Adventures in Stepford

Saddle Up

2011-08-26T05:20:00.000-07:00

Hi Kids!

How've you been? I missed you guys. Thanks for all the emails from my loyal invisible internet readers. Y'all are awesome.

Stepford blog is coming back up soon.

Right here. Same Bat time. Same Bat channel. As it should be.

Just gonna take a while to get the archived posts formatted & dates/times correct. Hopefully the photos will all come back over too, but I have no idea. And I'm a little busy over here in the real world, but it should be coming back up piece-meal as I can port it back over into Blogger.

Sorry for the drama - not mine, not my doing, or choosing.

And now: Not My Fucking Problem.

Game on.

Halestorm

2011-06-20T18:17:00.000-07:00

Bet U Wish U Had Me Back - Halestorm

It was you and me, and one hot summer
Beading up with sweat all over each other
Soaking wet
We didn't have a lot of time
So we didn't waste much
Found in all the right places
You wanted me to touch
And all those memories
Make it so hard to forget about me...

I bet you wish you had me back
Another chance to gain it just like that
The best you ever had

And do you close your eyes with her,
And pretend I'm doing you again
-Like only I can

I bet you wish you had me back

It was you and me, it seemed to last forever
The way you taste, and I still remember
The sounds we made.
One day in June I stayed all night,
And made love to you like
The 4th of July.
And all those memories,
Make it so hard to forget about me...

I bet you wish you had me back
Another chance to gain it just like that
The best you ever had

And do you close your eyes with her,
And pretend I'm doing you again
- Like only I can
I bet you wish you had me back

Every night, every time,
You see me when you close your eyes...

I bet you wish you had me back
Another chance to gain it just like that
-Like only I can

You wish you had me back

Ghost Town

2011-05-25T16:49:00.000-07:00

Yeah, it's empty here in Stepford. All 242 blog posts since July 2006 have been deleted.

My apologies to all my loyal readers over the last five years. Y'all have been fantastic, and I cannot thank you enough for your support along the way.

I'll explain later.

In the meantime, new blog. Can't post the URL here, but if you email me and ask - and I can verify you are who you say - I'll redirect you

For the others:
and the horse you rode in on, bitches

Share With Me

2011-05-25T07:25:00.000-07:00

A Common Disaster -Cowboy Junkies

A candle burning for everything I've ever wanted
A tattoo burned for everything I've ever wanted and lost
I had a long list of names that I kept in my back pocket,
But I've cut it down to one and your name's at the top

Won't you share a common disaster?
Share with me a common disaster
A common disaster

I found myself a friend,
But he's crooked as a stick in water
So now I'm writing fairy tales revenge
He's got a plan to steal my little sister,
But I'm not too concerned
'cause I will get him in the end

Won't you share a common disaster?
Share with me a common disaster
A common disaster

Going to find me someone to share
A common disaster
Run away with me from a life so cramped and dull
Not worry too much about the happily-ever-after
Just keep the Caddy moving
'til we're well beyond that hill

Won't you share a common disaster?
Share with me a common disaster
A common disaster

Eat Pray Love

2008-09-19T16:36:00.001-07:00

I had a whole intro to this post, and it disappeared when I published. [insert murderous thoughts here]. Something hinky is going on with my draft folder...

The nutshell: I missed the bus on this when it was all the rage, but glad I took the ride now. Here are all the passages I re-copied into my journal. Read it for yourself, no matter your theology (as you might imagine I squinted at quite a few things described), and you'll have lots of your own passages to dog-ear, too, I would imagine.

Photo links to the Amazon.com page:

[pg. 12]
..I only exhausted him. We both knew there was something wrong with me and he'd been losing patience with it. We'd been fighting and crying, and we were weary in a way that only a couple whose marriage is collapsing can be weary. We had the eyes of refugees.

[pg. 21]
Addiction is the hallmark of every infatuation-based love story ... when the drug is withheld, you promptly turn sick, crazy and depleted (not to mention resentful of the dealer who encouraged this addiction in the first place but who now refuses to pony up the good stuff anymore - despite the fact that you KNOW he has it hidden somewhere, god*mn it, because he used to give it to you for free) ... Meanwhile, the object of your adoration has become repulsed by you. He looks at you like you're someone he's never met before, much less someone he once loved with a high passion

...during the worst ugliness of divorce (a life experience my friend Brian has compared to "having a really bad car accident every single day for about two years")...

[pg. 58]
He says all Americans are like this: repressed. Which makes them dangerous and potentially deadly when they do blow up.
"A savage people," he diagnoses.

[pg. 83]
The other alternative in the backs of our minds, of course, was that one of us might change. He might become more open and affectionate, not withholding himself from anyone who loves him on the fear that she would eat his soul. Or I might even learn how to ... stop trying to eat his soul.

[pg. 102]
In Venice in the Middle Ages there was once a profession for a man called a Codega - a fellow you hired to walk in front of you at night with a lit lantern, showing you the way, scaring off thieves and demons, bringing you confidence and protection through the dark streets.

[pg. 122]
...the built-in glitches of the human condition, which I'm going to over-simply define here as the heartbreaking inability to sustain contentment.

[pg. 132]
I am burdened with what the Buddhists call the, "monkey mind" - the thoughts that swing from limb to limb, stopping only to scratch themselves, spit and howl.

[pg. 141]
"That's just your ego, trying to make sure it stays in charge. This is what your ego does. It keeps you feeling separate, keeps you with a sense of duality, tries to convince you that you're flawed and broken and alone instead of whole"

[pg. 148]
He says, "Give it another six months, you'll feel better."
"I've already given it twelve months, Richard."
"Then give it six more. Just keep throwin' six months at it till it goes away. Stuff like this takes time."

[pg. 150]
"You gotta stop wearing your wishbone where your backbone oughtta be."

[pg 155]
Letting go, of course, is a scary enterprise for those of us who believe that the world revolves only because it has a handle on the top of it which we personally turn, and that if we were to drop this handle for even a moment, well - that would be the end of the universe.

[pg. 157]
"There are only two questions that human beings have ever fought over, all thought history. How much do you love me? -and- Who's in charge? Everything else is somehow manageable. But these two questions of love and control undo us all, trip us up and cause war, grief and suffering" ... it is only questions of longing and control that emerge to agitate me, and this agitation is what keep me from evolving forward.

[pg. 171]
you cannot see your reflection in running water, only in still water.

[pg. 175]
In the search for God, you revert from what attracts you and swim toward that which is difficult ... Faith is walking face-first and full-speed into the dark.

[pg. 207]
"Imagine that the universe is a great spinning engine," he said. "You want to stay near the core of the thing - right in the hub of the wheel - not out at the edges where all the wild whirling takes place, where you can get frayed and crazy. The hub of calmness - that's your heart. That's where God lives within you. So stop looking for answers in the world. Just keep coming back to that center and you'll always find peace."

[pg. 279]
"I think she had a secret mind inside her other mind, nobody can see inside there."

Let it Fade

2008-09-09T16:34:00.000-07:00

Have you been walking on a surface that's uncertain?
Have you helped yourself to everything that's empty?

You can't live this way too long.
There's more than this, more than this.

Have you been standing on your own feet too long?
Have you been looking for a place where you belong?

You can rest, you will find rest.

Let this old life crumble, let it fade.
Let this new life offered be your saving grace.

Let this old life crumble, let it fade, let it fade.

Have you been holding on to what this world has offered?
Have you been giving in to all these masquerades?

It will be gone, forever gone.

Let this old life crumble, let it fade.
Let this new life offered be your saving grace

Let this old life crumble, let it fade, let it fade..

Are you carrying the weight too much?
Running from the call?

Let it fade

You can rest
You will find rest.

Let this old life crumble, let it fade.
Let this new life offered be your saving grace.
Let this old life crumble, let it fade, let it fade.

Have you been standing on your own feet too long?
Have you been looking for a place where you belong?

-Jeremy Camp, Let it Fade

Order up

2008-08-28T13:50:00.000-07:00

What I am looking for is a blessing that's not in disguise. -Kitty O'Neill Collins

I rely on the kindness of strangers...

2008-08-27T18:43:00.000-07:00

Can't remember the source of that movie quote, but my many thanks to your comments and emailed notes of encouragement; my readers are wonderful and I am always humbled by your insights - and the fact that you still check in when I haven't posted on a regular basis in probably a year.

I appreciate ya'll more than you know.

Thanks for sitting on the curb with me and watching things go by.

Open House

2008-08-26T21:14:00.000-07:00

Our house is for sale.

Life in Stepford has taken a sharp right turn since we last chatted.

Probably not what you're imagining, I would venture to guess.

This development is actually a good one, although the transition is bumpy at present.

Most of what transpired is The Husband's story to tell, and I still (foolishly? optimistically?) hope that one day he will relay the story to you himself.

But since that is not an option at this point, the simplest news is: he has a job after 2 1/2 years without one; located in Clean Slate, miles away from Stepford.

He's already there working, has been for two months; I'm back here hoping this house will sell before the next Olympic games in 2012.

He's home on weekends; I work weekends. You do the math.

We actually get along surprisingly well over phone, text, and email ... so there's a purpose in this separation-without-a-legal-separation dance, I crazily hope.

And here's the thing.

Our house shows well.

