Today is mine and my husband’s 10 year wedding anniversary.

I am feeling very loved and here’s your warning… this post is going to be bursting with cheesy, gross couple stuff. Feel free to tag out now if you need to.

As I write this post, fan whirling desperately at my feet trying to cool the oven masquerading as a living room I’m sitting in, my husband is remotely working in our oven masquerading as a bedroom. Covid-19 has put a stop to any plans we’d once excitedly thought about how to celebrate our big day but today, right here and now, it doesn’t matter like I thought it would.

This man.

This man is amazing.

We have spent 10 years married, 15 years together as a couple and so much has changed through that time. We were different people when we first met. Saplings reaching out through the dirt, longing for those strong roots. We found each other in a whirlwind of smoking sections, penguin mugs, dropped kebabs and whispered, sweetest compliments. Kisses at bus stops, hand-holding, treading softly, both carrying the heavy weight of our pasts but still with full, young and excited hearts.

We both take offence as a family with additional needs when people exclaim Ray is a hero for staying with me through my increased disability and need for care. To us, our love is strong, interdependent and essential, so to suggest he would walk away from me due to something we feel is so insignificant compared to our relationship is insulting to us. I feel that I need to acknowledge this today though, as yes, of course he is my hero…. he’s just always been my hero.

I chose him and hoped with all my heart that he’d choose me too.

From the beginning I knew his resilience. I knew his power and his gentleness. We grew from saplings in that dirt, entwined and stronger together. We’ve faced more than most will ever know. We became the trees, we grew our own forest, we continue to hold and lift each other up.

Happy anniversary, my love.

Forever and always yours.