We’re getting married!

As most of you already know, Noah and I were married in 2018 and then divorced in 2020. This engagement and wedding is the beautiful fruition of the promises of God and his work of restoration and reconciliation in our lives.

How we met: In the summer of 2017, Noah and I met at Fort Jackson, SC. We had both joined the Army National Guard just months before and Basic Combat Training (BCT) at Fort Jackson was our first experience with the “Big Army.” We each were seeing someone else when we started BCT. A few weeks in, Noah received a break-up letter and a few weeks after that I sent one. We had a few conversations and exchanged humorous faces during our nightly roll call but it wasn’t until graduation evening that things really sparked. Since his family was from Maui and couldn’t make it to the graduation, I invited him to our post-graduation family dinner at AppleBees. When we arrived, I left him with my family and joined my bunk mate and her family. That was a mistake. He won them over in a minute, and all I heard on the 12 hour drive home was “Noah is so sweet!” And “You should find someone like Noah” Needless to say, we started talking long distance while he finished up his military training in Mississippi and I embarked on my final year of my Bachelors. A few short months later we had moved in together, we were pregnant, and planning a spring wedding!

Oh man! Where to start? It seems like a million years ago. Ariella was born only four months after the wedding and that’s when things changed abruptly for us. All of Noah’s high hopes and Hollywood expectations for us were shattered: we were struggling financially; we had no idea how to stay connected emotionally; he had no idea how to bond with a newborn or support me in my new role as mother, and the worst part is that he believed that if relationships were hard then they just weren’t meant to be, that if you just chose the right person everything would be easy. Of course that’s a “happily-ever-after” lie that Hollywood sells and it absolutely set us up for failure. Noah began to believe he wasn’t meant to be a father or a husband and started searching elsewhere for meaning. His reputation in sales, his income, and instant gratification became his obsessions. He had many moments of clarity when he saw the path he was going down and made heartfelt promises to turn it around. It was his intention to be the best husband and father he could be, but after pursuing other women behind my back just months after Ariella was born, he fell prey to the shackles of shame and discouragement. The next year and a half were a roller coaster of heartache, broken promises, confusion, and struggle as I pursued reconciliation over and over again, and he wrestled with the lies shame whispered about who he was and where he was meant to be.

As the pandemic hit in 2020, Noah abruptly left. I was shocked and heartbroken. Only weeks before we had been house hunting and he had made fresh promises to preserve through the good and the bad with me. Despite leaving and dating other women, he swore that he wouldn’t divorce me legally. “It was too much paperwork” in his opinion. So, in October 2020 I made the agonizing decision to file for divorce. With Noah’s absences of income, I decided to undertake an accelerated masters in social work at this time to set myself up to provide for myself and Ariella in the future. It was a tough year to say the least. But in June of 2021, I graduated with honors, finalized the divorce, and was in the process of purchasing my parent’s house. Despite everything looking up, I still had the aching feeling that Noah and I were meant to be together.

Just weeks after the divorce was finalized, in July of 2021, Noah had a precious and transformative encounter with the Lord. I had heard about similar experiences and had believed similar promises from Noah before and I had been burned when he suddenly retracted all of it and fell into old patterns of fear and shame again. So I cautiously cracked the door again; not to a “R” relationship but to letting Noah be more involved in Ariella’s life and letting our friendship grow as a natural by product of that. I knew Noah was always sincere, but I also knew that I needed to see perseverance, consistency, and integrity before inviting him into the vulnerable places of my heart again. And so began the process of rebuilding trust, rebuilding friendship, and leaning into the healing love of the Lord and returning to the foundations of relationship: Jesus.

The past two years have yielded so much fruit in both of us. We’ve learned how to hold space for one another, how to be vulnerable, how to communicate in co-parenting, how to recognize old patterns, and how to lean into speaking life over one another and believing the best about each other. We are confident in our partnership. We are solidly grounded in faith. We have beautiful scars that remind us of what a loving and powerful God we serve and what a miraculous work he has done in our family. The hardest part for me was the uncertainty and confusion. I felt so sure, so absolute, it felt so divinely-ordained that we were meant to be a thriving happy family, but when Noah’s choices didn’t align with that it cast doubt on the how, the when, and the why. How could we have a thriving family if we were divorced? When, if ever, would he come around? Why did this happen? Did I choose the wrong person?Sometimes uncertainty still creeps in, “what if it happens again when things get hard?” But I have a God that’s bigger than the questions and I know he’ll bring me through anything. And I know Noah isn’t the same person he was. He discerns between lies and truth; he leans in when it’s hard; he stands firm in his faith when doubts arise. He is the partner I always wanted and needed. The best part for me has been watching Ariella and Noah’s relationship turn from sour to sweet. She was very confused and hurt when he left. She has gone from cold and resentful towards Noah (even calling him Noah and refusing to call him Dad) to warm and carefree with him. She always calls him Daddy, writes him notes, snuggles on his chest, and rough-houses with him on the daily. My fondest memories are watching him be a present, tender, loving father to her.

We are excited to take the next step of commitment and solidify our covenant, leaving the old in the past and embarking on the new with hope and vision. A few more cute little Splajts are on the horizon for sure. Growing our family in number but also in character and in faith are some of our priorities. We don’t know where the Lord will take us from here, but we’re excited to share our story and honored to have a community supporting us. In the little things and the big, he is faithful. He is worthy. He is good.