1 Year Later

October 18, 2012 - I was getting ready leave for the weekend. The Boise Temple Open house was going on that weekend.  Had he been feeling up to it, he said he would want to go. As the time got closer to the event, we knew that he wouldn't be able to come with me. ) I reminded Spencer that I would be gone for the weekend.

October 19, 2012 – I got the oil changed in my car. I picked up a hat and eye patch at the store. I was going to make Spencer be a pirate with me for Halloween. At 3:00pm I sent to his house. I kissed him on the cheek, told him that I love him and that I would be back on Monday to see him. He was asleep. He was snoring cute little baby snores with his mouth open a little. He was so cute. I wanted to go see my family. I also didn't want to leave Spencer. I was so scared for this trip.

October 20, 2012 - One year ago at 5:40am I received a phone call from Spencer's Mom. She informed me that He had been called home. I just sat on my brother Ryan's couch crying and in shock. I spent the next couple of hours calling people in my family to update them. I can't even fathom what was happening at the Hales House. I know what I was going through but I can't even begin to know what they were going through.

I was so thankful that I was with my family when everything happened. I wouldn't have been able to handle anything if I had been home alone. Dedra came back with me for the next week. I was so glad to have her at the funeral.

This last year has just flown by. I look back and can't even say where the time has gone. I have been saying out loud "Spencer's been dead for a year." over and over again. Even though it's been a year, it's still hard to believe. I really have a hard time wrapping my brain around it. I am still working at the same job. I am still living in the same apartment. I have the same friends. I do a lot of the same things. I am going to school now. Kyle is living with me. With so much still the same, I keep wanting Spencer to show up at my house and say "I missed you and I'm back now." I still wish we could have gotten married. Just so that I would have been able to have the option of being sealed either later in this life or after my own death. It makes me cry that I don't really have the promise of forever with him.

I still think about him every day.  My heart hurts still. I will have dreams about him sometimes. When I wake up I just cry. It's like its day one again. I still haven't been able to take down the pictures I have of us in my house. I still have the roses he gave me for Valentine's Day dried and hanging upside down from the curtains in my kitchen.  I still have things the recipes that he wanted us to try taped to my kitchen wall. I won't make BBQ chicken, French toast of biscuits and gravy because he loved them.  It hurts my guts too much. Whenever I hear Muse on the radio I cry still. I don't enjoy working on puzzles anymore. There are so many things that bring up good memories. I still love him so much.  Knowing that I can't make any more memories with him and that we don't have forever is what I think, hurts the most. He was the most amazing person. He brought so much joy to my life. He has changed me in so many ways. We were able to be there for each other. There wasn't anything we weren't willing to do or sacrifice for each other. He was the other half of my Orange.

Spencer made my promise that I would get married and have children. He told me that I had to love my husband. He told me I had to sing to my children. I trusted him with everything. We could talk about anything. There was nothing that we couldn't say to the other.  We truly understood each other. I love him. I know that is something that will never change. He will always have a special place in my heart. He was my everything.

I know I need to move forward. He wanted that for me. I also want that for myself. I am taking baby steps towards the things that I eventually want in this life. It just hurts more than I expected it to… move on without him next to me.

8/20/2013

It has been 10 months since Spencer passed away. I still feel like I am just going through the motions of life but it is getting easier.

In the last 10 months I have visited home, had family visit me, made blankets, moved Kyle to Utah, Went to 10 of the 16 Temples in Utah, Spent lots of time with my family, tried to date again (I HATE dating so much), got a second job and have started school.

I am trying to keep busy. Sometimes it will hit me hard that he is actually gone. Then it will feel like it just happened. I feel like I am starting from square one again. I will visit him I take a breath and just keep moving forward.

I was talking to one of my friends at work today. He told me how great he thinks it is that I am able to openly talk about Spencer’s death and how comfortable I am. He doesn’t get that sometimes I just need to talk. I miss Spencer so much. I miss the conversations we would have. I miss him just being in the other room as I did dishes. I love him so much still.

