The Love Story Behind @lynncoyle1 and @briancourteau

Hi everyone,

@briancourteau and I have welcomed all of you into our life, but you've been welcomed into the "near" end of it all, so I wanted to share with you the beginning of our fairy tale love story! I've always felt fortunate to have met him and had this whirlwind life of ours, but truthfully, I've not thought of it as a fairy tale until my days here on steemit and all of your reactions.

I was married for 24 years before. Yes, that is right, 24 years. They of course all weren't bad, but they were never quite good either. And I knew that from year one, but I had been raised to believe in the sanctity of marriage, so I forged on, and tried to make it right. Three years later we were moving; a transfer for his job, and I contemplated ending it, but again, it just didn't seem like the right thing to do. Eight years later our first son was born. Yep, eight years. So was it all horrible? I guess not, but again, it wasn't great either. Somehow I had learned to accept that not horrible was as good as it was going to get, that not horrible was a perfectly acceptable way to live. Three years later our second son was born. Play. Pause. Repeat. I could say the same for every milestone in our life; I reflected and thought, this isn't what I want, this isn't what I signed up for, but I was taught that "life isn't fair", "you take your lumps and move on"; I was conditioned to believe that this was all OK, that it was normal for life to be mediocre or less, that I had a roof over my head and food on the table, so what did I really have to complain about?

One day, 20+ years into our marriage, I watched my then-husband sit in a recliner beside his father, and they both pulled the lever that raised their feet, and they both asked for a drink. Really they demanded one, not with a "please can you get me...", but more of a "bring me ..." My then-mother-in-law literally scuttled off to the kitchen to fix her man his drink and I stopped. Dead in my tracks. And thought: What the fuck am I doing? That, funny enough, was my light bulb moment. It was at that very moment that I realized there was no turning back. My decision was made and no tears, begging, demanding, ordering, bribing was going to change that fact. It was done. It was over.

So. Brian :)

I was only single for one and a half years and my friend one day said to me, "I met a guy last night. I think you should meet him".

I said, "were you drinking last night?"

She said, "yes, only wine, but here's his name and number."

Only wine

I took one look at that name and number and threw it in my junk drawer. That drawer we all have that eventually gets dumped in the garbage only to be refilled one day in the future.

The future came, three weeks later. No kids (they were at their father's for the weekend), no plans, no work, nothing but freedom, and I thought, what have I got to lose? So I cowardly messaged him on Facebook (it's safer that way) and we decided to meet for dinner the next night, only after I'd scourged his Facebook history, vetting everything that I thought might conflict with what I wanted in a relationship.

I found out later that he almost cancelled, because like me, he was not interested in anything serious, especially after his 18 years of relative unhappiness; a marriage that had just ended about the same time as mine.

We met for dinner. I arrived early, sat down, and waited. I created a perfect excuse in my head to leave early if necessary; my kids are sick, the dog needs to be picked up from the vet, I have to work. I had them all in lined up, ready to be fired from my Gatling gun of excuses. He walked in, I stood to greet him, our eyes met, and that was it. We were both hooked, but neither of us were willing to accept it. It was too soon. It didn't make sense. It went against our vision of our new-found singledom. It wasn't right, but it wasn't wrong either.

After 15 minutes of chatting, and both of our phones repeatedly buzzing, I finally said, "we should let our friends know that we no longer need an out. He knowingly smiled, and agreed.

We literally have been together ever since.

In the beginning we spent hours lamenting about our previous relationships and how different this was, how loving it was, how respectful it was. I wondered if it would end. Like any honeymoon. I wondered if it would fade away and life would go back to being tolerable, acceptable, not horrible. But it didn't. It still hasn't.

Brian has been my light, my love, my reason for being. He has shown me what love is, what it truly means. He has taught me that I deserve this...every single day. And he taught my sons how to be men. How to be respectful. How to treat a woman. How to treat their mom. He has given me more in these 8 short years, than anyone has in a lifetime.

He has taught me love and living. He has brought out the me in me and taught me that there is no shame in who I am, that my smile and my light deserves to be lit. He has created for me something that can never again be filled.

And I am thankful for that, even though no man can ever come close to filling those shoes. Ever. I am thankful.

Proud Member of :