[OPINION] My Valentine story

HAPPY season of love!

Wherever we may be, we Filipinos are hopeless romantics, and therefore, Valentine’s Day is a month-long celebration for us talking about love and romance.

“Humans of Pinas” (HoP), a Facebook page inspired by Humans of New York, has been showcasing Filipinos’ stories deemed to be empowering and/or inspiring. This Valentine’s month, HoP asked me to share my own story, and I am honored to join other well-known and respected couples of ‘Pinas in sharing their own stories seldom told in public. Here is my story.

May 2, 1979 was the fateful day I met the man who would turn out to be the person I would be sharing the rest of my life with. I joined the summer theater workshop of “Dulaang Abot-Kaya,” the community theater group of Sacred Heart Parish in Kamuning.

I just graduated from high school and was excited to pursue my dreams to be working in the field of mass communications — radio, television, and yes, even in films having the “artists” genes of my aunts Tessie Quintana of LVN Films in the 50s-60s and Rebecca of Premiere Productions in the 60s to the 70s, and my handsome cousin Gabby Concepcion.

I joined the summer theater workshop, which was run by graduates of the Philippine Educational Theater Association (PETA), hoping to fulfill my longtime dream to meet and get my big break from no less than the late famed director Lino Brocka, one of the most influential and significant filmmakers in the history of the Philippines, who was once an executive director of PETA.

But, God had a different plan in my life.

Rene Relos became my boyfriend a year after we top-billed several theatrical presentations for “Dulaang About-Kaya.” He just turned 18 and I was 17 when we became a couple. We went to the University of the Philippines together, where I graduated cum laude from the College of Mass Communications while he finished magna cum laude in his pre-med course.

Yes, we were both driven and have been planning to get married and share our lives together, but all of these were fulfilled expeditiously with the coming of our first-born son.

And so, we got married at age 21 and became parents at age 22. I was then an instructor in Broadcast Communication at the UP and later joined the broadcasting industry as a news anchor and TV host for ABS-CBN. Rene went on to pursue his medical education and residency at the UP College of Medicine, where he graduated valedictorian and placed fourth in the Medical Board Exam with a rating of 90%, despite us having two children.

We had no money when we started our life together as husband and wife, grateful for the support of our parents as we worked hard to fulfill our dreams, build our family. We had two more children during his surgical residency years. Eventually, we became financially independent and began living a comfortable life.

However, somewhere along the way, we drifted apart. The emotional immaturity of early adulthood, the demands and stresses of his medical education and training, my building a career in the limelight of broadcasting, raising four children, our weaknesses as human beings — the interplay of these factors eroded our once happy relationship and our marriage.

The song of Neil Sedaka comes to mind:

“I miss the hungry years
The once upon a time
The lovely long ago
We didn’t have a dime
Those days of me and you
We lost along the way…”

We had a complicated relationship for more than three years, asking ourselves if we should stay or go on our separate ways. But amid the inner turmoil, we knew deep inside how our vow and commitment to give our children the best life in spite of ourselves had been our guiding light and reason to remain friends.

And perhaps, more than how we wanted to admit during these times of uncertainties, the shadows of the simple joys of our hungry years nurtured by our love for each other had somehow kept on pulling us back and made it impossible to really let go.

And so, by the grace of God in the most miraculous circumstances, only He could have made possible, Rene and I found each other again. We went to court together just before the decision to annul our marriage was handed out to tell the judge we were dismissing the annulment case and are keeping our marriage.

“Beautiful!” gushed Judge Rosalina Pison of the Quezon City Regional Trial Court. Indeed, it was the greatest blessing of our lives — God’s promise of giving us “beauty for ashes” that healed our hearts and gave us the grace to start again.

As all of these events happened during Rene’s short month-long visit in between his interviews and the start of medical fellowship training in the United States in the summer of 2000, we made the most of this time to renew our marriage vows in the same church where we met, fell in love, got married, and had our four children baptized.

Rene went back to the U.S. and I went to visit with him during fall, winter and spring. It was during this time when we decided to immigrate to the United States to start a new chapter in our life.

Everything just fell into place, after we said YES to God’s still small voice inside our hearts.

In May of 2001, I gave up my career at ABS-CBN. My children and I joined my husband in the United States. Rene was offered a rare chance to have a surgical residency after he finished his fellowship, and this opened the path for him to practice surgery.

We started anew with hungry years again as he was just getting a humble stipend as he completed his re-training in the U.S. to get his medical license. I did real estate on the side. But our hearts were full of love and of renewed dreams in our adoptive country for us and our children.

And just after Rene started his medical practice here in the U.S. in 2005, ABS-CBN asked me to work for the company again as talk show host and news anchor for The Filipino Channel, which has started producing programs in California. I was given the chance to continue the career I gave up for my family.

We are now celebrating our 37th wedding anniversary this July. The kids have grown up and are building their own lives. We have also been blessed with two grandchildren!

Rene and I are now (almost) empty nesters and are living our lives as honeymooners — something we missed when we were navigating the struggles and crises of our younger years all at the same time. We are now able to live our passion, pursue our own dreams, travel around the world, celebrating each moment we are together.

We did not get here on our own. We grew up together from our teen years through adulthood, through middle age through the golden years. Every season of our life presented new challenges, which have been our opportunities to grow together. But what had sustained us is our renewed faith in God who has been giving us the grace to carry on and nurture our love and our life together. All the pains of the past He used so we may find this new life in Him as one.

God has blessed us with each other to help us become better human beings, growing in love and faith together, making our crooked paths straight, smoothening our rough edges.

And this all began when we said “YES,” and started the new chapters of our new life rooted in our faith, and He helped us do things we can never do on our own.

And we continue to say “YES.” Every day.

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The opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints of the Asian Journal, its management, editorial board and staff.

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Gel Santos Relos has been in news, talk, public service and educational broadcasting since 1989 with ABS-CBN and is now serving the Filipino audience using different platforms, including digital broadcasting, and print, and is working on a new public service program for the community. You may contact her through email at [email protected], or send her a message via Facebook at Facebook.com/Gel.Santos.Relos.