HI guys,

I’m on a roll now….so I thought that after the posts that I have already done, I would throw something in that would brighten things up just a bit….and its all about that greatest thing in the world…LOVE.

After everything I had been through, I was now more alone than ever, I never thought that I would find love again.

In the meantime our wonderful Government introduced the bedroom tax, and as I was in a 3 bedroomed House and unable to work because of my mental health, I was forced to move out of the house where my children had been brought up.  I had lived there since just before Louise was born in 1991, and now the year was 2013, so a total of 22 years!! I asked the housing association who owned my house if I could be considered for one of the flats at the back of my house and I needed my support network around me, as Stacey lived facing me, and my mum lived in the flats round the corner I thought this was the answer.

Eventually they agreed to let one of their flats to me, but the downside of it was they gave me just 3 days to move 22 years of not just my life but my children’s upbringing, a 3 bedroomed house into a 1 bedroomed flat. Needless to say this was a monstrous task, everyone chipped in helping me to pack things away, doing tip runs, trying to sell things that were too good to throw away but not being able to take them with me.  This was a very emotional time for me, so many memories, good times, bad times, times I would rather forget, and times that I wished I could turn the clock back on and re-live again, but pause in the moment of time.  I remember at one point sitting on my bed in my bedroom and just breaking down in tears, one of my friends Aaron who had come to help walked in and just hugged me telling me everything was going to be ok…..thanks Aaron that was just what I needed, it really was.

I started to come around to the idea that as the saying goes, “as one door closes, another one opens” and thought this was the time to close the chapter on the last disastrous few months and start a new chapter of my life.

The move went ahead without any hitches, and I finally sat down in my new living room, feeling quite proud of what we had all accomplished, but I still had things to sort out in the old house, and the housing was in my case each and every day.

Anyway fast forward a couple of months and I decided it was time to start thinking about meeting people, I told myself it would be what Ste would have wanted for me, everyone kept telling me he wouldn’t have wanted me to be on my own forever. The time felt right, he had been gone almost 2 years.

I started to chat to this guy call Barry, I remember it like it was yesterday, it was 10th June 2013, the day before what would have been my wedding anniversary, we chatted all day long, and well into the night. We made arrangements to meet the following weekend, we talked about absolutely everything, from our relationships, children, what our favourite kind of music was, and I was pleasantly surprised that we had a lot in common.

The day after, Baz messaged me asking if I was ok, because I had told him the significance of the date, I told him that I was fine, he said that he would leave me alone for the day if I preferred, but I disagreed, he was like a breath of fresh air to me.

Anyway, cut a long story short we arranged to meet that night, I may not have made the best decision at the time by inviting him to my flat, but in the moment I wasn’t thinking about any ramifications that could come of it.  As he walked in, ( I felt fine, a tad nervous but I had been in the pub that afternoon so had a bit of dutch courage).  We where sat in my garden when he turned to me and said “you have a visitor”, and who should walk through the back gate but Louise…..”Oh my god” I thought, so i had to explain to her who he was, needless to say she wasn’t very happy that I had invited him to my flat, but you have to be a bit rebellious sometimes don’t you?? hahahaha

Anyway,  we sat and talked for hours, I made him that many cups of coffee it’s a wonder he wasn’t climbing the walls, We agreed to see each other the next night, and the next night , and the night after that….and sooner or later we were seeing each other every single night, apart from Thursdays when he had to go to his Poker tournaments that he ran.

As time went on I could feel that I was beginning to develop feelings for Baz, and I thought, no, I hoped that he was feeling the same. I was right, we were falling for each other. I never thought that I could ever love again let alone BE loved again.

He brought sunshine where there was always dark clouds, he brought music back into my life where there was only silence, but most of all he brought love and happiness back into my life. Now I know this sounds so soppy, and I can imagine the looks on my girls faces after reading this paragraph, but after feeling so rotten about myself, this WAS how he made me feel.

We went out on days out at the weekend, taking me to places that I had never been before, we did things together, where as in my last marriage, even though I loved Ste so much, we didn’t really do thing like that….we just didn’t. So this was another part of my life that was kind of being re-born, to be honest as daft as it may sound to some people, I actually felt like this as well.

As time went by, our love blossomed more and more, I couldn’t imagine my life without him. Everyone  could see the difference in me and commented on how happy I always Looked.

We got engaged, and we decided to set the date for our wedding. I asked Baz to pick a date and out of thin air he said “26th September”, I looked at him and asked why he picked that date he said that it just popped into his head. and asked me why, “because that’s my dad’s birthday” I told him.  So we agreed that we would get married on my dads birthday.

We found the perfect location in North Wales, a country hotel called Plas Hafod.  So the date was booked, a few weeks later I was looking on the website of the hotel and noticed that they were doing an offer, that if  you got married in April of the same year, 2015, they would reduce your package by a massive £500, plus add extras to it, so I showed this to Baz, and said that I thought we should change the date to 25th April, he looked at me and said “you know what date that is don’t you?” I looked at him with a quizzical look on my face, “well Penny (his niece) is getting married on that date, its Denise’s (his sister)  wedding anniversary and the 26th is my mum and dads wedding anniversary”….”Well I said that’s it, its a good omen, we HAVE to change the date”, we went ahead and changed the date to 25th April 2015.

The day arrived, all the preparations, had been made, we had moved an re-located to Wallasey from Bolton, and we were about to start the rest of our lives together, and I couldn’t have been happier than I was on that day!!!

My Uncle (who has always been my favourite and holds a special place in my heart) agreed to give me away, and we had the most amazing day.

Even though I still suffer from depression and some days are very much worse than others, it shows that you can get to a point in your life where you just know that meeting that 1 person can completely turn your life around.

I whole heartedly believe that Baz was sent to me by Ste, because he knew that he would make me happy and always look after me, because we actually met on what would have been our wedding anniversary, I thank Ste for that, because even from the grave he was making sure that I was looked after.

I’m in a much better place than I was 5 years ago, but I still suffer from really bad days, but there are more good days now than there was before.

Thats all for this blog.

Much Love people

Jackie xx