Ten Years with Mal (Day 3026 - 3/8/18)

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Nintendo Direct (3.8.18) • Stephen's Reactions

This vlog about how Stephen and Mal met, became friends, dated and then got married. It all started on a site called Starman.net, it is the website for Earthbound fans dedicated to the 1995 Super Nintendo game Earthbound.

In 2007, Stephen started a radio show with his friends, that radio show was called Fobbies are Borange. One of the viewers was Mal. After they were done script writing, they would just hang out and talk. After awhile, they started to bring in other people just to hang out and chat. One of those people was Mallory. This group grew smaller overtime to be just Stephen, Mal, and some of his friends. But, overtime, Stephen began to develop feelings for Mallory.

But here's the thing, Stephen wasn't interested in love, not interested in a relationship. The big reason for this is, when Stephen was in high school, there a girl, he was quite interested in, pursued and ultimately the feelings were not reciprocated and he was rejected.

Well, the, Stephen and Mal started to have just chats together one on one. Just it's clear, these were "text chats" via AOL Instant Messenger, not "voice chats" via Skype. Using Skype would have been a bit too forward. Around this time, either Jami somehow noticed that Stephen had feelings for Mallory or Stephen had told Jami how he felt for Mal, Stephen can't remember which. Jami, who basically played uncover spy, had found out that Mal had feelings for Stephen, like Stephen did for Mal. After Stephen found out, he developed the courage to do something about these feelings he's felt.

It was on March 8th, 2008 that Stephen confessed his feelings for Mal, and after they both said that they like each other, Stephen said "I have so much to say right now, and all I can hear are Link and Pikachu." Some time later after that Stephen decided to buy Mal a webcam, because if they were going to talk to each other on Skype, they might as well see each others faces.

It wasn't until June that year, that they got to meet up in person for the first time, so Stephen flew up to Wisconsin to spend a week with Mal. Then, in July, they both met up for that year's Starman.net convention, which was basically Cheffcon. Then, in August, Mal visited Stephen in Myrtle Beach. After that, they went see each other (in person) again until that Christmas.

One of things Stephen has enjoyed about their relationship is that it gives encouragement for others currently in a long distance relationship. A few years later, they got married, which that was back in 2011. While they lived in Columbia, their relationship had been affected by Stephen being unable to find any work there, and Mal had this terrible job as an elementary school teacher. "The students were stomping on pencil sharpeners to get the razor blades out to cut each other, they were elementary kids." Mal would come every single day crying. There was a lot of mental anguish that first year.

The reason, their relationship never fell apart was because of a few rules they had set for themselves. The first is to never go to bed angry, which that leads into the second rule "communicate always." Talk about everything, EVERYTHING. How your feeling and how certain things make you feel. Whether it's from that other person or just in general. Talk about your deepest darkest secrets. Don't hold anything back from this person. And that's the way they've operated for 10 years. When you communicate, you won't go bed to angry. Honesty is a necessity in a marriage.

After that first year in Columbia, they moved back to Myrtle Beach. Mal got a new job and Stephen started to get more revenue from the money he made from StephenVlog and StephenPlays. Which the job, she had here eventually led to MalMakes and resigning from her job.