The last 10 months have really been a learning experience for me. Learning to do things on my own is still something I struggle with. (I still forget that he isn't right behind me when I walk into the grocery store. I miss bumping my bum with the cart then giggling.)

This post is just ramblings of my brain at the moment. I don’t know if it even makes sense or not. I haven’t proof read any of this. What everything boils down to is that I miss Spencer. I can't hardly believe that he has been gone for 10 months.

May 20, 2013

Today is May 20, 2013. It has been 7 months since Spencer passed away. That is mind boggling. I can’t believe how time has passed. It makes me sick to think about sometimes.

The first year is always the hardest. I know this. It’s hard to look back on where we were a year ago. At this time, we had known that he was terminal for 2 weeks. Spencer would come over for breakfast still on my days off. Rather than us going out on dates we would have picnics in my living room.

Last year on May 20 I had to go to work. Spencer had had a rough day. Things were starting to sink in. I had sat with him as he took a nap on the couch.

I think about Spencer often. I still have pictures of him on my walls at home. I have been trying to come up with pictures that I could use to replace them. The thought of it still makes me feel ill. I still have up on Facebook that I am in a relationship with Spencer. Once I change that I won’t ever be able to have that again. I am so scared for that and I don’t know why. I guess it could be because I'm sad to let him go. I know I will never be over Spencer. I do know that I need to move forward. That is what he would want. He gave me a huge list of “you must do’s” for after he was gone. I must get married. I must love my husband. I must have children. I must sing to them. I must be happy…. Things like that. I am working on it… He’s bossy.

7 months ago… that is just too weird. I never could see myself without him. I really had forever in my mind. Now that he has been dead for 7 months… I don’t know, it still doesn’t seem real sometimes. Other times it seems so real that I can’t breathe. I feel like there is a hole in my chest. That when he died I did too. My body just didn’t have the good sense to stop living.

Things haven’t been all bad. I do miss Spencer terribly. I have the most amazing friends. They have been my sanity. If it weren’t for them I would have gone crazy. While Spencer was sick, Julia and David were my support. After Spencer’s death Jentrie, Chris and Ana were life savers! I don’t think that I would have been able to function or stay at work long enough to pay my bills if it weren’t for them. They made things bearable. I love them mucho. My family listened to me cry on the phone and have visited me several times. Heather sent Alexa and CJ to live with my for a while. Kyle is living with me now. I love not being alone. I have lots of other people that have been amazing over the last several months also. There are too many to name. If you are reading this and are wondering “Was I a help?” Good chance you were. If it weren’t for my amazing support system I would have just crumbled.

I am so thankful for the Gospel in my life. I have seen Heavenly Fathers hand in my life. I am so thankful that He has been there for me to comfort me and to listen to my prayers. I know that prayers are heard and answered. In the last few months have been very trying. I know that there are things that I am to learn from these experiences. I have felt like I have had my own personal Korihor in my life. I know that this gospel is true. I know that the church is led by a true and living prophet. I know that Heavenly Fathers loves me. I know that He wants me to come out the other side of this stronger.

I have read my patriarchal blessing several times over the last few weeks. I take great comfort its words. There are several things that have come to pass. There are still blessing that I have to look forward to.

I am going to end this rambling before it gets any longer…..

7 months …. That’s crazy…..

Happy Birthday Spencer

Today would have been Spencer's 26th birthday. He would have told me that we are the same age finally! Then on my birthday he would have informed me that he'll catch up on day. He was silly.

Birthdays weren't a big deal at my house growing up. Spencer and I didn't really do presents but we went to dinner and would just hang out at home. Birthdays were more of a party at his folks house. His mom made a special dinner. She would decorate the table all fancy. It was always fun.

I know that I say this often but I really do miss Spencer. I miss how he would get so excited when he would get home from work and dinner was ready. I miss how when he would "help" me do the dishes he would end up just standing behind me resting his head on my shoulder with his arms around my waist. I miss him telling me he loves me. I just miss him as a whole.

I have gone through my pictures. I have found a few that I like. I think I have posted some of them before. I'm not sorry. These are just some of my favorite pictures of Spencer.

