It's Not Always Sunshine And Roses

One of the most difficult times in my life occured just three years ago.  Thank God I had Denise to help get me through it.  My husband and I had at that time been married for 11 years.  We had a 10 year old and 8 year old boy.  For years I had wanted 3 kids.  Two boys and a girl.  I had the 2 boys, but the prospect of having a girl wasn't looking so hot.  I had pretty much given up on it and my husband didn't want to have one at all.  Although I hadn't been on birth control for several years and we were not using anything to prevent pregnancy, my husband was completely against having another child.  That same summer I had been offered a new job as a school nurse.  It was a job that had great benefits-paid holidays and summers off!!  Could it get better than that?  Of course I accepted without hesitation!   I gave my 2 weeks notice at my then current job.  I was excited but it was hard to tell.  I felt horrible!  I was tired.  No, I was EXHAUSTED.  I didn't think much of it until my boobs started feeling sore.  I was late for my period, but that really wasn't (and still isn't) odd for me.  I rarely have a regular cycle.  But the sore boobs is what tipped me off.  I told my husband that I was going to get a pregnancy test.  He didn't respond too much.  I think he truly thought he was shooting blanks-which I don't understand why he thought that.  But, to be honest, I really didn't think I was either.  Since my periods were so irregular I really just thought it was a fluke.  I went ahead and took the test.  We all know what the results were.  If you haven't figured it out, it was positive!  I was ecstatic!!!  Shocked, but ecstatic!!  I couldn't believe it!!!!  I called my husband into the bathroom and excitedly told him.  His reaction was the extreme opposite of mine.  With a stone face he said "What?  You can't be.  You are starting a new job in two weeks.  The timing is horrible!"  No excitement.  No joy.  Nothing.  Two things happened.  I got really sad..... And then I got really mad.  He had already planned to take the boys to the park and play ball with them, so he took them and left me by myself to try and figure out what had just happened.  After the initial shock wore off, I called Denise.  She gave me the exact response I needed!   Elation!  She was so excited!  At the time, we were (ok still are) huge Twilight fans (Team Edward!).  We were waiting for New Moon to come out but had just finished reading the entire series together.  You will only understand this next part if you are a Twi-Hard.  She wanted to buy me a maternity shirt with the words "My Lil Nudger" printed on it.  We were already making plans.  She was talking about breast pumps and baby showers and I needed that!  The next day, I called my ob/gyn to make my appointment.  My husband and I weren't going to tell anyone about the pregnancy until we had been to the doctor.  They couldn't get me in for a week, which is eternity when you want something this important confirmed!  The day of my appointment came to me having to wake up at 4a.m. to go into the hospital to assist with a procedure.  I felt great!  I was sleeping great and very happy.  My husband still wasn't near as excited about the pregnancy as I was, but atleast the look of shock was gone from his face!  Things changed that day.  As I went to the bathroom that morning and wiped my privates, I noticed blood on the tissue.  I had gone through a miscarriage before and was almost sure that this was what it was, but I was hoping that it was just spotting from all of the changes occuring in my uterus.  The nurse in me knew, the mom in me was denying it.  Sucks to be in the medical field sometimes.   I knew my doctors office wouldn't be open for several more hours so I went to work, got done with the procedure and called the clinic.  They said I needed to come right in.  I hadn't told my husband up to that point.  I think I was afraid of his reaction, and rightly so.   I called him next and told him.  His reply?  "It's just Gods way."  Really?  That's all that SOB could say?  I have said I am a strong Christian before, but that is NOT what I needed to hear right then.  He asked if I wanted him to come with me to the doctor and I said not only no, but hell no.  Who did I call?  Denise.  She met me at the doctors office where it was confirmed that I was miscarrying.  I felt all alone except for her.  My parents were shocked by the pregnancy and even though they are good parents, didn't know what to say.  I understand to a point.  It's always somewhat akward in a situation like that.  My in-laws were the same way.  Not Denise though.  She stuck by my side the entire time.  Thank you Jesus for my friend (as I write this, tears still stream down my face because I know that without her friendship that time could have been a lot darker). My husband was still acting very non chalant about the entire thing.  After a couple of days of lab work to see if the pregnancy was going to leave my body on it's own, the doctor decided I needed to have a D&C done.  I was emotionally numb.  The only person I felt I had to lean on wasn't my husband, but my sister, my friend.  Denise.  For the next year  I held a lot of anger towards my entire family.  Especially my husband.  He was jealous that Denise filled the void from my loss.  And she is who I looked to for comfort.  I was mad at God for letting this happen, so I didn't turn to Him.  I still went to church regularly, but I sat through services, not listening.  I was in a fog.  I was depressed and angry.  And not one time when I was griping and moaning about what had happened did Denise ever tell me to get over it or anything like that.  She listened.  Finally, on Christmas Day something snapped in me and I killed my husband... Just kidding.  I needed to lighten the mood.  HAHA!  But something did snap and I know it was God, who never left me, telling me that I had a choice, continue to dwell on the child I didn't have, or love and cherish the two I do have.  I, of course, chose the latter.  My husband and I had a heart to heart where he apologized for his actions.  He knew I had lost some trust for him and he would have to work to get it back.  And Denise was there the entire time.  So thank you "H" for your help.  I love you dearly!