It is such a pretty place: not too big, clean lines, fresh flowers, no clutter (all packed away), happy family photos, nicely decorated (I give ups to the Husband for that, he's a natural), super nice neighborhood, thick woods, deer & fawns, apple trees, ducks on the pond, yet close to town, super school district, yaddayaddayadda.

Other realtors were jealous, stating they wished it was their listing. No, really. It's a sweet house.

BUT.

Like the wolf in sheep's clothing, it's our Ground Zero.

If I were looking at my house as a buyer, I would walk through (scarily-clean-for-unannounced-realtors-) rooms with a twinge of envy. I know me.

I would be so covetous of the family that lived in this house; their children are gorgeous, the colors on the wall are perfect, the hardwood is pretty, the views are sweet.

They must be such a happy family, I would think. They are living the perfect life.

And I would want the kind of life that this home looks like it contains.

I would probably make an offer, subconsciously hoping that the good vibes would stay in the tile caulking and emanate to my life should I, too, live here in Shangri-La.

And that would be a lie; I would have bought into appearances. Like we all do.

We look good, therefore maybe we can stretch that performance into actually being good. As if that magical thinking works. What am I, Eight?

I still struggle with pirouetting for the masses. Even after all this destruction and hard-won self awareness. For people who don't even matter, I worried that they consider me 'put together'. You do it too, right?

And on the other side of the picket fence, I totally buy-in to everyone else's 'presentation'. Are you kidding? I rarely, if ever, entertain much thought that things aren't what they appear in other people's homes. I mean, not until presented with concrete evidence.

I always presume other couples are happy, affectionate, and that the wife knows what the hell she's doing in her role... you know, that other couples can't possibly be as far off the rails as we have been.

Surely, she never agonizes in the anniversary card aisle at Hallmark. Surely her mouth isn't dry from preventing the escape of an anguished half-sob whilst perusing the "For The One I Love" column of greeting cards

Because she can't possibly buy any of them.

Because they don't use such words between them anymore.

Yet she must buy a card.

Surely this other wife reads such cards with ease. The cards that wildly celebrate the years of love, support, no regrets, friendship, fun, and hot sex with tender verses and images. Surely she chooses her "For My Husband" card without any of the chest pressure that resembles a cardiac event. She is without the guilt of having to carefully scrutinize every phrase.

She is without the ache of passing over a plethora of sentiments that are absolutely off limits between them.

But the house shows well.

The Long & Winding Road

2008-08-11T10:44:00.000-07:00

A long dispute means both parties are wrong
-Voltaire

I'm sitting in a wi-fi cafe catching up on emails and attempting to blog. Here's a great quote, and I have several posts rattling around that I'm going to empty on the page today/tonight, so more to come.

No, really

Cracked Rear View

2008-05-29T21:17:00.000-07:00

The definition of hell: proximity without intimacy -Dante

Pause in the yadda yadda yadda

2008-03-17T09:46:00.000-07:00

Oh, lookie. This is a draft from last month I worked on but never posted, which says basically the same thing about the gabbing-on-and-on thing I just posted a minute ago. Hmm. It's not finished, and I've revised some of my thinking, but I'll throw it out here for general discussion.

I've been quiet for a bit, just stopped talktalktalk-ing about my life to the world at large (well, ya'll. and my counselor. and accountability partner. and phone-a-friend lay counselor. I just got sick of blahblahblahing. It happens).

I just sort of hid away and tried to just be for a bit. That's hard too, b/c my judgment is wonky (I think) without people to bounce things off of, and yet no one can really know my life except God, me, and The Husband. And the kidlets, inasmuch as they can know.

I read somewhere (and may have posted this before) about living with pain in your life, that you just have to be still sometimes because if you flail around in it, the blades of pain will only cut deeper. I am a master flailer; my emotions have had me spinning around for years in my pain, just letting the blades do more damage.

So I stopped for a bit. And am regrouping.

And I am probably having some kind of annotated mid-life crisis, because I hated turning 40 last year. It really doesn't matter that I don't look 40, and co-workers/friends are constantly shocked that I am this age. I hate being 40 and feeling trapped and stuck and unhappy and regretful of most of my life. I feel gypped, I told God the other day. No surprise to Him, but I'm attempting to be more honest with Him about the Ugly.

Fermenting

2008-03-17T09:39:00.000-07:00

Love conquers all, rapes all, pillages all, leaves all for dead." -Pratt

I'm around, ya'll, just fermenting a bit, trying not to whine and bemoan my life, but find the purpose in it, and get off the throne in my heart and let God have a seat there. Every time I think I have done so, I grab it back like we're playing Musical Chairs and the music has stopped. Nobody wins that, especially me.

Is it just me, or does this blog take for-freaking-EVAH to load in your browser too? Clue me in. I love my template but I think there's some hiccup in it that hangs up the speed.

Thanks for checking in, my internet friends.

Real Boats Rock

2008-02-18T12:57:00.000-08:00

"Show me a completely smooth operation and I'll show you someone who's covering mistakes. Real boats rock." -Frank Herbert

Damn straight, Skippy. Wish everybody got this.

A Rapid Succession of Continual Days

2008-01-22T20:30:00.000-08:00

The Husband said something in recent weeks that makes sense: (a) he has no one to talk to, which is very very true. There is nobody. And (b) for the last two years, people have only wanted to talk about his Marriage, not his Hurt.

I am ALL ABOUT talking about my marriage - it's the most important thing to me. But it's not the most important thing to him, to be honest. He lost his whole Life, his Purpose, his Friends, his Reputation, his (perceived?) ability to Provide and Protect, and Nobody has come alongside him in Stepford to walk this long road.

He is coming undone, off and on, after years of the same. He has nothing to give to anyone (except to the kids), and feels like he's losing his mind and his faith, along with his life. It's the Loss trifecta.

Yes, sure, I selfishly think it's been cruel and sinful - the physical/emotional freezing out of me by him, pre- and post-affair, I am ready to come undone over that point alone. But this post isn't about me today. (shocker, I know) And as I've spelled out before, ad nauseum: he has his reasons. I've been an abusive spouse. But the affair (his part, my part, the aftermath) complicates the 'black & white' of it all.

The Husband has often thought that God must be waiting for him to get something, or solve some spiritual Rubik's Cube - that he simply does not have the strength to do, and cannot understand - before God will move/encourage him/change his circumstances.

And, honestly, between you and me, and at the risk of sounding like the Total Fcuking Center of the Universe: I do sometimes wonder if the lack of effort/focus toward the Wife and Marriage Relationship plays any part of his lack of Restoration in other areas. Is it 1Peter that says something about how you treat your wife affecting your prayer life? Plus the whole your-body-is-not-your-own stuff, etc. from Corinthians.

BUT.

BUT: I realize that I may likely be extrapolating out of my self-centeredness here. That's just me me me, want want want, take take take- which is how The Husband views me, and has said so. And at this desperate point for me, is certainly the case.

BUT.

He has no one to talk to, and that still remains true. And moreso now, two years later. No friends, no phone calls, silence. He falls frequently into a pit that gets deeper with no one offering a hand that doesn't point back to me, what he did, and Fixing the Marriage above all else. No one else is in this house to see him slowly dying from the hurt. Losing his mind from the stress. Falling down in his continued, never-ending pain. A succession of days go by with no change. Day after day after day. He is coming apart with nowhere to put it. He can't sleep. He has mysterious aches and pains. He keeps a headcold/sinus infection that flares about once a month. This from the Artist Formerly Known as the Picture of Health.

We both have our Falling Down days, and then somehow live to crawl the next inch.

He was reading a book a few months ago, Rebuilding Your Broken World, that made this point: that if the church/community doesn't offer grace, restoration cannot occur. I understand that, but don't believe the church/community is bigger than God, who can do anything no matter what the world does.

And although He's not come through yet, I still hold up my tee-tiny Bic lighter in this darkened concert venue in my -albeit faltering- hope that God, the Ultimate Rockstar Savior, will come back for an encore performance. But my husband holds onto this book's point as The Reason (or one of them) that his World Will Not Be Restored.

He's in no shape for marriage counseling (as so many people continue to recommend), or any form of 'counseling' - he is SO alone, and feels God is punishing/ignoring him. He is in his own cocoon of self-loathing and hopelessness - I swear I don't think anybody GETS that. And in order to have someone talk to him, he has to pay them (when we've counseled). And even those people quickly focus on Fixing the Marriage, and don't give any value to his pain and the Loss of Who He Was; only What He Did.

Which compounds his hurt and only continues the path of Aloneness.

So. I am desperate for The Husband to have someone to talk to, before I come home to find him dead from a stroke or heart attack, or worse.

He is a good person. I believe in him - even while I have emotionally beaten the sh!t out of him for far too long, and continue to when I feel threatened. Damn me. He has talents and gifts being wasted and unused. I believe God has a purpose for him that it's not time for yet, for whatever frustrating/heartbreaking reason. He has lost faith in his future, and he has NOTHING coming in.

No one feeding him hope. I try to encourage him and tell him what I see, but obviously, I am so enmeshed in this situation from my own stuff, sins, wants, and the complexities of our situation - that it's laughable to think I could possibly be effective at this point.

And so I continue to pray for him, for me, for us, and struggle with my own faith issues because of the lack of God-Saving-the-Day here.

