Articles

Two Little Girls, Written Oct 20, 2015

Almost three years ago now, I was in a very bad mental state of mind. My depression worsened and my anxiety told me to give up on everything, but I had to make my parents proud, I had to do something to get off my lazy butt and focus on school and actually want to succeed in life, but nothing made me want to do anything except sleep.

I would have a boyfriend here and there, and I’d try to have fun and hang out with friends, but it was really hard because even when I was having fun, something in my head would always say “why are you trying to have fun? This is a lost cause, Cassidy.” It really is true when people say ‘you’re your own worst enemy’, because we are always – or at least in my case – harder on ourselves than other people are on us.

Anyway, after years of being suicidal and having such a negative mind all the time, my sister’s friend was blessed with a baby girl; well, two actually. My sister became a God Mother! My family became very close with her friend, and thus we are all like family, now. I got to feel this little baby kick my hand from inside her mother’s tummy, and at that moment, it was like a light-bulb went off and I was mesmerized with what this tiny little baby would grow to be. I got to hold her the day she was born, and my oh my was she tiny!

I didn’t see her for a little bit, and I began to go down hill again for a short period of time, and I felt worthless again and like a burden on everyone, and then I held her. I held her again, and this time, I had her half-sister, who’s a couple years older, too. These two little girls quickly became my entire world, they give me so much joy and happiness, and I feel so much better than I did before.

These two little girls, are the pride and joys of my life right now, I can only imagine how our friend must feel, how proud she must be of all that the two of them have grown into, and I can only imagine how I’ll feel when I have kids of my own someday, watching them grow is truly magical. These two little girls aren’t my children in any way, but boy am I glad to be their Auntie Cassie, and I’m so, so, so blessed to have them in my life. When I’m helping my little kindergartner with her homework, or singing the ABCs with my little toddler, I see how far they’ve both come. I’ve watched them grow up and start to use their big-girl words, I’ve watched them go from crawling to walking, and I’ve heard so many cute little “I love yous” and gotten the tiniest little hugs and kisses from them, and it’s in moments like those where I know I’m doing good, I’m helping them learn the simple things in life, and little do they know – they’re helping me learn the better and more important things in life.

Without these two little girls, who knows where I’d be. Watching them giggle and smile, playing peek-a-boo or jumping and dancing with them, really absolutely anything we do together is amazing and I will cherish each memory that we create together.

Although I’m sure I could’ve gotten to where I am today on my own, it would’ve been one hell of a struggle, and with them, I’ve been helped and given strength. I’ve been given hope, from all the love and support I’ve gotten… I was able to get to a better place, to start being a survivor – I still have bad days occasionally, but not nearly as bad as they were – this long with the help and love from my mama, my best friends, my family, a couple doctors, and these very important two little girls.

I love you, My Little Princesses.

I thank God so much for giving me these wonderful blessings, these wonderful people to help me with the struggles of mental illnesses. I truly am blessed. I couldn’t thank my friends and family enough for everything they’ve done for me…

**Originally posted on my previous site, www.cassidymott.com on Oct 20, 2015**

Our Story/This Is It… Continued 3.1.18

When you know, you know. When the time is right, and you’ve finally met the right person, you know. Something changes inside of you. There will always be people who may not support it fully, or at all, but those people don’t matter. Nobody matters but you, you and the one that your heart has chosen to be yours for the rest of forever.

On July 8, 2017 my “this is it” person, my best friend, my other half, the absolute love of my life, my soulmate, “the one”, proposed to me.

Let me tell you the story of the proposal… actually, let me tell you OUR story. For the purpose of the story, I will refer to my S.O as X. We’ll start at the beginning.

The end of March/Early April, 2016

We matched. We both swiped right on Tinder, the world’s “hook-up app”, which neither of us were on it for, if we’re being completely honest, and thus began the conversation. Short responses at first, just getting to know each other… and then, suddenly, within days, I was telling him my whole life story. Still, on Tinder. I became so comfortable with him, right off the bat – which is not like me. I would never share so many personal details about myself while still only messaging on Tinder. But, we took things slow. Finally, I asked him if he wanted to message off of Tinder – on Kik messenger or text – he said yes and asked which one I’d rather, and being fairly shy I was going to say Kik, because I didn’t know this guy in person and it’s easy to portray yourself as someone else online, even though I already trusted him; but, I didn’t get the chance to say Kik, because my coworker at the time, took over and said “text”, and alas, I gave him my phone number and shortly after received a “Well hello there, beautiful” text message.