Ooh la la!!

So here I am once again to share the follies of a wonderful friendship!  I have to say that several of the MOST DARING things I have ever done in my life has taken place with my BFF Denise!  And what I am about to share is one of those times!!
This took place only 2 years ago.  I am a member of Cafemom which is a social site dedicated to moms.  I love this site 90% of the time (if you are going to have a social web site for women only you can guarantee their will be drama-hence the 10% of the time that I loathe this site!).  I am a member of several groups, one of them called "Married Sex" which people can discuss ways to pep up their sex life with their spouse, things that drive them crazy and many other things.  I was poking around (pun intended) this site for ideas when, low and behold, someone brought up boudoir photos.  They were even brave enough to post their pictures!  They were amazing!  Even women who were overweight and out of shape looked beautiful and said they even felt beautiful doing it.  They were doing this as a gift to their spouses!  What a great idea!!!  I knew I wanted to do it, but because I am very modest I would NEVER go to a professional to have it done.  It would have to be someone I was comfortable with.  That's where Denise came in.  As soon as I gathered up the nerve to discuss it with her, I called her and after some persuasion on my part, we decided we would do it.  The perfect date was coming up in October.  Her husband and oldest child and my husband and two sons were all going out of town to a college football game (Gun's Up for any Texas Tech fans).  Once they all hit the door, so did I!  I drove to Denise's house with my Nikon and lingerie in tow.  Denise lives about 30 miles away so the entire time I was driving I just kept repeating "I can't believe we are doing this."  I was nauseated because I was so terrified.  Denise is my very best friend and I love her dearly, but only two people have ever known me intimitely and they are my husband and my gynocologist.  Now I know that sounds like we were about to embark on something extremely raunchy with brown chicken brown cow music in the back round, but that's not true at all.  It's just that, like I said, I am VERY modest!  I grew up in a house of boys that made fun of you for having boobies, so I sure as heck didn't go around letting everyone see them!! 
The first thing we did when I got to Denise's house is pull out all of the, umm.....paraphanelia!  Their was enough make-up and jewelry around to make us look like a couple French flucies (Ihave no idea how to spell that)! After we got dressed...or undressed depending on how you want to look at it, our moment had arrived.  Since it was my idea, I posed first while Denise snapped away.  I truly think she was hoping she could take so much time doing my pictures that we would run out of time to do hers!  My response to that is HA!  If I am going to drive 30 miles to get naked, then by God, she is stripping down, too!
At first it was a little uncomfortable.  I am not exactly model pretty.  To be honest, I am working with 175 pounds on a 5'4" frame.  I am in between thick and super absorbant.  So on top of being modest about my naughty bits, I wasn't real happy about Denise seeing everything I had to offer (BTW we did not go south of the border).  I want to say this about my BFF.  She made me feel exquisite and beautiful.  I can't imagine a professional photographer doing a better job than her.  We tried to keep everything covered to leave something in the imagination of my husband, but we did have a wardrobe malfunction once.  One of the pictures  that a mom had shared on Cafemom was her laying on her back with a large wine bottle over her breasts.  It really was a very beautiful picture and I really wanted to use it.  That girl from the photo obviously had two, make it three very large gifts that she was working with. The first two being large breasts and the third being gravity (I truly wouldn't have put those three things together).  Listen, we taped my ta-ta's together, we taped them to the bottle (which was too small anyways) and if we could have taped them to stand at attention, we would have). It was just a matter of time before Denise, who was standing over me trying to get a picture of this,  was about to see nipple.  And I knew when it happened because she went from being very professional to not even looking me in the eye (I am not sure she would have been able to look me in the eyes anyways at that point).  All she could say was "ummmm....nipple."  It had happened!  Nipple slippage! You couldn't get me covered up quick enough!  For Pete's sake I went most of my childhood thinking I wasn't even supposed to have the dang things and now here one was poking out! It was at that point that I decided we were finished using that stupid bottle and I was getting dressed! 
Now it was her turn!  The night at this point was getting late and at first, we weren't sure we were going to be able to do her pictures (so she said).  I was very confident we could pull this off (I love puns).  She finally changed into what she was going to wear.  As I said in my earlier post, she really is a very pretty young woman (if she wasn't my BFF I would hate her) so she looked great!  Her favorite  outfit was a very pretty pair of lace undies, a pretty silk scarf and a gray fedora.  It was prefect because it covered in the perfect areas and the fedora was such an awesome addition!  She rocked it!  But, as said before, it was only going to be a matter of time before things started slipping out.  That's right, it was time for the sequel-The Nipple 2!  The scarf fell away.  It didn't fall off of her, just fell away, leaving her exposed.  I think I said "BOOB!" about 5 times before she finally realized what I was saying as she sat there in a squating position with her fedora tipped to the side.  It was a little uncomfortable.  Now I knew why she couldn't look at me when mine slipped out.  What's funny is obviously, we see boobs everyday when we look down, she and I are both in the medical field and have seen all sorts of boobs, but seeing each others boobs, wow....  I tell you, it's just not the same!  I don't care if boobs are boobs.  Call them what you will, but BFF boobs make you uncomfortable!Now, on a side note, I ordered the pictures and gave them to my husband as a Christmas gift.  He loves them and Denise knows exactly where they are located in case my husband and I are ever tragically killed.  Her mission is to locate and destroy!  She didn't order any, although she "says" she showed them to her man.  I am not sure I believe that!  LOL!  If I had to guess, she was being a good sport and supporting me on my perverted mission and deleted those bad boys as soon as time could allow her!  And if that is the case, I would just like to give Denise a big thank you for going through that ordeal with me!  Only a true BFF would take naked (almost naked-:) ) pictures of her friend!  Now, in the case of my death, if I find out that you share those pictures with anyone before you destroy them, I will haunt your ass forever!