He needs a friend. Just one. Just someone to listen to him and validate him. And hold his arms up in this battle (what Bible story was that? I can't remember). Would he even be able to see that person reach out -and reach back - at this point, this late in the Disillusioned and Mistrustful game?

More on my crap later, of which there is always much.

Which Pill?

2008-01-16T13:27:00.000-08:00

Where does the time go? Been 10 days since I posted? geez. That was unheard of back in the day.

Anyway, got stopped dead in my tracks last night by these words of a Wise Internet Sage (especially the last paragraph). Shared with ya'll with said Sage's permission

Maybe forgiveness is simply the act of letting go of the hurt and allowing ourselves to move past it while continuing to live. To take the lesson we have learned and use that knowledge, instead of being paralyzed by the fear that it will happen again. Not to be stupid, no, nor turn a blind eye, but instead to trust ourselves, knowing that we have already faced a terrible thing and survived. We try to teach our children to learn from their experiences - why then do our own often experiences make us want to hide.

Bitterness, resentment, anger, these are all extremely heavy burdens to carry. If we can find a way to forgive, maybe we can just lay down that burden and cherish what we do have.

Sometimes I look around at other couples in their mediocre relationships and wonder if there is a bomb in there waiting to drop. Or maybe the bomb will never drop and they will simply continue to go on as they are, never realizing how much more there could be to their relationships.

Maybe we are the "lucky" ones in that we all really know how great our marriages could be, and we have this wonderful goal to strive for. All they have is what they think they know, the same thing, day in, day out. I don't know what is better: to never really live and never really hurt, existing in a state of numb indifference, taking each other for granted; or to experience the highs and lows of what we are going through - at least we know we are alive, we know what we want, we are striving to make ourselves better people and to, hopefully, make our marriages better in the process.

If you saw The Matrix (the original), you may see the parallel here - which pill would you choose?

Pausing for Perspective, and non-snarkiness

2008-01-07T18:10:00.000-08:00

...Is that a word, Snarkiness? Or should I spell it Snarkyness?

Anyway, every post I'm composing over here in Stepford is sounding like a complete b*tch-fest (a/k/a Snarky), and that's not very nice, so I'm keeping them marinating in the Drafts folder until I can be a little more balanced.

Which does not seem to be today. Dammit.

I'm mad and frustrated and hurt and p*ssed off. And it's not even PMS-week. But I still want to be fair, since the pen is mightier than the sword and all that.

As my husband attests, I love to be miserable, and the victim, and in the middle of Drama. Yes and no. Drama, yes, I've copped to that before. Victim? check, but I've been working to confess those times in the past and act accordingly in the present. Miserable? It may be a familiar thing in my life, but I don't aim to be miserable, or want it. That pisses me off. Take this fcuking misery, you can have it.

Ugh. My snow-covered acorn is becoming an avalanche. Will post an update when I recover my center.

2008

2008-01-07T16:52:00.000-08:00

Be always at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let each new year find you a better man. -Benjamin Franklin

Behind the Facade

2007-12-13T18:48:00.000-08:00

As ya'll may have noticed, I'm not posting every day - or even close to it - like I was when I first started this blog. Sometimes, I wonder if it's been toxic to my Real Life to overthink all this garbage. (Although over-thinking is certainly not limited to my writing here, nosiree! I analyze my existence like a 3rd party narrator in my brain all the freaking TIME!). I've only recently made some effort to stop the Narrator/Analyzer in my head at times. Long road, that. It's hardwired in me. Like my own version of The Truman Show, starring Moi.

From some of the comments/concern expressed (and thanks for them), I also wanted to clarify that this blog is a dumping ground of my inner black rot, and reading this blog only and not knowing the rest of me (which is 99.8% of ya'll I imagine), would give the impression that I should be placed in a facility to prevent harm to myself and others. Or to just be slapped around and told to Quit The Whining, For Pete's Sake. I can see that.

If you saw the other 95% of me in a casual setting, or at work, or as my friend, you would probably be stunned to realize the extent of inner sludge I dump here as part of the girl you have known. Not that everything is entirely separated, but you realize my point, yes? OMGosh, at work the other day we were talking about a former coworker who was really negative in general, and I mentioned how hard it is for me to be around that kind of person [because: I am a sponge, absorbing the emotions of others] and someone said, "That's because you are such a happy, upbeat person" and I laughed the laugh of the embittered soul and said, "That is such a crock of sh!t"

So I wanted to at least pop in and say hello.

Life in Stepford is a freefall right now, and I'm trying to not fight it. To just fall, feel the scary stuff, and trust that God will catch me before I Splat. That sh!t is HARD, ya'll. I am the first to admit I do not do this well, or consistently. I default to 'it's going to be all right' happy-ending scenarios in my head, just to calm my inner panic when things are scary. I even dream life as I wish it to be, and wake up absorbing that faux 'Life's Okay' into my psyche. And you know, sometimes it's not going to be all right (in the short term), and I have to quit fooling myself in order to gain some false sense of control of the situation. I fake myself out, I've realized, so I don't have a complete panic attack and sit in a corner eating my hair.

At this rate, I'll have my life together by the fourth of Never.

I Lived Awake, but Half Asleep

2007-11-22T19:36:00.000-08:00

This is from Sheri Lynch's blog (of the famed national radio duo Bob & Sheri). I am NOT claiming these words as my own, but I wish my brain were so fab to spit these out.

Below is part of her blog post in a few jagged pieces - the ones that spoke to me most. Her post in it's entirety is here

…And if I die before I learn to speak
Can money pay for all the days I lived awake
But half asleep…

from Standing Outside a Broken Phone Booth With Money in My Hand
Primitive Radio Gods

Imagine if that’s what hell was: the utter loss of God, and of love and hope, and the sure knowledge that it was you who destroyed whatever good might have been yours. That it all could have been different, if only you had been less selfish or less cowardly, if only you had been a more grateful, more loving human being. To know that it was you all along and no one else, not the people you punished or blamed or pushed away. Total responsibility: yours. All second chances: gone. You’d almost rather spend eternity as a pitchfork target – at least then you could hang on to the meager pleasure of thinking yourself a victim.

Instead of seeing your life as a whole, maybe it’s better to break it into episodes. Since you’re not the same person you were ten or fifteen or twenty years ago, you ought to cut yourself some slack. What we think of as mistakes now surely seemed like reasonably good ideas to the people we once were. Some of those mistakes even felt like inevitabilities, didn’t they? Also, it’s a painful fact that many of us can’t fathom the cost of our actions until it’s past time to pay for them. So what are you going to do? Wallow in the past and wish for another try? Daydream about the future when things will finally be the way they’re supposed to be? Or face up to the reality that everything counts, and this moment, the one that’s slipping away half-noticed is the only one that matters. There’s no point chasing the ghosts of our former selves. What could we possibly say that would make any sense? We did what we did, and here we are, powerless to change even one single second. That’s the sting of regret: the knowledge of what needs to be put right, the impossibility to make it so. Kind of like standing outside a broken phone booth with money in your hand.

Put down your weapons

2007-11-15T08:07:00.000-08:00

Not my words below, not even written to me, but it could have been. Okay, so between individual counseling, phone counseling, a local accountability person, and the Will of God, perhaps my dark places will get exposed to the light and melt like the Wicked Witch of the West. What? It could happen.

It took BOTH of us realizing where we failed and coming to terms with our demons. He used to lie, cheat, withhold affection.. you name it, he did it and I justified my anger and refused to change. One day I woke up and realized that I was going to find a reason to be suspicious, angry and unloving no matter what he did. I realized this because when he was gone and I was alone, I had no one to unleash my anger on but myself. It almost destroyed me. I finally decided to set down my weapons and figure out where that anger came from and start loving myself. I spent years feeling angry because no one could love me enough. It's hard to love someone who's just waiting for "proof" that they're unlovable. I'm not saying this is what you're doing, but it was a problem for me. I wanted to be loved, but I wanted it on my terms. I wanted to be loved, but wouldn't trust. I wanted change, but didn't forgive.

Just Showed Up For My Own Life

2007-11-05T07:08:00.000-08:00

Spending my time sleep walking
Moving my mouth but not saying a thing
Hoping the changes would take by working their way from the outside in
I was in love with an idea
Preoccupied with how a life should appear
Spending my time at the surface repairing the holes in the shiny veneer

There are so many ways to hide
There are so many ways not to feel
There are so many ways to deny what is real

And I just showed up for my own life
And I'm standing here taking it in and it sure looks bright

I'm going to live my life inspired
Look for the holy in the common place
Open the windows and feel all that's honest and real until I'm truly amazed
I'm going to feel all my emotions
I'm going to look you in the eyes
I'm going to listen and hear until it's finally clear and it changes our lives

There are so many ways to hide
There are so many ways not to feel
There are so many ways to deny what is real

And I just showed up for my own life
And I'm standing here taking it in and it sure looks bright

Oh the glory of God is man fully alive
Oh the glory of God is man fully alive

There are so many ways to hide
There are so many ways not to feel
There are so many ways to deny what is real

And I just showed up for my own life
And I'm standing here taking it in and it sure looks bright

-Sara Groves

Inside Out

2007-10-26T19:21:00.000-07:00

The wise woman builds her house, but with her own hands the foolish one tears hers down. -Proverbs 14:1 NIV

Woe to you ... you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.