Happy Birthday to Spencer Stephen Hales. He was and still it my favorite. I love him.

4 months

It's been 4 months. I still can't believe he's gone. I miss him. I love Spencer so much. My heart hurts.

Surprise Picture

I received an email from Spencer's Dad that contained 2 pictures from when Spencer went through the Temple. They made me cry today at work. I love seeing pictures of us that I've never seen before.

December 16, 2012

As I sat in church today I looked around at all the young, happy, newly married couples. I just cried. It a painful reminder that I don't have Spencer sitting next to me holding my hand. I miss him so much.

We had our Christmas program today. It was nice. Spencer knew how much I dislike Christmas music. He would always tease me. The Christmas program was great in his eyes because he would be silly and tease me the whole time. I miss that.

I like my family ward for the most part. It's a good for the girls. The ward doesn't have a ton of youth. The doubled the young women. Haha. It's a good ward.

Happy Christmas

Spencer Stephen Hales March 5, 1987 - October 20, 2012

So it’s been one month since Spencer passed away. I have been trying to come up with something that would be worthy of him. After trying to write many things that have been nothing but tripe… I have come to the conclusion that nothing would be good enough.

This is what I have come up with, July 17, 2010 – October 20, 2012 I have pictures and memories of this wonderful man that I am going to now share. For every 1 picture that I was able to post of Spencer I have 15 that he told me “I better not see these show up on your blog.” Now that there is no way for him to see the pictures on my blog, I am going to post them.

If you don’t like this post that is all on you. This is for me. I love Spencer. This last month has been hard without him. A lot of these pictures have not been posted before. Some of them haven’t been seen by even Spencer. Haha.

After our first couple of dates we didn’t see each other until Derek and River’s wedding reception. I dropped off some of the guys at the Temple.

 

  I took a couple of pictures of the boys. This one is my favorite. Spencer was so cute. 

I love his smile so much.

Later at the Reception I was trying to be sneaky and take pictures of him. I just wanted a couple. He was just too cute. I wasn’t sure if we were going to be seeing each other anymore. I wanted a couple of pictures.

 

 I asked him if he wanted me to help him pin his flower to his shirt. I was so flustered being so close to him that I had a hard time pinning his flower.

I also insisted that Spencer be in the pictures be in the group shots.

 I really think that he is just adorable.

 

   I made all the groomsman stand for a picture that wasn’t professional. (Again, I just wanted a picture of Spencer)

At the Second reception He was standing by the door talking to someone that I didn’t know. I just took the picture randomly. That’s how I got his attention. :) I invited him to the grocery store with me that night. He asked me if I would cut his hair. I said yes. I invited him over for dinner the next night. He said yes.

At Dinner we were playing Mow. He ended up with the tiara. There were 2 or 3 of them during the game. I took his picture. He told me “I better not see this on Facebook.” It was the start of him bossing me. I miss him bossing me like that.

We started seeing each other every day. We talked on the phone, we texted each other; we made up any excuse to see each other. He would come over as soon as we were both off work and he would stay until about 5am. Some days he would leave at 5am to go home. He would shower, change his clothes and then just come back over. I was crazy about him. 

We would work on puzzles all the time. We would talk about everything. He would make me laugh. I instantly trusted him. There was just something about him that made me feel instantly at ease. He has such kind eyes. He smile made me melt. 

This was a mini date with friends. Dinner and Karaoke. It was a blast. 

We stayed in the parking lot talking until maybe 2 or 3. I couldn't hardly look him in the eyes. I had such a crush on him. He mad me so happy.

Okay, This makes me laugh to think about. I told him I wanted a picture of him where he was smiling. He told me no. I told him that I was going to just take 100 pictures of him until I got the one I wanted. He got up off the floor leaving the blanket where he was. He sat on the couch and smiled for me. I just about died. He made me giggle. he was just so cute. 

 This is a good one. He was teasing me about my socks. The tied them together to make a rope. He was a turd.

Random Pictures. 

 This is one of the many puzzles we put together.  

 

He brought over rock band. Can you see me just looking at him?

