I’ve been reading this thread since September 2011. It is only now that I decided to share my story.
I wasn’t blessed with a good love life since I first fell in love at the age of 13. I had four ex-boyfriends that we all know didn’t work out well. One was puppy love, the other was out of desperation, the third wasn’t promising any future at all and the last was again, out of desperation. The last was unfortunately an annulled soldier and the reason for annulment was a mistress with his kid. And fate of all fate, that faulty soldier even dumped me.
I’ve come to accept that becoming happily in love was not meant for me. My career was doing fine and I am blessed with a wonderful family. Nasa akin na lahat – pwera lang ang lovelife. I felt ugly and felt that no one got interested in me.
I left my job of two years last July 2011, went to the US for a family vacation on the whole of August 2011. That whole time, I was expecting and praying that my friend of six years could be “the one.” I even wrote a 13-paged story relating the events of how much I treasured the friendship that spanned years and wasn’t broken by continents and time zones. This was my friend from college whom I hoped, “sana Lord, siya na lang po.” My friend and I met after six years of being apart and did a catch up of what we missed since we last spent our days together after college graduation.
I came back home in September 2011 and started with a new company in Taguig. I was still floating – hoping and wishing that my friend was “the one.”
Out of nowhere, I started browsing the internet about the St. Pio Shrine at Libis. Ironically, I am from a very devout Catholic family but I never got a chance to visit the shrine even when I worked at Libis for two years. I didn’t know what brought me there. It was like, I was dragged by some force and before I knew it, I was at the Shrine one afternoon of September 2011. That time, I felt like I would go crazy. I quote a line from my favorite novel, Paulo Coelho’s By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept, “Waiting is painful, forgetting is painful; but not knowing what to do is the worst kind of suffering.” I was literally feeling that way then.
I went to the Shrine on a Monday and met a certain Tita Cora who was a devotee. On my first visit, I attended Mass and later on bought the prayer booklet at the store. I started the novena that same night. I prayed, “Lord, kung hindi man po si _____ ang lalaki para sa akin, sana po dumating na po taong inilaan Nyo Po para sa akin.” On the seventh day, I got my answer. My friend confronted me sa yahoo messenger, saying, “Are you still dreaming or hoping or imagining na magiging tayo someday?” It turned out na he never felt the same way about me. And that he thought it was unfair na sobrang close namin tapos may nararamdaman pala akong ganito.
I thanked God I got the answer. Little did I know that my new job was God’s way of leading “the one” to me. He led one of the guys I HATED at work to join me one afternoon. I drove home, giving him a ride, but I had to do some errands at the supermarket and ended up tagging him along with me at the St. Pio Shrine. That was October 2011.
In December 2011, that same guy proposed within two months into the relationship – without any ring. On the 29th of December 2011 – a payday – we went to the Minor Basilica of San Sebastian to pay the reservation fee for a wedding on December 29, 2012. He only had PhP 75,000 at hand during that time. May 2012, the pamamanhikan took place. We agreed at a budget of PhP 300,000 for the Church wedding, but it turned out that it would balloon to half a million.
September 2012, he again proposed, this time with a .38 carat solitaire diamond ring.
December 29, 2012 was the start of my “happily forever after.” Relatively, I had a wedding that most women only dreamt of – the grandeur of one of the most beautiful churches in the country, the only steel church in Asia at that, a very beautiful wedding gown, the romantic serenade of a string quintet, a very romantic prenuptial shoot – name it, I had it!
Indeed, there is a time for everything and a season for every activity under the heavens.
I once felt ugly, but my husband proved to me that I’m not. Being a consultant of a real estate company (aside from his full time job), I ended up having my own building size billboard at Katipunan Avenue last February. I am no headturner, but the billboard was placed opposite Lee Minho’s and Anne Curtis’ Billboard (near Ateneo).
The man that God has destined for me proved that I am indeed lovable and I am beautiful.
He was playing around girls when we met – planning to marry in his late thirties. When he saw me, he said he couldn’t wait for me to be his wife. He was 29 and I was 28 when we got married.
Thank you very much St. Pio for your intercession.
And we lived happily forever after.