Woe to you ... you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead men's bones and everything unclean. -Matthew 23:25-27 NIV

Hymn

2007-10-18T19:35:00.000-07:00

Oh refuge of my hardened heart
Oh fast pursuing lover, come
As angels dance around Your throne
My life -by captured fare -You own

Not silhouette of trodden faith
Nor death shall not my steps be guide
I'll pirouette upon my grave
For in Your path I'll run and hide

Oh gaze of love, so melt my pride
That I may in Your house but kneel
And in my brokenness to cry
Spring worship unto Thee

When beauty breaks the spell of pain
The bludgeoned heart shall burst in vain
But not when love be pointed king
And truth shall Thee forever reign

Sweet Jesus, carry me away
From cold of night, and dust of day
In ragged hour or salt worn eye
Be my desire, my well sprung lye

Oh gaze of love, so melt my pride
That I may in Your house but kneel
And in my brokenness to cry
Spring worship unto Thee

-Hymn, Jars of Clay

Fire Up a Colortini

2007-10-01T17:36:00.000-07:00

Fire up a colortini, sit back, relax, and watch the pictures, now, as they fly through the air.

-broadcaster Tom Snyder,1935-2007

Wheeee! Lots of sh!t flying through the air.

Sure enough, I open my mouth and satan sees where to get me. Fcuker. The engine noise has been so loud in the last week, I just want to lay down and give up. He who is in me is greater, He who is in me is greater, He who is in me....

I am weary of this seesaw I live on. Hope - and change, and then backsliding and nothing good. Fall is in the air ...literally.

Ya'll, truly. I'm ashamed to post anymore. I cannot imagine what a fcuking SNORE it is to read 'hey, big insight' and then 'hey, i still suck'. I hate being me, and then every once in a while I don't. I keep pushing this elephant up the stairs, I keep blowing it, yet I keep having hope. Many days, I honestly do not know why, other than God won't let me quit completely. And, lucky you, are stuck on the ride with me.

I also feel like I'm giving God a bad rap. Not like I'm some big influence or He can't take it, but I keep saying Yay God about stuff that happens, thinking I'm on the upswing, giving Him credit. And then BOOM, I crash, my inner garbage coming out from underneath the carpet where I've apparently swept it, and it kind of makes God look bad to those of you who don't know Him well.

I am not representing Him worth a sh!t. This is not God's fault, it's mine. And looking back over old posts from last fall/winter, some of my world is different and yet much of my Insight remains un-acted-upon. Again, that's my fault. Emotional impotence.

I have seen changes in me, and I write those first to encourage myself. The most positive changes have been with my children. I have been, in the past, a scary horrible no-good parent. Selfish, downright mean, and easily irritated by small people who were not intentionally doing me harm.

Every parent struggles with pieces of this puzzle, but my struggles were more than sleep-deprivation and normal stress. There was a black place inside me, still is, that puts a shield between myself and my family. Cannot put words on it, but it was ugly with the people who least deserved it. And rose up in a swift tsunami-type fashion when it came.

If nothing else, that change in me is Real. And I weep, that deep-down painful sorrow of regret, when I think back. I would give anything, anything to rewind -and tape over- that part of my movie.

I look back in my rearview mirror with a clarity that I don't have in The Moment (or The Month, or The Year). Honestly, I feel like I'm several years behind myself. Like now, for instance. I'm learning much about me that would have SO better served me two years ago. But it's not enough to know it now, because such damage was done in the interim that I need bigger forces than Two-years-ago-Insight. Capice?

Like bringing in FEMA way too late for Katrina; would have been beneficial on the ground before landfall, not playing catch-up in its wake. Bigger forces (military, etc) were needed in the aftermath - and even then, it was impossible to 'fix'. Granted, hindsight and all. Who can know what is needed ahead of time, or how much destruction we'll find ourselves in, etc. But really, ya'll. You know what I'm saying? I am just now getting the FEMA funds in, far too late for where the circumstances are.

There is a deep piece of my heart that swings in a free fall, scared and frightened. It looks for a place to grab onto something safe, but chooses people & circumstances to validate me. Especially my husband: please love me, please like me, please find me to be good, please please please.

Nothing 'sticks' to my heart, it's like Teflon. God sees me as I really am: filthy rags. BUT. He also sees me through the blood as I am in Jesus, worthy of love. Why can't that stick to me?

I wander through life like a Wemmick, letting people put their gold stars or red dots on me as they choose. Even those don't stick: and not for the good reason in the story, but because the ways of other-seeking validation don't work.

I'm no fool. I am actually a smart person, good student, quick study. But not where the rubber meets the road obviously. I'm an asset to most situations - outside of my own home. For the most part, I like who I am with everyone else in my world. I've learned to be a better friend to people, really be interested in them and concerned for their wellbeing, I accept responsibility for dropping the ball - personally with friends, or professionally with coworkers. Quickly. I don't need to be reminded or prompted for that.

At home I do. It has taken the better part of three years for me to to step around the screen of My Defensiveness with my children - my own children, for fcuk's sake - and apologize when necessary. My husband had to call me out, listen to me deflect like a petulant teenager, and finally, I would say I was sorry about something to my own child. I am sick at myself when I think of it all. This was not some isolated incident; it happened often.

On the thank-you-Jesus flipside, I can now spot when it happens without a Proctor/Chaperon/Husband present and apologize immediately to my children, with a non-deflecting explanation. Even more than half the time (praise God), I can see it coming and stop the Bad in a pre-emptive strike, completely foregoing the need for apology and repentance. Am I making any sense? she asks the invisible internet.

But I can do none of these things with my own husband. There have been very itty-bitty-small, too-little-too-late FEMA-type improvements, but again, they are small in proportion to where we are -and where I need to be with this stronghold. I need to be down the road a-piece, people. And I don't move. Much. WTF?

I do not, without great wailing/gnashing of teeth- if ever - say "you're right, i'm wrong" right off the bat. I imagine myself being able to do it, but when we arrive at an opportunity: WALL. Fear. Defense. And it's only with my spouse. I will own up to anything, anywhere. Elsewhere. Here online, at work, with my counselor - about the very thing my husband has told me. I can't think of anywhere else that I do NOT eat my sandwich I made.

But to his face, in the moment? I am mute, with my insides contorting. Dying to connect in a real way, yet placing a firm wedge between us that grows larger with each conversation: But that's not what I meant, I never said that, I didn't do that. Because, as he so aptly puts it, if I am never wrong he is the one who always must be. That's not relational balance, nor is it fair. Dammit, I am NOT this person. I'm not. But here I am, having been her for the better part of my life.

This screams "Trouble with Authority Males over Me", as there is only him really. And God. I fool myself that I'm cool with God, just not my husband. I'm probably not cool with either of them. This is something else my husband has suggested. And, like all his points, I cannot come to grips with in his presence, yet mull it over afterwards. He thinks I don't believe anything he mentions or insights, but that's not it.

I've been on my knees about this problem, and others, and continue to be. And will continue to be, until He changes me or I die. I can't do this alone. I crave relationship, yet am so damaged. The area of Relationship is where my damage was done initially (childhood/innocence/trust betrayed, etc). Why do you think it's hard for me to even trust God, a heavenly Father, when parental relationship was so perverted in my reality.

I have no excuses: yes, my past is why I've made all these fortresses to my heart, but I no longer live in a battlefield. I should not function like I do, to the detriment of everything I ever wanted. And years behind the learning curve.

I see through a lens of competition with my husband. I want to be Good Enough, I think he's a Better Person, I reflexively feel like a Loser and/or Belittle him in some way. Not always directly, just not Building Him Up or Supporting him. I pray for the know-how to Get Over Myself and my implanted fear that if he is a Happy, Successful human being, he'll want nothing from me or not need me. Or find someone Better. This is a whole different topic, but it all ties in to the tangle that is my black, ugly places. Fear is immobilizing

Ironically, or not so much, I do Build Him Up in my conversations about him. Just not to him. Like it's Giving In, or some such bullsh!t. Again, in my rational mind, I see all (well, most) of my wrong behaviors and know I need to change. Every opportunity reveals my failures.

He's really a good man, my husband. And I really want to be a good woman. In general, but especially in my home. I want to be well-matched with him. I want to be vulnerable with him, rest in him. I have likely never done that, at least not since we were very newly in love maybe. The undercurrent of Us is static and tension, as I manipulate all things in order to Keep Me Comfortable. I want victory where I've previously had nothing but defeat. But I want it on my own, not depending on him to validate me. And this is where it's so tricky. Where I fall down.

So easy to see it in your mind, especially after the fact, but impossible to implement. I am NOT the one person too fcuked up for God to fix. I just had to write that 'out loud' because I need the reminder. I'm too big for me to fix, but not for Him.

When "You're right, I'm wrong" about anything (but especially the big things) I pray to step over myself and tell him so. Within minutes, not hours, days or never. With God's help, and only through that, I will change.

From this day forward, I drag my sinful prideful self to a standing position and attempt to move forward. Again. Damn, ya'll.

Dead Man Walking/Fighting

2007-09-25T04:23:00.000-07:00

Ultimately, we're all dead men.
Sadly we cannot choose how, but what we can decide is how we meet that end - in order that we are remembered as men. -unknown

My hope is a habit

2007-09-23T03:23:00.000-07:00

But what is happiness except the simple harmony between a man and the life he leads? ~Albert Camus

Want to tell ya'll what's been going on - yet scared if I open my big, fat, quick-to-claim-change mouth, it will go away. Aside: I felt the same way the day after I became a Christian, too. Everything felt very different, and I tiptoed around it for a while thinking it was some total bullsh!t placebo effect. Or if I acknowledged it in any way, it would dissipate immediately and prove me a gullible dumba$$. Trust no one. I am Fox Mulder.

