So...can I start drinking Diet Coke again then...?

I have high blood pressure. Like, way too high for an otherwise healthy 20 year old with no risk factors for high blood pressure. My doctors have no clue why I do. Well, one thinks she does, but I beg to differ. She basically told me I was a frazzled, broken mess and all I needed to do to lower my BP was to sit in a corner and use a prayer box. I needed to find God and quit being an emotional mess. She made me cry in her office. My mom was furious with the woman. I love my mom.

Anyway, here I am a year later and guess what? I found God! Yup. I go to church every Sunday and I read scriptures and I pray (without the use of whatever the hell a prayer box is, thankyouverymuch). But, um, my blood pressure is higher than it's ever been. Maybe I found the wrong God. Whoops.

I've done everything humanly possible it seems to take care of this issue of mine. I've gone to multiple doctors, had tests and bloodwork and ultrasounds, but still nothing. My faulty kidneys are not the culprit. Neither are the coffee, artificial sweeteners, sodium, or caffeine that I've cut out of my diet. It's not genetic. I have no clue.

So in the meantime, I get to listen to stories from my grandma about So-and-so who also had mysterious BP issues, and she had multiple miscarriages and live-births and well, her life is kind of miserable and depressing.

Anyway, my only conclusion is that I'm really this uber-anxious stressed out little bundled up ball of nerves and I'm so used to being that way that I can't even tell when I'm stressed. I just have a constant level of stress. I just said 'stress' waaay too many times in that sentence. I think my body hides things from myself. On second thought, I don't think I'm capable of being that complex.

I know this was a mess of rambling about nothing significant. I apologize.

I'm the worst.

No, really. I'm a horrible blogger. I want to be a good one so bad, and I always think about blogging, but that somehow never translates to me actually sitting down at the computer and writing. Nope, instead I spend hours stalking people on Facebook (mostly wedding pictures) or on weddinggawker.com (doing what else...looking at weddings) or reading whatever blogs I can come across (often by Mormons or about Mormons). I know, I need some new hobbies other than being an engaged Mormon.

School started, and that's keeping me kind of busy too I guess. School feels so different this semester though. I've had many moments sitting in class, looking at the other girls or overhearing conversations, where I start thinking that I wish I went to BYUI. Or Utah State. Because I feel like I'm in a different place than everyone else here lately. I spend my time planning my wedding and thinking of where I want my husband and I to move to and settle down next summer. I have baby fever (I know, that's bad and crazy and whatever). I get excited about a stew that turns out well and about buying a new couch. Not playing beerpong or hooking up with the hot new guy from Delta Kappawhatever.

And I feel very stereotypical saying that. I feel like that's something so cliche and annoying to hear this little 20 year old, newly engaged and suddenly Mormon girl to say. I agree, it is. But I still feel that way. I'm craving living somewhere more LDS-ish. I guess I spent too much time in southeast Idaho and Northern Utah this summer, because I love it there. 

Either way, I love U of I. It's a million times better than living and schooling in California. But I still can't help but get pretty excited about getting to move somewhere else in less than a year.

Suddenly life means so much

Whenever I stop to think about it, I realize just how crazy it is that I'm at where I am at. I mean, from my life in general right down to exactly where I physically am at this very second.

Never would I have ever guessed that right now I would be sitting in an LDS familys' house in the middle of a tiny farmtown in Idaho with my fiance downstairs. I don't think I ever really thought I'd be living somewhere other than California. Or that I'd be getting married at twenty years old. Or that I'd be a Mormon. 

I have no clue how I got here. It seems like I've had at least a half dozen life plans since I was 16 or so, but none of them worked out. And none of them were even remotely as crazy as this one. This current life plan never was really even a plan at all. Well, I did know I was going to marry Sterling since the day I met him, no joke. But I'm still amazed that my little declaration to myself last fall has amounted to this. The one plan that I thought was the least likely to ever go through was the only one that actually is. 

And I think the fact that this all is so crazy and unexpected is the exact reason why I have so much faith in it. Something so random and out-of-the-blue and unplanned fell together so perfectly, there is no doubt in my mind that it must just be meant to be. How else would this have happened? This is where I am supposed to be, and I'm with who I'm supposed to be with, and there is a greater power pulling this together because there is no way I would have found my way here on my own.

I set out on a narrow way, many years ago
Hoping I would find true love along the broken road
But I got lost a time or two
Wiped my brow and kept pushing through
I couldn't see how every sign pointed straight to you

Every long lost dream led me to where you are
Others who broke my heart, they were like northern stars
Pointing me on my way into your loving arms
This much I know is true

That God blessed the broken road
That led me straight to you

I think about the years I spent, just passing through
I'd like to have the time I lost, and give it back to you
But you just smile and take my hand
You've been there, you understand
It's all part of a grander plan that is coming true