Six months later.

(Disclaimer - this is a very uncharacteristic post for me, as it's not a moan or a bitch. It's actually pretty soppy. If you do not like a PDA, then this will make you vomit. You have been warned...)

So, six months have been and gone with Mr A. Don't get me wrong, it's hardly been a fairytale, with ups and downs and a fair few "he's an idiot" moments (and I'm sure this feeling would be reciprocal, if he were to have his say), but things are now absolutely amazing. I'm finally in a relationship I enjoy being in, without being controlled or changed, and my life is still very much my own. I don't have any of the anxiety I usually have in relationships because I still decide what I want to do and am in no way having any decisions about my life made for me.

We bounce off of each other, have such a laugh together and are definitely in love. Actual, real love; love like neither one of us has experienced before. He told me five months ago that he didn't know what "love" was, but now I know he does. He tells me, yes, but I can also tell from the way he looks at me. When I'm cooking or just sorting out some washing or something equally mundane, I sometimes catch him watching me with these amazing eyes and a unique smile, one I only ever see when he's about to tell me he loves me. So I know, and so does he. And he's even beginning to open up with the soppy stuff. When I went back to Plymouth for a week earlier in the holidays, when I got back, he looked me straight in the eyes and said, "don't ever go away for that long again".

This, coming from a guy who would, six months ago, never have said anything even remotely soppy, and I know things are good. I feel more secure now, having felt quite insecure in the first place due to his constant desire to keep me at a distance, refusing to admit that he actually liked me, but now all that silly crap has stopped, he's opened up, I'm more able to open up and things are really amazing.

He is even meeting my family next week. I'm so nervous I may cry, although I don't know why. My family have been lovely to much worse guys than Mr. A in the past, and I'm sure he will be fine. I guess I just really want them to like this one, you know?

So what is the point of this post? Just to document the passing of the last six months and to admit to you lot that, as much as I moan and bitch sometimes, I am actually very happy. I'm in a relationship with a guy who I adore, who adores me, who makes me better and who will never try to change me.

Happy Summer :)

I can see clearly now my brain has gone.

I still remember singing that line over the real lyrics in primary school singing assembly and it still makes me laugh.

In all seriousness, I am much clearer on things now than I was yesterday. Thank you so much to everyone who commented and reassured me that I was at least, in some parts, right and that I should not settle for someone who was settling with me... if that makes sense.

I had a discussion with him last night about it all, and he was upset that I had been upset by it. He told me that we don't need words and names to describe how we're feeling because he knows that he likes me more than he has ever liked anyone before, that I'm the only person he's ever wanted to see as much, the only person he has ever enjoyed sleeping in the same bed with and the only person things have ever felt this easy with. Whether I believe him or not, he knows that he loves me and that even if I don't believe him now that he's going to convince me.

He is so right (although don't tell him that I said that). We're both happy, that's all that matters.

I'm more than happy. They haven't invented words for how happy I am with things so far. We just fit, we want the same things from life and each other, we feel the same things and that's what's important. Not the words that we put on things.

So, I'm officially signing my brain out of this relationship. Clearly when I over-think the things he says, I end up more confused. If I'm confused or upset, I'll ask, rather than stew on it for a few hours before asking him. He doesn't always mean the things that he says in the way they come across, so really, what's the point in worrying when there is probably nothing to worry about?

So, thanks brain. You've served me well thus far but I think we are pretty much done here.

(Maybe jump in if I'm about to do something stupid though, yeah? Don't let me ignore any red-alerts...)

My boyfriend doesn't believe in love.

Yesterday, he kept asking me if I loved him. I dodged around the question a bit: we've been together for a couple of months and whilst I am falling head over heels for him, I'm not quite there yet.

Then, this morning in a different conversation, he said he didn't know what love was. So, I called him on it. I asked him why he was so desperate to hear me say that I loved him if he had no intention of saying it back to me. He then asked how I was so sure that he wouldn't say it to me, so we had a bit of a discussion.

He said that he doesn't know what love is, but he was with someone for 4 years so that must have been love. He thinks that he couldn't possibly like me any more than he already does, so that must be love, but that he doesn't know what love is and he's just assuming this is it.

I tried to convince him that he's wrong - if you have any doubts, have to think about it or somehow convince yourself that you are in love then that just is not it, but he wasn't having any of it. He's adamant that as much as he likes me now, that's as much as it's ever possible to like anyone, but yet he still thinks love doesn't exist.

That can't be it, surely? Don't get me wrong, I have never been in love before. Not really, and I guess the reason I walked away from relationships which were 'ok', or 'good enough' despite the person I was with being in love with me was because I thought love was this amazing feeling which completely changes everything and it was something worth taking a risk to have. It's this thing which erases all doubts, it takes over every thought in your mind and makes you feel that kind of scared which is actually good for you. When you are with them, you feel like you are the only and most amazing girl in a packed room, you feel as if nothing you could do or say would ruin things because you are on a pedestal in their eyes and not only that, but they make you believe it is actually true, no matter what you think of yourself.

Maybe I have been raised on too many Disney films, but that has to be true, it just can't be any other way. Thinking about couples I know, just having strong feelings for each other can't be enough to spend 53 years with someone who must drive you round the bend most of the time; to forgive them when they betray you or to hurt so much when they do that even 17 years won't be long enough for you to get over it; to be prepared to change your whole life and move to a different continent just to wake up next to them every day; to wait by their bedside for years whilst their mind and body are gradually destroyed... just liking someone a lot is not enough to put up with those things so that absolutely, 110% cannot be it. It just can't be.

Anyway, love must exist. I see it in my Grandparents. I see the strength my Grandma shows when my Grandad goes for his cancer treatment, I see the resilience she shows to him having become increasingly deaf through the years, to the strange and inexplicable things he does more and more often. Love must be the only thing that stopped her battering the daft git half to death years ago, it's the reason she cries herself to sleep now and the reason that she always stands up for him, no matter how insane he has been... Love does those things, not "like". Like just isn't powerful enough.

Call me an old romantic, and I didn't think that I was, but I refuse to believe what he says.

Someone please tell me that I'm right and that it's worth waiting for, worth fighting for... please?

Probably not the "Disney love" I meant thanks, Google...

A long over-due update.

This week has been absolutely amazing.

I did it. I gave him the letter. We talked and he listened to me, he understood and the whole thing went better than I ever could have imagined. We aired everything that was a problem, we talked about things we didn't even realise were causing problems and it felt great to be free of it all and to really have him listen to me. A lot of my suspicions were confirmed (mainly to do with other people butting their noses in) but the main ones were not. I know he loves me for the right reasons now, I know he always did and I'm only sorry it's taken me until now to realise it. But now it's out, we both know where we stand and at that moment, we sat in the restaurant and looked at each other, realising everything we had ever wanted and, when all is said and done, that we have nothing to lose but perhaps a whole lifetime of happiness to gain from trying again. I fell in love with him all over again in that second and from the moment he reached out and grabbed my hand, we took on a completely different relationship and laughed, joked and talked for hours.

Actually, not just hours. Days. This was last Tuesday, it is now Sunday night and I have just got back home. I could try to explain how amazing these last few days have been but they would not do it any justice at all because they have been the best few days I've had in years and suddenly, my future, as well as my present, seems so much brighter.

If only I didn't hate being at home now because you're not here.

And so the soppy, new relationship type thing starts. And I could not be happier.

Back to reality tomorrow. I have a classroom to sort...