I have been clinging, clinging, clinging to The Husband, or the Hope of him for-freaking-evah since the affair. Unhealthy and all that, well aware. Much advice given (and heard) to not focus on my spouse, but to look up to the Lord and put my faith in Him with the capital H, not the lowercase h. Concentrate on that at He will give you the desires of your heart, etc.

Heard it, understood it, totally agreed with it.

Still could not do it.

My emotions have been all tangled up with my husband's actions, what he was -or wasn't- doing. My validity as a woman, person, etc. all directly dependent on how my husband acted.

Trying to be pretty enough, helpful enough, or [fill in the blank] enough for him to [love me, be attracted to me, want me, need me] again. Fcuk. Who could stand that? He told me that I was measuring everything he did or said against how it Made Me Feel.

I kept wanting that to NOT be true.

But it was.

Even when I tried to disconnect from reacting to him, I did it in a p*ssed off kind of way. As if to Prove a Point, or Get Him To Notice. All about - still - his reactions, just from another angle.

I b*tched and moaned wherever I could ... on this blog, to my counselor, to a very few friends (who could still stand to hear me whine about my tribulations months later) ... all about how my marriage was difficult, how my life was SO HARD, how I needed, I wanted, I craved. Pity me, I am Suffering such Woe, I am the Victim of my Life.

Even while learning to see my own flaws in this relationship, and empathizing the state of my husband's painful path, I still did every action, thought, prayer, with the motivation of Getting What I Want.

So.

Long ago, when I was maybe 10 years old, I went to California and was able to ride in a glider one afternoon. Amazing. Gliders are unpowered airplanes, launched by an aerotow -or powered aircraft- tethered to the glider by a rope.

The tow plane pulls the glider until the desired altitude is reached and detaches the glider by disconnecting the rope. The glider then sails in the air until landing on its own.

While the tow plane is pulling the glider by the rope, you're surrounded by the loud engine roar and feeling the vibrations of the engined plane, as if you are riding in a regular small plane. And then, suddenly a loud pop occurs, and all noise and vibrations cease. Immediately. Everything is very, very quiet although your landscape has not changed a bit. It is unreal.

This is the perfect word picture for what happened to me about two weeks ago. My landscape has not changed one eensy iota, but suddenly everything changed inside my plane. It got quiet and smooth, and I didn't even do anything. I've been praying for change for, oh, years and on some random September day - in the middle of the day, no less - I untethered myself from the lead plane.

Or should I say God untethered me, because as we all know, in my own strength I am a glorious failure many times over.

He probably just got sick of watching me spin and spin, fiddling while Rome burns, tethered to the wrong thing. I imagine he reached out and said 'you know, this glider you are in is pretty cool, but you're not using it right. You're still hooked to someone else way past cruising altitude. No one else is supposed to be leading you at this point but me' and-

POP

end of freaked-out vibrations and jackhammer engine noise. Calm, eerie quiet and blue sky. While the landscape is exactly the same.

My external situation has not changed one whit, same marriage, kids, job, life, hardships. But my attitude has. Fo' reals, yo. Do I trust it? Are you kidding? Of course not (see: Fox Mulder), but I sure have enjoyed it. I got untethered from The Husband and found some sense of Who I Am, validation on my own, and a sense of worth in spite of all that jazz.

Oh my, this sounds all kind of self-helpy. Eww. I swear there will be no summer-camp karaoke version of "Friends are friends forever" sung at the end of this post.

The fact remains that this is a significant change in my thought pattern (regardless of how I've come off as so Enlightened or whatnot); no self-pity, no hovering around him, aching that he doesn't want to be around me or love me or whatever.

I've been most careful to hip-check my motivations and make sure I'm still respectful and kind to him, not detached in that Fcuk-you kind of way at ALL. I keep proofreading myself, thinking I will surely be bursting into flames emotionally at any point because I cannot ever keep up any change I'm trying to make.

So far, there are a few twinges of my old stuff ready to bubble up on occasion, but I look up and pray for focus and it generally works. Inside my glider is still quiet, although not as dramatic as when it first occurred (dammit). But I think God knows that Drama gets my attention and He swung the pendulum waaaaaaaay to the extreme initially so I would know it was Him (with the capital 'H') and pay attention.

I'm working be a team member in the household, because it's Right, not because it might please (lowercase-'h') him.

I'm just kind of 'over' him, but not in the break-up way.

Dealing with my FOO (family of origin) as a grown-up is crazyhard, especially in the aftermath of my mother's death, but I don't think much healing would be happening without it.

But still.

I've been dealing with sh!t for a looooooong time now, and I've still been tethered to the towplane. So why now? Mid-afternoon in mid-September? His ways are SO not our ways, but when He steps in: you know it.

Getting the Script

2007-09-22T03:22:00.000-07:00

I've been working on an update from Stepford since the 16th; still working the kinks out! Anyway, ran across this brilliantly-put thought from a Wise Internet Sage this a.m. and had to post it. I know that when some folks end up in affairs, they really feel that they've found the person who "gets them", as opposed to their spouse. (but they're just in the "velcro phase" of a relationship)

You have this script in your head of what the perfect spouse would do and say when you're down, when you're excited, or whatever, and when they don't follow the script, you feel lost and alone, like no one really "gets" you, least of all the one person who's supposed to "get" you like no one ever has before. Of course that happens quite a bit because they haven't seen the script.

I'm pushing an elephant up the stairs

2007-09-18T18:50:00.000-07:00

This song has been on my iPod for a looooong time, and I just recently caught the lyrics in my brain. It makes me smile because I have felt like this recently, busy concentrating on this damned elephant and -hey, would you lookit that- there goes a piano all to pieces right behind me.

I've watched the stars fall silent from your eyes
All the sights that I have seen
I can't believe that I believed I wished
That you could see
There's a new planet in the solar system
There is nothing up my sleeve

I'm pushing an elephant up the stairs
I'm tossing up punchlines that were never there
Over my shoulder a piano falls
Crashing to the ground

And all this talk of time
Talk is fine
And I don't want to stay around
Why can't we pantomime, just close our eyes
And sleep sweet dreams
Being here with wings on our feet

I'm pushing an elephant up the stairs
I'm tossing up punchlines that were never there
Over my shoulder a piano falls
Crashing to the ground

I'm breaking through, I'm bending spoons
I'm keeping flowers in full bloom
I'm looking for answers from the great beyond

I want the hummingbirds, the dancing bears
Sweetest dreams of you
Look into the stars
Look into the moon

I'm pushing an elephant up the stairs
I'm tossing up punchlines that were never there
Over my shoulder a piano falls
Crashing to the ground

I'm breaking through
I'm bending spoons
I'm keeping flowers in full bloom
I'm looking for answers from the great beyond

-The Great Beyond, R.E.M.

Some Light Reading

2007-09-15T05:13:00.000-07:00

Geez, I cannot find a minute to gather my thoughts like roping a bull and reigning them in on paper. I'm working so much lately that I come home and collapse, preferring to pick up a book than turn on my laptop. So here's some of my simultaneous reading material of late.

Very readable, and surprisingly necessary. About halfway through, and so far highly recommended.

This book has been in my stash for maaaaaaany years, I just wasn't ready to read it until now. Very good stuff, even for someone like me who has read quite a lot about this subject, plus therapy ad nauseum, yadda yadda yadda. The author has personal experience with abuse, and has devoted his life to untangling the rest of us from it. He conducts seminars and small group workshops in Seattle, which may be an option at some point for me.

Twisted up inside

2007-09-14T03:01:00.000-07:00

I drafted this entry well over a month ago, and never got around to posting it. There are more changes internally and I'm currently not so twisted up, at least in different areas now, but it's worth putting out there as late as it is. I am taking Yoda's advice (see below):

Train yourself to let go... of everything you fear to lose. -yoda

This has been a tough time. It could be worse, mind you. Much, much worse. But it is what it is: tough for me.

My mother is unexpectedly dead, with many things unresolved between us.

My marriage is ... different from what each party desires from a marriage. Is that PC enough?

I came back from my mother's illness/death/funeral and immediately returned to work and the rest of my full-time life. I'm having the bare minimum of free time, and no time that's without the frantic undercurrent of you need to be doing x,y, and z. My time to process everything is jagged and haphazard. Which leads to random ambushes of grief and tears.

And, oddly enough, pain from the affair is back in spades. Hello? It was over a year ago, almost two in a few months. I think perhaps because it's a known pain, and one I can deal with -compared to the complex pain about my mother.

I also think satan is throwing me curve balls. Exhibit A: I have over 700 songs on my iPod, and what shows up on Shuffle mode for the last two days: twice? Fcuking Sarah McLachlan and Song for a Winter's Night. Twice. In two days. WTF. It's playing now as I type this. I really like that song, but she burned a CD for him with it and it is a flesh-eating, heart-squeezing pain to hear it lately. Dammit. This should be loooooong gone, but it has made a comeback. Just what I need. Thanks.

