If you follow me on Instagram (@seachels1294) you probably are familiar with this guy named "Jer". While some may see him as my "Insta-boyfriend" -which no doubt he is very good at- a fun fact is he is my boyfriend off the internet too!
Crazy right.
People existing outside of their social medias and blogs.
And lately in my life I've been having a really hard time.
I've been full of anxiety and self doubt from about anything to theatre, friendships, the future, and everything in between.
Side note: You all may think I have it all together. But I don't. I try to share every side of me on social media, but obviously the positives are what gets highlighted the most. Because they are the most fun.
And Jer, as you all have come to know him, has been the one constant thing through it all.
(Besides like my mom - and Nana. Because you know they are the best.)
And recently I've been getting super paranoid about our relationship and overanalyzing all of it. And after chatting with a good friend, I realized what I was doing without even realizing it.
I was trying to sabotage our relationship because I didn't think I deserved to be happy.
I care so much for this person and because everything else in my life is a bit of a mess right now, I felt this should be to. That I don't deserve this one good thing.
And I do.
And so do you.
I communicated with my partner my fears and anxieties in regards to our relationship and we discussed how to overcome this.
One of these things is distance. While we are separated by state lines, I don't know if I would consider us long distance (because I have some friends in those cross country relationships and cross OCEAN relationships. I don't know how you all do it- I applaud you.).
So for this past Monday off, I took a much needed getaway to visit Jer because he was working in his college town. Quite the little journey and of course I made a few wrong turns along the way.
I arrived a little early and headed immediately to the cutest little coffee shop Mudd Puddle. I ordered a mocha, hot -because it's still not quite spring - and sat down to blog a little while I waited for Jer to get off work.
After Jer got off work, he showed me the new theatre he's working at there! It's a petite little black box space, but I absolutely adored it. Then we took a walking tour of his university, followed by dinner at Bacchus. I ordered fish and chips and this AMAZING cider and Jer got a steak sandwich and an IPA.
It was a two hour drive there and a two hour drive home (and on the highway- which if you know me, is a huge deal). This trip wasn't short. But you bet it was worth it. I absolutely loved getting to see his school and hear stories about his time there. I cannot wait to explore New Paltz even further on another trip and to show him JMU this summer!
Sometimes you have to put in a hell of lot of work to get an ounce of happiness.
But those moments are worth it.
Stop fighting the positive things in your life.
Embrace them.
You deserve goodness and you deserve to be happy.
Or as my friend said, "Take it easy on yourself. You're really great and you're doing a wonderful job."
Much love always,
Chels 💜
PS. Jer and I officially booked our Air BNB to New Orleans for this summer! And we are so in love with it and we've already started planning our trip. Send all the recommendations!
Let's see if we'll be smiling this big after our 26 hour drive down the East Coast 😉