The Beginning of a Dynamic Duo-the story of Lesley and Denise

It's hard to even know where to start with the story of our friendship.  It seems like yesterday but our friendship has been a work in progress for about 12 years now.  When you talk about two guys being best friends, you call it a "BRO-mance" and I don't know if their has been a word made for two women's friendship and I refuse to have it called a "HO-mance!"  so we will just use the term BFF.  Now, I know that as she is 32 years old and I am 34, BFF may sound a little immature.  But, as you read, you will come to find that we really fit the bill.  Infact, a mature friendship would only be the definition of our relationship if sarcasm were being used!  So, BFF it is!!  I really do feel like God sent her to be my best friend in the whole world and I wanted to share our journey.  Some of it will make you smile, some of it will make you cry, but for the most part, if you are anything like us, you will laugh so hard you come just short of peeing your pants!
It all started when I was working at the local hospital as a nurses aide.  She came in and applied for the job.  I remember seeing her outside the supervisor's door.  She was cute and kind of preppy looking and let's be honest, had a cute body.  I had already had one child and things just weren't what they used to be with my body so I instantly became jealous of her.  Apparently it showed, b/c a few months after we got to know each other she revealed to me that when she first saw me, I looked mean...  Oops!  I told her that was because she looked skinny.
Most of the time, when you first meet someone you go through several days or weeks of formalities before you feel comfortable enough to share any type of intimate detail in your life.  Not Denise though.  After we had worked together for just a couple of days, we were already really enjoying each other, but were still trying to be polite to each other.  Let me rephrase that-I was trying to be polite!  But the time for formalities for Denise were gone at that point when I asked her during our 15 minute break if she would like some of the peanuts I had brought to work.  I expected a "no thanks" or "sure!"  That's completely NOT what I got! Her response to me, after knowing each other for two days was this "oh, that's ok.  The only nuts I like are David's when they slap me in the ass."  (It's ok...take a minute to pause, re read that last sentence and then laugh!  After 12 years of friendship, it's still one of my favorite stories.)  Now as you can imagine, my jaw hit the floor and I may have sucked all of the oxygen out of the room due to shock!  It was at that exact moment I realized Denise had no filter!  After the shock wore off, we both sat there and laughed so hard we cried.  And thus, a friendship was born!  That was the day we exchanged phone numbers and began our daily regimen of calling each other and to this day, we still talk almost everyday! 

I am really excited to continue sharing the story of our friendship.  And, if I can talk Denise into it, I may try to get her to add her two cents in every once in awhile as well!  My true hope is for everyone to read this and be able to say "I have a friend like that."  She is a true blessing in my life and I don't know what I would do without her!  I will try to get on here and add a story or two a week!  I am not going to try and trick you into believing that all of our stories will be sweet and clean.  She and I are both Christians that love the Lord with all of our hearts and nothing on Earth could change that, but we also talk together about things that are real and happening to each one of us and because life gets messy, so will this blog!