We began messaging everyday, and ‘talking’ rather quickly, too. I was so naive about my feelings, and whether online relationships from the world’s “hook-up app” could be true. Sadly, I turned him down about a month after messaging – I was damaged goods, I didn’t want to hurt him more than I already was. I thought he was better off without me. I was still very intrigued and wanted him in my life. I knew that he was meant to be in my life, even if I didn’t want to admit that he was suppose to be my significant other. We planned to still meet the next day, at International Mall, after I got off of work, but he was called into work that evening (Work is very important and should definitely be one of the main priorities in life [unfortunately] so I understood), I told him I was still going to drive to International Mall and do some shopping, and he apologized a thousand times for having to work. Once I was at the mall, I told him that I would visit him at work. I didn’t drive half an hour for nothing, and I wanted to prove that I meant what I said; about wanting him in my life – whether as friends, or more. So, once I completed my shopping, I drove to his job. I walked inside, nervous as hell, but extremely excited. I turned the corner and saw his twin brother J, who worked there also, and waved to him – having recognized him and he waved back knowing who I was. Once I got to him, J radioed to X through their work Walkie-Talkies and said “hey X, there’s someone here to see you” to which X began smiling very hard, and his best friend, T, teased him for that {all of which was told to me by the three of them}.

Then, there he was. He came around the corner in this big fuzzy cooler jacket, cheesing away at me. My nerves were spiraling out of control and my heart almost leaped out of my chest, I couldn’t stop smiling. There he was. The man of my dreams. The man that I just told the day prior that I didn’t want to be with, and suddenly seeing him, I knew that I had to be with him.

I was in his store for a total of 3 minutes. 180 seconds. All it took was a moment of his time, a glance at his smile and a never-ending gaze into his eyes, and I knew. This is it. This is “the one”. A few days later and he took me on a date, dinner and a movie. Nothing major. He picked me up, all fancy. He was in a maroon button up and grey chinos, and I wore this floral hi-lo dress, and no make up because I had just had surgery next to my eye and my eye was still a little swollen. He still tells me I was beautiful that night – even though I didn’t feel the most confident. We went to dinner at Joey Brooklyn’s in downtown St. Pete, he got two slices of pizza and I got one. We sat there for two hours, just talking the night away. We finally walked to the theater just a couple blocks away and saw the live version of Jungle Book. He held my hand when we sat down, and one of the previews was a Coca-Cola commercial that entailed a couple explaining their first date together and how they knew that they found the one for each other, and at that moment, he glanced at me and squeezed my hand. My heart fluttered with butterflies and sparks. There was nothing more I wanted than for that moment to last forever – or so I thought at the time (we’ve had a lot of them since then). I think of that moment often. My heart still flutters around. After the movie we sat in his car for roughly 2-3 hours, just talking. Not the usually assumption *eye roll*, we just talked, and around 11:50 something on May 21, 2016, he asked me to be his girlfriend, and I nervously said yes.

Flash forward to January 2017

We move in together. We move in, with four of our friends (his brother, J, and his brothers boyfriend. His best friend T, and my best friend at the time, L). Three couples in a three bedroom apartment, all of us best friends. How everything turned out is for another time.

Summer 2017

We take our first trip as a couple to Seattle, Washington in June, planned way in advance, to visit my family out there. We stayed for a week, and it was one of the best trips to Seattle that I had had in a while. My family loved him, almost as much as I do. *wink*

Finally, in July of 2017, we bought rings for each other and chose a date for the wedding (to be discussed later on, below). When we went to pick up the rings at Kay Jewelers in International Mall (where we were supposed to meet, remember?), we tried them on, of course – and they fit beautifully. We decided to eat Charley’s Subs at the food court and try them on again. I told him I loved it and that I didn’t want to take it off,  I thought it was so beautiful. That’s when it happened. He said, “well, you don’t have to…” and I looked up, nervous and confused, that same heart fluttering and nervousness that I felt the day we met, and he goes “Cassidy, will you marry me?” Once again, I nervously and excitedly said “…yes!!” I couldn’t believe it was real. It was really happening. He had my dad’s blessing, so why not do it whenever he wanted to. I wasn’t expecting it because we had just gotten the rings, why would he do it then? It was the perfect trick. The perfect moment. X was now my fiancé.

November 2017 

We got our own apartment. We moved out of the apartment with our friends and for our own place. It’s absolutely beautiful and I love living with X. Everything is perfect.

