Dear mom,
I believe I learned more about love from two people who showed it for us and for eachother long after their marriage was over than I ever would have from two people who stayed together because they thought it was the only option.
I'm not saying it was always easy. On you, on dad, or on us. And I'm not saying there weren't times when it was difficult to put all your feelings aside for the sake of Neal and I. I'm not saying there weren't times where you probably wished it would have played out differently; where you wondered "what could I have done differently to change this outcome?"
At the end of the day and at the end of your time here with us, Neal and I witnessed a love story from start to finish. It may have ended as a completely different kind of love than the kind that was there when we first entered this world and this family, but the beginning, end, and all types of love in between were all equally important for us to learn and observe.
I will always remember the reactions people would give when we tried to explain the dynamic of your relationship..."yeah, my parents are divorced but my dad loaned my mom his van to drive to florida while he (uncomfortably) squeezes into her Sebring convertible." To us, your partnership never ended. Your support for your kids never wavered and it never changed or lessened regardless of the circumstances between the two of you.
Through my own journey of accepting that I was the product of a relationship that did not work out, I gained character and strength. I am who I am because I am the child of divorced parents, just as I am who I am because I am here on this earth without you. I am stronger, wiser, and hopefully a better person because of all the curveballs life has thrown my way.
I often told people the reason you and I remained so close and didn't have the struggles and issues that so many teenage girls and their moms dealt with was because we didn't live together. Looking back on it now, I'm sorry for breaking your heart. When you gave me the choice of living situations, I chose dad and I never looked back and I never changed it. The last time I lived with you, I was 12 year old. You dropped me off or walked me home every night, and you left to go to your own home. I know that must have hurt, but I also know that was you just showing me yet another kind of love: the kind that puts those you love before yourself, regardless of how much it kills you.
Because of you and dad, I know how to love Stormi in more ways than one. I know how to love her as my better half and absolute love of my life. But I also know how to love her as my best friend. I know how to love her as the mother of our fur children (screw all of you who are judging me right now!) and I'll know how to love her as the mother of our future human children some day (I'm gonna be such a great dad-mom!)..and I know how to love her as just the incredible human being that she is.
I hope I'll always choose love over anything else; the way you and dad did together, the way you always did, and the way dad continues to do for us now. Thank you for marching to the beat of your own drummer and for doing things your own way, regardless of how others reacted to it. If a handbook were ever written on how to be gracefully and lovingly divorced, there is no doubt in my mind that you and dad would be the authors.
