New beginnings are often disguised as painful endings.

-Lao Tzu

If you’ve hung around these parts long enough, you know there are very few things that I allow to define me.  Writer is one.  Wife, another.  Believer, for sure.  And football wife.

I told you about how my marriage was untraditional.  How being a football wife involved sacrifices most would never assume.  It’s hard for outsiders to understand what kind of toll it can take on a family.  People forget the long hours the coaches put in and never know that they rarely see much reward.  It’s not an easy lifestyle to keep up with.  It’s unstable.  And the further in to it you get, the harder it becomes.

Before I get into this, know that the five years we put into the game were important.  They were hard, but they were wonderful.  But we are no longer a football family.

I’ve seen my husband more in the last 6 months than I have in the last 5 years.  We’ve eaten more meals together.  We’ve spent more time together with friends.  We’ve seen our families and we’ve taken trips.  We’ve sat on the couch both dozing off to some random television show.  We’ve gone to the gym together and made new friends.  We’ve had conversations about nothing, laughing until we cry at the randomness.  I’ve fallen more in love with the man who was a shadowy figure creeping in at all hours of the night the last five years.

If he came home tonight and said he thinks he made a mistake, that he misses the game, we’d dive back in.  I’d sit in a stadium every Saturday for the rest of my life if that’s what he wanted.  Once married to the game, it’s hard to get out.

I won’t get into the details of how it all went down.  That’s unimportant.  But the longer I sat, holding on to this secret, the more I realized it’s just a part of life.  People move on from the lives they thought they wanted.  

It wasn’t an easy decision.  One we discussed to death and prayed constantly about.  Whenever you decide to redefine yourself, it takes some time.  It takes some tears.  It takes a lot of back and forth, hoping you didn’t make a mistake.  But that’s the case with any kind of risk, really.  You never know for sure until you just do it.  Close your eyes, jump, and hope for the best.

We jumped.  That’s part of the reason we moved to Charlotte.  When we cut the cord and took that first gasping breath of civilian air, we realized the options were limitless.  We could go and do and be whatever we wanted to be.  And that was such a liberating feeling, though a little sad.

Though our hours are much more in sync these days, I don’t think it’ll really hit either of us until fall rolls around.  Until that first game day Saturday that we spend at the pool or…shock…sitting in a stadium as spectators ourselves.

Life does this.  The plans you think you have just aren’t the right ones after careful consideration.  And it’s okay to admit that.  It’s okay to think about what you want.  What is best for you, for your family, for the life you really want, and to go after that.  Whatever it is.  

And there you have it.  The final piece in this whole Charlotte puzzle.  The truth.  It feels…weird.  But it’s good.  Important.  Different.

And we’re just fine.