I was messing up the song so bad.

I just wanted to look at him.

One night we were just talking about growing up. Then I decided I wanted to go home. I invited him to come with me. He hadn’t kissed me yet. Heck he hadn’t even held my hand yet and He was driving me home to Washington so he could meet my family.

 This is the first picture of our first trip to Washington together.

 He wasnt thrilled that I was already camera happy. Hahaha

These are at the Silverdale Water Front Park. It was so pretty there. He loved it. He said how he would love to live in Washington one day.

(As we dated more we talked about living the Southern Washington, Northern Oregon area after he was done with school.)

 This was his first trip the Shari's

We went to Seattle. He was looking forward to this trip. 

Kyle and I showed him all over. It was really fun. 

 This Picture was taken on the Bremerton Boardwalk.

SEATTLE!

 We were back at my Dad's house. This is one of my most favorite pictures of Spencer and I. 

I don't know why I love it as much as I do.

 I do love it though.

We went to my sister Wendi's house for dinner. It was really cool to see him interact with my family.

My nephew Matthew fell in love with Spencer.

He was being cute and flirty. It was so funny. 

Every time I tried to get chapstick he would tickle me until I gave it back. 

I was smitten.

The morning of the Temple trip at breakfast Matthew and Kyle put on a show.

 

 We went to the Temple with my bother Ryan's ward. 

This is my man in front of my Temple. 

I love him.

 This is him gassing up as we were leaving town. 

 At the Shari's in Twin Falls on the way home.

When we were driving to Washington Spencer was telling me about a blanket he had as a kid. It was his "green and white" He loved that blanket. He was so sad when they had to get rid of it. So when we got back I made him a new blanket. He loved it. He was excited to have a blanket that was big enough for him. :)

A couple Random Pictures....

October 24, 2010

Spencer Kissed me for the first time. 

These are a couple of silly pictures from that day. 

It was a day to remember.

He was so anti picture. I was so camera happy...

I just like this picture. I have a think about hats...

We had gone to the park for a date. It was so fun! 

We played tag. We played on the toys. 

It was a great ending to the day.

This was the first time that he let me be with him while he took his Chemo. It was a long night. I didnt leave until around 4am. He laid on the couch with his head in my lap. The meds made him so sick. He was scared that I would never want to see him again after that. 

He is wearing the safety glasses for fun. 

He got out his meds and then put on the glasses.

 He then told me "Its about to get dangerous."

This is from the Slinky date!

This was a different date where we decided to make chocolate

 pudding and eat it with graham-crackers. haha

Our First Christmas Together

This is him opening one of his presents from me. I put together a binder for sheet music for him to play that was fun.

He had Olivia for Christmas that year. He made her a scarf. I told him he needed to model it for me. He told me I wasn't to post these pictures on Facebook.  haha. This isn't Facebook.

Random Photo

 This was taken in January. We were babysitting Sophie for Katie and Ben. She was mucho in love with Spencer. I really can't blame her. He was something Special. She wouldnt let me sit by him. We ended up going to the store because we needed diapers. Sophie wouldnt let me walk with her. She wanted Spencer to hold her. It was so cute. 

When we were talking into Wal-mart Spencer had Sophie in one arm and was holding my hand. He said with a huge smile on his face "We're going into the store with a baby to buy diapers." I didn't understand what the big deal was. As we drove back to my house he told me how he looked forward to being a dad. That he thought we would make good parents.

This was our first Valentines day. He made the card. I still have the roses on my dresser. They are dried and dusty but I still have them. 

Second Trip To Washington

It was the 1 year anniversary of my Mom's death. Spencer drove me home to a family get together.

My Brothers took us shooting. 

I tried to take his bed. He said no.

We stayed at Dedra's house the night before we drove home. We had a slumber party in the living room. He slept on the mattress on the living room floor. I slept on the couch. Spencer held my hand as we fell asleep. It was so sweet.

I loved the facial hair. It was so very attractive. Spencer liked it also. 

He just didn't like that his family reacted to it.

I always thought he looked so handsome.