The crease between my eyebrows is more prominent each day; etched from worry and past pain revisited. I've considered cosmetic intervention, it's so disturbing to me lately.

I am craving -craving- physical comfort, and quit begging for it long ago. I miss the spontaneous touches, hand holding, etc. Not to mention hearing "I love you" - well over a year-and-a-half for that.

And that's not to say there's no other side of the coin. There is all the crap I brought to my marriage to make things difficult at best. When things are emotionally arduous for me, I close off and lob my visceral grenades. And I'm not talking about just your regular, garden-variety difficult: I can get crappy over small things that just make me uncomfortable -and therefore defensive.

My husband has said that I have not ever 'built him up as a man' - and still do not. That includes support and respect. And over time (and time, and time again), we are grown far apart on a most basic level. Trust. Connection. All that Must-Be-There stuff. How do you renovate a house upon an eroded foundation? Can you recreate a foundation after things are so far gone? I mean, yeah, yeah, God can do anything. But, will He?

So. I know a lot in theory, but fail to implement. Acknowledge issues and fault, yet hope that the mere act of acknowledgment will somehow fix things, or give me a 'pass'.

The Breaking of the Dawn

2007-08-30T17:45:00.000-07:00

There's a slow train pulling through the desert
The colored cars pass quietly from sight
Between the highway and the long horizon
Precious dreams wind away with the light.

My brother's and my sisters' faces linger
The hours of our childhood, grave and gold
Driving through these solitary places
Memories of their gentle kinship
Touch my soul

The hawk wheels away as we pass here
The clouds billow up and fly on

Down the road some hard turns are going to shake us
Ride with us through the breaking of the dawn

I worry for my loving mother
The dimming years, The trials she has known
Her heart so kind and so weary
Keep her safe one more night 'til I get home

How I long to be right there beside her
And bring everything back to before
We'll arrive with the first light of morning
Keep her safe, let me hold her once more

The sage and Joshua tree remind me
Of the miles to go, the journey that we're on
In the still, sweet air of the desert
We will ride through the breaking of the dawn

-The Breaking of the Dawn, Fernando Ortega

Grieving and Processing Changes

2007-08-30T03:06:00.000-07:00

Some dog-eared pages in this book I'm reading. Thought I'd share a few excerpts from The Orphaned Adult by Alexander Levy:

How well anything is put together is disclosed when pressure is applied. Lean on a table. See if it wobbles. That'll tell how well the joints are glued. Sit in a chair, scrunch around, and learn how tightly its pieces fit. Pull a cloth to test its threads and the tightness of the weave. Put pressure on a marriage, and find out what it, and the people in it, are made of. (pg. 90)

I had always been a taker, not a giver. I remember one time in particular, when I was a high-school senior, my mother came into my room one Saturday morning around eleven o'clock or so, sat on my bed, and said, "It would please your father and me very much if you would make the effort to get up one Saturday on your own, without me having to nag you, and mow the lawn."
Well, I never did get up on Saturday morning and mow the lawn. I was too selfish. However, when my father was dying, for the first time in my life, I discovered the ability to be generous, gentle, kind, and loving. At one point, I even decided to move in with my father. He was having accidents at night, and I would get up and change his sheets for him. In the past, I would have gone on a tirade: "You have a urinal there. Why didn't you use it? If you didn't think you were going to make it up, why didn't you wake me? Why should I have to get up and change this bed?" But, no, I didn't say those things. It almost wasn't me. For the first time, I was able to give of myself, from my heart. It's like I was finally able to get up and mow the lawn without having to be asked" (pgs.103-104)

Grief comes in waves that last for a while and then abate. We get distracted for a while by something else - a phone call, hitting our thumb with a hammer, having to park the car in a very tight space. Lonely times are interrupted for a while by visiting friends. Pain and fear-filled thoughts temporarily yield to happy or amusing reminiscences. We feel better, and mistakenly, think grief is over, only to be discouraged by its return with the next wave.
We do not pass through grief in a straight line. We do not start feeling better and then, bit by bit, get better and better, each day an improvement over the day before, each week easier than the one it follows. The recovery from loss is much more erratic than that. It is characterized by times of feeling pretty good, in which we dare to believe that crying time might be almost over, followed by crushing times of feeling much worse, in which we believe crying time will never end. (pgs. 150-151)

Edited to add two more:

The bereft are exhausted. Emotions activated by grief - sorrow, anger, fear, remorse, and so on - require a lot of energy. Expressing emotions, whether by crying raging, or sulking, uses energy. Suppressing emotions to conceal them from ourselves and others uses even more energy. Becoming increasingly vigilant in response to strange circumstances uses energy. Struggling to understand and solve problems with which we are unaccustomed, especially when resources are already depleted, uses energy.
Grief is hard work. (pg. 159)

When people ask for guidance to get through times of great sorrow, I usually include the recommendation that they pray. If they ask me how, I reply, "However you pray will be fine."
....If they say they do not know how to pray, I tell them, "Well, then, that'll be the first thing you can pray for."
Just about everybody prays, one way or another ... I know lots more who never enter any religious building ... but they cry out indignantly at the injustices life throws their way ... I wonder to whom they are speaking.
I do not encourage people to pray in order to convert them to a particular religion, or for that matter, to religion at all. ...I encourage people to pray, by themselves or in prayer groups, for one reason - I see that it works. Prayer causes something unexpectedly restorative and wonderful to happen in healing people's hearts. Prayer is good for us. Prayer helps us to recover faster and to live our lives more fully.
...Over the years I have observed that people who have come to me for help who also pray - regardless of their religious affiliation, what they hold sacred, or how dogmatically they observe the doctrines of their faith - seem to get their lives going in satisfying ways and start feeling whole again faster than those who do not pray.
I encourage people to pray because I have observed a direct connection between prayer and recovery.
I cannot say why this happens. But then, come to think of it, I have no idea how a television works either. I just know which buttons bo push. I don't understand how flowers grow. I just weed, fertilize, and water. The flower takes care of the rest.
I don't know how or why prayer helps. I have just seen that it does.(pgs. 170-172)

Saddle Up

2007-08-26T05:23:00.000-07:00

Saddle up your horses
We've got a trail to blaze,
Through the wild blue yonder
Of God's amazing grace

Let's follow Our Leader
Into the glorious unknown;
This is a life like no other
This is the Great Adventure

-song from my kids' Vacation Bible School this summer

Miles Away

2007-08-03T19:18:00.000-07:00

I know there's always something we have to go through,
that has some deeper meaning,
but right now I just can't say

I know there's gonna be a lesson somewhere,
I'm gonna think a lot about it later,
Right now I'm miles away

-Marc Cohn, Miles Away

2007, or The Year I finally got an Easy Bake Oven

2007-07-29T20:29:00.000-07:00

"to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from. -t.s. elliot

I don't know why I have always wanted an Easy Bake Oven. No clue. Perhaps having grown up on the Wrong Side of the Tracks, it was the appeal of the Glamour toy. It certainly wasn't the cooking aspect; I was such a latchkey kid that I did a lot of cooking for myself. Mainly noodles and Ragu, or Swanson's chicken pot pies -but still. I was not craving time in a kitchen.

But I never received one as a present. And frankly, I'm not even sure that I ever told anyone that I wanted one. Maybe it never was written on a Wish List for Santa, but I cannot remember a time when I didn't want one. Perhaps in my fantasy thinking, someone would just know and get me one.

Never happened.

I was not scarred for life by it. As ya'll know, there were plenty of real-life events in my childhood to scar my psyche. The lack of an Easy Bake was not one of them.

Eventually I became an adult(-ish) person. And I have mentioned over the years that I always wanted an EBO. I even remotely entertained the idea that perhaps one day a creative, thoughtful boyfriend (or later Husband) would buy one and put it under the tree for me. I never asked for one outright, but subconsciously I pictured a sweet man giving me the Easy Bake Oven I never had.

Ya'll, I am not right.

As an aside, I will tell you something wonderful that The Husband did years ago that resembled this little fantasy. There is a Dr. Seuss book called Happy Birthday To You! about a Seussical place called Katroo where on your birthday all kinds of amazing stuff is done for You! Just for You! I loved it as a child. So happy and celebratory, and completely opposite of my entire childhood. It's not a widely known book, and we found it one day in a bookstore. I waxed all kinds of nostalgic about it to my husband. The next year on my birthday, that book was one of my presents, complete with a sweet inscription from said husband. It's one of my favorite presents ever, and I read it to the children on their birthdays at bedtime. I doubt my husband even realizes how special that was for me.

Moving on!

So here I am back in Stepford after a horrific time dealing with my mother suddenly, unexpectedly in ICU and her subsequent death, and all these swirling emotions. One Saturday morning we go to a yard sale as a family. And what to my wandering eyes should appear? A brand new, still in the box, Easy Bake Oven.

Of course we bought it for my daughter you see, but my inner little girl was sated. A wrinkle in the fabric of my life was smoothed. I do not pretend to know why, it just was.

The next day we made a chocolate-frosted cake from the still-unopened mixes included in the box. I knew from licking the batter that it would be perfectly hideous, so I didn't even have a bite of the finished product. That wasn't the point, and I knew that going in. I just wanted to have one. And I do. How did an Easy Bake Oven get on my cosmic To Do List? I've no idea. But now I can check it off the list. And I'm oddly thankful. Go figure.

