Four years.

As I've gotten older, I find myself saying "where has the time gone?!" a lot more often. This situation had me saying the same thing, too.

My four-year wedding anniversary is today.

Four years ago, in a courthouse in Lawton, J and I got married. With close friends, family and our 3-month-old as witnesses, we said our vows and made it forever. While it wasn't the wedding I'd always dreamed of, the outcome was still the same - so it didn't matter.

Four years later, we have been through so much more than I ever thought we would go through. Air Force, living in separate states, deployment, losing a child, issues with JJ...we have had a LOT of things test our marriage. Some days, I didn't think we'd make it. Some days, we talked about separating. But after four years of very high highs and very low lows, we are still together. Still strong. Still happy.

No one said a long distance relationship would be easy - and that's pretty much all we know is the long distance stuff. But we both hope this will end soon, that we will all be together in the same place. Until then, though, we rely on phone calls, text messages, FaceTime and the occasional card to get us through. When you love someone, when you've found the person you know you want to be with forever and a day, you just make it work. I'm so glad that we've made it work, that I'm still in love with my husband, that he and I are still together through everything we've been through.

Yes, he and I don't always see eye to eye on things. We are very much two different people with two different sets of interests [well, besides sports and cheesecake]. But at the end of the day, what matters is that I love him, and he loves me. I am so lucky to have him here, so lucky that he's stuck by my side through all of the random crap that life has put us through. He isn't who I imagined I'd be with, but he's who I needed and wanted.

I still can't believe it's been four years. I feel like we've been together for so much longer, but that's just because our marriage has literally been tested to the breaking point on multiple occasions. What hasn't broken us has made us stronger, and J is definitely a very strong man. He's been my rock, my other half, and my joy for 8.5 years now; I hope that we have many, many more years together with us, JJ and, heaven willing, more children.

Happy Four Years to the one man [who is not my dad] who has put up with my obsession with Justin Timberlake, my crazy couponing habits, my love of the right kind of orange [sorry babe, but ostate orange is way better than burnt orange], and my tendency to wear flip flops all year round. I'm so blessed to still have you by my side. Here's to forever and a day. I love you.

We totes love each other. Totes.