December 2017

Ah!! The month of our wedding was here! All of the last minute stressors were freaking me out, and yet I was also very calm through December, counting down the days.

Finally, December 30th, 2017, I got to walk down the aisle and marry my best friend. All of our family and friends were surrounding us. The ceremony and reception were both in my parents yard, which is absolutely stunning now. I couldn’t have imagined a more perfect day. My best friend and I had finally become one, we now share a last name and a home, wear rings on our left fingers, and talk about our future together, all the time.

I have never been more in love with anything or anyone than I am with X. He is my person. My best friend, my other half. He is the one I confide in with everything. He is the one I trust wholeheartedly. He is the one that knows me better than anyone else has. He, is the love of my life.

 **Originally posted on my previous site, www.cassidymott.com on April 7, 2018**

Friendship & School

The idea of ‘Friendship’.

I’ve had a great deal of friends throughout my life, my ‘circle’ of friends was huge! I suppose one could say I was a “social butterfly” in my elementary-middle school days, and at times I could still be considered that. I was homeschooled until I began seventh grade at a public middle school, but before that, I had a good amount of homeschooled friends. Once I went to public school, I didn’t keep in touch with many of my homeschooled friends, and suddenly they were just memories (of course, I kept in touch with some, just not often) and I had new friends, a bunch of new friends. For those two years that I was at that middle school, I had some of the best friends. Seventh grade was my favorite out of the two, because eighth grade was when I was bullied more. As we all moved on to high school, I was lucky to keep in touch with some of those that I was close with, and others I drifted so far apart from that they’re no longer friends either – just memories, some good and some bad.

For high school, I was lucky enough to get into a great arts program – that may not have been my favorite, but I’m definitely glad I went there. My class for the department that I was in was rather small freshman year, and it grew as the years went on. Almost every student in the class came from my middle school, so I was lucky enough to not have to start over completely. Friendships blossomed rather quickly and I was fairly close, or ‘best friends’, with a few of them. Out of everyone in that specific department class, I’m still in touch with one person on a regular basis. I’ve kept in touch with a couple people from the school, but not nearly as much as I use to.

Senior year, I left the school. I had enough credits to graduate, so I went back to the homeschool life for my senior year and dual enrolled at a local college – one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. Obviously I got crap from people and was talked about at the school by my ‘friends’ and acquaintances, because I had ‘made it that far, why leave now?’, ‘I wouldn’t graduate with the people I’ve been with for the last 5, almost 6, years’. They were right, but the part that some of them didn’t comprehend, was that I wasn’t just leaving the school because I wanted to – I left for multiple reasons: one being my mental/overall health, two being free college for a year (which is pretty freaking great, if you have the opportunity to do that – DO IT), and three being that I got to graduate with people that I’ve known a lot longer – maybe not kept in total contact with them, but I’ve known them longer.

By leaving the high school, I got to: graduate from high school a month before the public schools did, receive college credit for multiple classes, be healthy and happy, get a job and help provide for myself and my family, reconnect with the homeschool life, be apart of two high school graduations – one of which was at my favorite resort, how cool is that? I have 3 high school tassels, a National Honor Society stole (much like the public schoolers that are in the society), a homeschool medallion, and 7 honor cords (Royal Blue for College Credit, Pale Blue for College Prep Math GPA 3.3+, Forest Green for Fine Arts, Red for 4+ years of a Foreign Language GPA 3.3+, Pink for Perseverance, Blue with Gold for being a part of the Thespian Society, and Gold for Honors GPA 3.5+). I graduated Magna Cum Laude and I am very proud of that. Some public school students have, and are able to get/earn, this stuff, too, but this was overall the best thing for me to do, so I did it. That being said, I could have, and would have, received some of these things from public school as well, but the more important ones to me – I couldn’t’ve.

There are a couple morals to this story:

• Do what’s best for you and your health first.
• Don’t let the opinions of others, keep you from reaching success.
• Some friendships will not last forever, and sometimes that’s what’s best.

We go through life hoping that friends from our childhood will always be here for us, or always be loyal and honest – that simply just isn’t true. Friendships end, and that is more than okay. My circle went from HUGE to about five consistent people, quality over quantity. Always remember that.

I’ve attached this photo because I’m PROUD of myself, and that’s a great feeling. This photo also shows two of my tassels, all my cords, medallion, and stole. Never Give Up on your dreams, however big or small they may be.

**Originally posted on my previous site, www.cassidymott.com on Oct 27, 2015**

6.21.17 – Appreciation.