 Sadly it only lasted a short time. :(

There aren't really Stories behind these Pictures. I just like them.

I took his phone from him. I started a fight that I lost. hahaha. I think this was right before I bit his arm. He then licked my face. I gave him back his phone.

This was a Sunday dinner. Alexa took this picture.

This was one of the reasons I didnt help with puzzles much after we had been dating a while. He told me I looked Pretty with all the pieces on me.... He is the one that put them there.

I walked away from my phone for 5 seconds and this is what I came back to.

Spencer fixed my hair for me. He said I was pretty with braided hair.

He wrote a love note on my foot when we were watching a movie. 

This is after I read the love note.

I went into the kitchen to get something and he hid my purse. But fear not! He left a trail of everything that was in my purse to its location. It wasn't lost for long. 

I was making dinner. He was playing on his phone.

He drew me pretty pictures while we were watching a movie. For a man that hated tattoos, he drew on me a lot.

I wanted pictures of us for Christmas cards... He wouldn't sit nice for any of them! I didnt sent out cards. He told me he would sit nice for them the next year. "Unless I'm dead, we'll take holiday pictures." I almost want to say he planned this...

CHRISTMAS!

I made Spencer the best Blanket Ever! It was a Scrabble Board! He loved Scrabble. The video is him Opening the present.

I loved that Sam and Spencer had matching Pajamies! They were so cute. 

This was from Christmas Eve. The Kids were playing an unpracticed, impromptu concert.

ENSIGN RANCH

Payton Painted out toes.

Almost a kiss

Spencer helped me place the Hearts on my walls for Valentines day...

I have these Roses hanging upside down from my curtains in my kitchen

It was the 2 year anniversary of my mom's death. Spencer didnt want me to be sad. He took me to St. George. We spent the night at Uncle Jason's house. It was really fun.

Spencer's Birthday! Can you guess what I got him?

I had bought this chair in February. I told him he wasn't going to get it until his birthday. I went to make dinner. He took the chair down the hall and put it together. The turd! He was so pleased with himself and how sneaky he was that I couldn't even pretend to be annoyed. He was so cute. I loved that chair.

 In May Spencer's cancer came back. 

The next 5 months and 2 weeks were very hard for him, his family, his friends and myself.

They were being Super Heros

We hiked the Y. It was the first and only time I ever hiked the Y with Spencer.

He had just gotten the first half of his Temple Recommend. He came over to show me. He then said. Lets take a couple of Pictures. He never wanted to take pictures. I was all up for it. He pulled me in close and took the first one. He then Took the very first Picture of us kissing.

There are only 2 pictures that were ever taken of us kissing. This is one of them.

This was a lunch date with Alexa when she was in town. She took this picture.

Our last 4th of July

This was our 2 year mark. I told him he had to take one picture with me. That this was going to be our last anniversary. After we took this picture. He said he was sorry that this was going to be our last one.

Family pictures.

This was one of the last pictures taken of us while he was still alive.

This is in the drive way of his house. He was 18. That is my hand in his.

I told Spencer that i was going to make us a blanket that would be of all my scraps. He told me he would buy me pretty fabric if I would just make us a pretty blanket for when we got married. I told him no. This is that blanket.

Even with his mind going he still told me it was ugly and that he thought I should me pretty things. He's sweet. hahaha

This was the last picture of us taken while he was alive. I dont know who took it. I am just glad it was on my camera. We had fallen asleep. Who ever it was, Thank you.

Spencer Passed away in his sleep. I am so thankful that he was able to be released from this life. He was suffering so much towards the end. He was an amazing man. I count it to be one of my greatest blessings to have been loved by him. 

Spencer was truly one in a million. I have never loved someone the way that I love him.

This was the last Picture of us taken together. I do not have words to express the love I have to this man. I am so thankful that I have had the chance to know him. He was the love of my life. He changed me in so many ways. I am a better person because of him. I have a better understanding of who I am and who I want to be. Spencer opened my eyes. I will never forget him. I will always be able to look back on what we had with such great happiness and joy. He was my everything. It feels like I now have nothing... that's not true. I have memories.