myself and a voice was saying "this is not how it is meant to be", then I immediately seemed to ping back inside myself. That instant I poured (the little) that was left in the bottle down the sink. I realised that I had been given a chance, by whom or what I did not know at the time. All I knew was I wanted to be happy and I never wanted to drink again. I am happy to report, I never have.

That night was the first step to realising something Rob later told me. In order to love anyone you have to love yourself.

After another frightening incident with my husband, I phoned a friend and asked if I could move in for a couple of weeks. I explained the situation and by that afternoon I had left the family home. I had left my home, my husband, and my children. I cannot begin to tell you how much this hurt. I had no option but to leave, I was TOLD in no uncertain terms I had no option. I was scared. I left. But to leave without my children tore me to pieces. My eldest daughter had turned against me and my youngest daughter was caught in a cross fire. She came to see me every day after school but her father would not let her stay with me. It took me three weeks to get myself a new house, not only that, but I also sped down to Cornwall and picked up Rob, we moved in together. It was bliss. But it seemed I had a heavy price to pay. My children. My husband was using my youngest child as a stick to beat me with, I wanted vengeance, I wanted to tear him limb from limb but Rob just held me and told me to trust in the fact it would be OK. Not to fight, not to enter into arguments. Keep texting Katie telling her I loved her, phoning her keeping as much contact as I could.

I took his advise then three months later my daughter was living with me as one night she refused to go home to her father. I phoned him and explained what was going on, to my ultimate surprise he did not fight back, he just said OK.