Independence Day

2007-07-08T18:04:00.000-07:00

My mama died on July 4th.

It was her time, but nobody knew that was coming except God.

I'm not in a place to blog about that for a while.

But let me tell you something:
God is faithful.

Even when you think he's forgotten all about you and doesn't hear your sobbing, I promise you it's just not true. The last 2 weeks have been nothing but miracles and encouragement that have been solely provided by the Lord. Praise Him.

Despite our Differences

2007-06-23T02:25:00.000-07:00

When we tried to rework all of this
Each to [his] rendition,
We painted ourselves in a corner
Lost for ideas, blindly fishin'

For a compliment or kindness
Just to bring us into view
But you could not interpret me,
and I could not interpret you.

I remember that cold morning when the trees were black with birds
I tried to make out some connection - we were at a loss for words.

After all that we've been through
I could not see giving up,
Despite the picture of our coffee
growing colder in the cups.

I want to say that underneath it all, you are my friend.
And the way that I fell for you, I'll never fall that way again.

I still believe, despite our differences, that what we have's enough.
And I believe in you, and I believe in love

So we went rolling on down through the years
taking time off we could steal,
until the Thief Of Things Unreconciled
Stuck a stick into the wheel.

Now we're tumbling in a freefall,
No one's gonna go unscathed.
But it's not because you held back,
and its not how I behaved.

I want to say that underneath it all,
you are my friend.
And the way that I fell for you,
I'll never fall that way again.

I still believe, despite our differences, that what we have's enough.
I believe in you, and I believe in love

There are avenues and supplements
and books stacked on the shelf,
Labyrinths of recovery
in search of our best self.

But most of what will happen now is way out of our hands.
So just let it go, see where it lands

I want to say that, underneath it all,
You are my friend.
And the way that I fell for you,
I'll never fall that way again.

I still believe, despite our differences,
that what we have's enough..

I believe in you

and I believe in love

-I Believe in Love, Indigo Girls

Learning to Surf

2007-06-20T18:35:00.000-07:00

You can't stop the waves, but you can learn to surf. -Jon Kabat-Zinn

While You're Waiting for the Hope Part...

2007-06-15T03:12:00.000-07:00

...a little ditty about Forgiveness, that eternal pain in my ass.

I have been reading a book on and off since last summer. More off than on lately. That's how I roll, and I have several half-read books littering my life and nightstand. I am moving close to the end, pick it up here and there as I am led to do so.

Like tonight.

God's timing is so freaking perfect. That God, he's so clever.

We in Stepford had recently been having conversations about generational sins, and strongholds over us (read: Me), and not to get all Amityville Horror/Exorcist on you, the hold that satan has in various places in our (read: My) life. More on that in the Hope part, perhaps, but just to show you a glimpse of the view from here.

So I pop open to my bookmark and start reading. Italics are the author's words, and I jump around a bit in her text, but they should be credited solely to her (Sandra D. Wilson, Ph.D.), much of the emphases are mine.

Tonight's reading was a Relevant Trifecta: me as a child, me with my husband (and he with me), and me with my kids. Lots of things stirring around in my stew as I read.

[a client] realized that hurt people hurt people...

[on the misperception that forgiveness makes the incident/hurt become 'no big deal']:
On the contrary...sin is such a colossal 'big deal' that it needs to be forgiven. Excusing, minimizing, trivializing it won't work. It must be forgiven - not denied or discounted.

...even when we have sincerely chosen to forgive, we may need to settle for very limited reconciliation with some people. Their emotional problems or lifestyle choices may preclude anything more.

But even after sincere commitments [to forgive], we can be blown temporarily off course by painful memories or other violent emotional storms....It's important to remember that only God forgives perfectly. The rest of us have to keep working at it with continual recommitment.

...would an apology pay for a repeated betrayal of your trust? In fact, ask yourself, what could those [people] in your past possibly ever do to make up for what happened? In effect, they own a debt they can never repay.
Can you see the picture? There they are, standing in front of you with empty hands and pockets, utterly unable to pay for the past. And there you are facing a choice that will shape your future.

...forgiving is not merely difficult; it is humanly impossible. Forgiving is not natural to human beings. We are more in tune with 'an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth'. As a result many of us go through our lives and our relationships blind and toothless!
We blind and toothless Christians operate from a double standard when it comes to grace. We enjoy relating to God by grace but we insist on relating to others by law.

God is not playing games with us about forgiveness. He doesn't call us to forgive without supplying the power to do it

...our postsalvation sins may be the ones that haunt us most. Though we can't disappoint God (his expectations are always realistic), we can grieve Him. He knows how destructive the results of our sin will be in our lives and in the lives of others.

...[a client] learned that confessing her sins was no substitute for forsaking them....to "help" God in punishing her she had dropped out of ... activities that brought her joy.

...you may have confessed your sins...but have you confessed your complete forgiveness? ...But do you believe it? I mean, do you believe it for you?

It's true that I don't know how horrible your sin might be. But I know how great God's grace is. And I know that either "the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin" (I John 1:7) or God is a liar. 'All sin' includes even yours - and mine.

These words really spoke to me, and she specifically points to intergenerational forgiveness and sins, going on to talk about parenting and passing on the hurts, etc.

So.

Ya'll know. I need to forgive my mother. Again. And again. I need to forgive my husband. Again, and again. My husband needs to forgive me. Again, and again.

My children will learn that they need to forgive me. Again, and again. And I am breaking the cycle by ASKING THEM for forgiveness the minute I realize I've wronged them. In word, or tone, or deed. And, thank God, so far they always do.

That perpetual (yet, hopefully diminishing-) cycle of recommiting to forgive when we get temporarily derailed by painful memories or pissed-off-ness about being 'wronged' past or present. And to remember that it is temporary, because it was emotion-based. And, hello? Have you met me? I could go on a pro-am tour showcasing Emotional Rodeo Riding.

Props and whatnot, yo.

2007-06-14T19:31:00.000-07:00

Yeah, I am so not ghetto cool.

But anyway I wanted to point out that someone else has posted about something I wrote and give her a shoutout. Also, a permalink in the Part Where I Feel Famous sidebar - woot!

Many thanks to the Sensuous Wife for the internet love and validation. Isn't that a great name, btw? I have a strong desire to be the sensuous wife, dog, yo. Whoops, sorry for the bad faux ghetto. It's totally addicting.

Victim, Party of One, Your Table is Ready

2007-06-13T09:18:00.000-07:00

Take this one when you have a cup of coffee and aren't otherwise in a hurry. Or skim it, whatever. It's long, and there's more but I owed you. Took a while to spit it out and spellcheck, so I'm a day late on the promise.

Things in Stepford had been moving along, only in that time passes. I made more stupid mistakes on the road to Real, as I'm going to do, but some of these were thoughtless and hurtful to my husband, again proving to him that I'm no safe place to put any investment of time, heart, affection, etc.

Like what, you ask? A few examples off the top of my head:

Mother's Day.
I found a pretty bunch of flowers for me in the kitchen, when really he didn't even have do that. I thanked him initially, but felt shortchanged later that day when we saw friends who had breakfast in bed, yadda yadda. Yeah, I was feeling unloved, that's how it works right now. We were also two-weeks post milestone birthday, which was so bad we will not speak of it. That's nobody else's burden but mine. That's just where we are; it is what it is. But I could've sucked that up. Did I? I didn't. I was quiet and withdrawn, most obviously down deep in the Poor-Me well, when I could have climbed out and shown my husband in a good light by describing being surprised by the pretty flowers I received. The sad-wife-vibe was picked up on by others outside our family. I once again projected my heartbreak all over the landscape, letting my feelings run the fcuking show, instead of seeing where I could step up. I didn't protect the Partnership.

Unauthorized Disclosure I.
I mentioned our financial situation to the one couple we still have as friends, who know nothing about our inner workings. Nothing. That is an anomaly in Stepford. Or at least that's how it feels, and perception being reality and all that, there you are. Needless to say, we like them, and I think we like how they see us. How we should/could be, bits of who we used to be long ago. I see some things in them as a couple I would like to shoot for. Anyway, they seem normal to us in a way that we seriously crave Normal. So at some point, I said something to the wife about my inlaws funding some necessities lately, who told her husband, who brought it up to my husband, who felt blindsided, betrayed, and infuriated that I would portray us (read: me) as hurting victims. Had we been hanging this information out for public view, that would be one thing. But finances are sensitive issues here in Stepford, as to any man who has lost his job, and I threw it out there with careless insensitivity, not looking out for him and how he would feel. Only for someone to sympathize, commiserate, get in my boat. I didn't protect the Partnership.

Unauthorized Disclosure II.
We have a mutual friend, a former co-worker of my husband's at Work You To Death, Inc. She was a friend of mine, but moreso after the affair, because she is divorced from an adulterous husband. As she loves both The Husband and me, she has tried in her way to be supportive, but for obvious reasons she has her own emotional leanings in this situation. Plus, she has made it clear that The Husband needs a male friend/confidant, as his relationship outside of the marriage began with an opposite-sex friendship that grew into confiding more personal stuff. You can read his own account of that part in the sidebar. ANYWAY. I have a point, hang tight. So Friend and I text messaged a bunch, and again, I probably shared too much Poor-Me crap over time but also shared some things my husband had said to me about his personal feelings in a down time. In my defense (which is slim), I was trying to actually argue a case FOR my husband, but whatever. He found out and was hurt/p*ssed/betrayed by disclosure of his feelings to a 3rd party. I didn't protect the Partnership.

Last example.
I decided a few weeks ago that we should touch base with our Pastor. He's been around from the beginning of our marital disaster; we went to him six months before the affair knowing our marriage was crap and looking for help. He did what he could in his limited knowledge; we didn't do all that we could for whatever reasons, and here we all are sadder and wiser. So he's been in our camp for a while, but he's human, the pastor of a too-fast-growing church, with not enough shepherds to help the flock, but that's how it goes and it's not all up to him. We both trust and respect him enormously, and I wanted some answers and a safe place to put my angst. So, before even telling The Husband, I email our pastor and ask if he has time to speak with me or us, and set up a time to meet. Then I ask my husband about going. I inadvertently set him up. If he doesn't go, he'll look bad. I should have spoken with him first. I didn't protect the Partnership.

I am a dumba$$. Absolutely. And that was just May.

Look petty to you? Maybe, in an otherwise normal marriage. But over time, in an already damaged relationship, these occurrences erroded any good will between us. Remember, a marriage should build walls to the outside and windows between us. Pre-affair, we had been building walls between us and windows to the outside. Hence, part of the affair. (yo, my window's open, you know?)Post-bomb, we had started to reverse the trend, and then didn't. That needs to be addressed at some point, but that point doesn't seem to be now.

Wear you out, won't it? And you're not even living it. Go thank God right now for your partner, the person on your team who looks out for you and takes care of you. Who loves you and makes love with you. Go thank God and then go thank them for it.

June is an improvement for sure, at least I think so. I don't have any positive feedback about it, but I'm okay regardless of the feedback. That's a hard place to get to, and I work hourly to keep my foothold in the vacuum.

I have no credits. I am way in the red for Goodwill Toward Me. Actually, his giveash!t-ometer is on zero and it's no secret. Every man for himself right now, mostly. Don't let that be a victim statement. He is still kind and thoughtful on a daily basis, I am just "the last thing" on his mind.

Still God loves me. Still. I cannot rest in that yet. It's the Truth, whether I feel it or not.

God's love is more important than my husband's.

I find that hard to own, but I work on it constantly.

I am self-protective, and want people in my boat with me who will See My Side. We all do. Yeah, my husband has Sh!t He Is Doing Wrong Too, believeyoume, but I am making it no cakewalk to come on over here and take my hand. When it's all I want. I sabotage my deepest longings.

You think it hasn't crossed our minds to cut bait and try again elsewhere? You bet it has.

But my core belief here has never waivered: What I want, I have always wanted with my husband. Always. Even when it makes no damned sense. I would rather work through this stuff with him than with Someone New. Although, sure, it seems like it would be mondo easier to do this with a clean record. No reminders of your failures, trust still intact, emotions not weighed down by past injuries from the other.

Sure the grass looks greener. I still fight fears that he sees greener grass across the miles. Still.
But the grass is only greener where you tend it.

My marriage looks dead. :::sniff, sniff::: smells dead. :::checks pulse::: acts dead.

God can raise the dead. God can re-create, reconcile, and resurrect. Make ALL things new. Even me. Even my husband. Even this non-relationship.

He says so. He's the God of the Universe. This is chicken feed to Him.

Where there is no way, he sent The Waymaker. People, say it with me.

Yeah, there's a Hope side to this, but dang, I'll make it a separate post.

Today I Will Make A Difference

2007-06-12T16:38:00.000-07:00

Two weeks with no posts? That must be a record in Stepford. Any readers left? I have mulled and ruminated and turned over half a dozen different post ideas in those two weeks+ and lost half of them to busy-ness, some fire to put out, or plain forgetfulness. Making a priority to write an entire post of my own words tonight, sleep be damned! ha.

I am not consistent at the following Action Plan, but when I am, I'm amazed at my own happiness potential. Posted here to reinforce my refocusing efforts.

Today I Will Make a Difference
by Max Lucado

Today I will make a difference. I will begin by controlling my thoughts. A person is the product of his thoughts. I want to be happy and hopeful. Therefore, I will have thoughts that are happy and hopeful. I refuse to be victimized by my circumstances. I will not let petty inconveniences such as stoplights, long lines, and traffic jams be my masters. I will avoid negativism and gossip. Optimism will be my companion, and victory will be my hallmark. Today I will make a difference.

I will be grateful for the twenty-four hours that are before me. Time is a precious commodity. I refuse to allow what little time I have to be contaminated by self-pity, anxiety, or boredom. I will face this day with the joy of a child and the courage of a giant. I will drink each minute as though it is my last. When tomorrow comes, today will be gone forever. While it is here, I will use it for loving and giving. Today I will make a difference.

I will not let past failures haunt me. Even though my life is scarred with mistakes, I refuse to rummage through my trash heap of failures. I will admit them. I will correct them. I will press on. Victoriously. No failure is fatal. It’s OK to stumble… I will get up. It’s OK to fail… I will rise again. Today I will make a difference.

I will spend time with those I love. My spouse, my children, my family. A man can own the world but be poor for the lack of love. A man can own nothing and yet be wealthy in relationships. Today I will spend at least five minutes with the significant people in my world. Five quality minutes of talking or hugging or thanking or listening. Five undiluted minutes with my mate, children, and friends.
Today I will make a difference.

Beauty for Ashes

2007-05-29T10:12:00.000-07:00

I have much to process and share with you and absolutely no stinkin' time for online navel gazing of late. What's marinating here deserves more than some limp synopsis on borrowed time.

As those great philosophers Toad the Wet Sprocket sang, "All I Need Is Hope." I'm getting some, and I want to share it with you. God's grace is huge -it is- but the road is long ...and fraught with potholes.

Thanks for waiting. Here are some pertinent words in the meantime (Ya'll know how I am about my quotes and lyrics):

I am unwritten
Can't read my mind
I'm undefined

I'm just beginning,
The pen's in my hand
Ending unplanned

Staring at the blank page before you
Open up the dirty window
Let the sun illuminate the words that you could not find

Reaching for something in the distance
So close you can almost taste it
Release your inhibitions

Feel the rain on your skin
No one else can feel it for you
Only you can let it in
No one else

No one else
Can speak the words on your lips
Drench yourself in words unspoken
Live your life with arms wide open

Today is where your book begins
The rest is still unwritten
-Unwritten, Natasha Bedingfield

When nothing is sure, everything is possible. -Margaret Drabble

You have to be willing to give up the life you planned in order to live the life that's waiting for you. -Joseph Campbell

Faith sees the invisible, believes the unbelievable, and receives the impossible. -Corrie Ten Boom

Things I Miss

2007-05-22T13:59:00.000-07:00

sleeping with my leg hooked over his

the look in his eyes that made me weak with anticipation of his kiss...and then his kiss

drifting off to sleep with my head on his shoulder, my hand on his chest. The impression that I am safe, anchored by this good guy.

hearing someone tell me they miss me already

This made me laugh today

2007-05-21T14:57:00.000-07:00

"I think that this situation absolutely requires a really futile and stupid gesture be done on somebody's part." -Otter, Animal House, 1978.

Much Afraid

2007-05-18T15:56:00.000-07:00

Empty again
Sunken down so far
So scared to fall
I might not get up again

So I lay at your feet
All my brokenness
I carry all of my burdens to you

All of these things
I've held up in vain
No reason nor rhyme
Just the scars that remain

Of all of these things
I'm so much afraid
Scared out of my mind
By the demons I've made

Sweet jesus, you never ever let me go
Oh, sweet jesus, never ever let me go

So happy to love
Yet so far to go
You lead me on to where I've never been before

-Much Afraid, Jars of Clay

The greatest of these is Love

2007-05-15T20:46:00.000-07:00

This is a Part 1 of a personal journal entry from March 20th of this year.

I don't know how to love well (nor have I been well-loved). I know how to love wildly, be passionate, love you when it's convenient. When it's hard or difficult, I say I love you but I don't show it. I'm selfish, my grace is limited and conditional. I want to be placed in the best possible light, the most flattering.

I was a victim, and I continue to want to be one if I don't get my way. That way it's all your fault. I don't have to take any blame. You have to fight me to get me to own any "bad" in me, my situation. I will whine and poor-me when things are going poorly in a 'well, I'm just a big piece of sh!t' kind of way - it's a blanket I use to cover a multitude of sins quickly and painlessly without having to own any individual faults, or examine my specific part.

It's so automatic. SO automatic. Deflect, deflect. Get this bad stuff OFF of me. Did that literally come from the sexual abuse? Get. Off. Of Me. Now I push even good people away. Push. Elbows locked.

I am like my mother.
I fcuking hate how my mother is.
I see so little good there - can't remember good because of all the bad about her.
I am repeating history to some degree. No wonder the bad looks so big.
In the interactions/avoidance.
In the won't-take-blame.
In the Quick-to-Anger.
In the Quick-to-Sarcasm.
In the Instant-Cutting-Tone-of-Voice.
In the Poor-Me/Serve-Me attitude.
In the laziness toward the work of changing.

Blah, blah, blah.

What We Do

2007-05-13T04:44:00.000-07:00

If only we could brand this on our souls when it really counted:

What we do is more important than what is done to us.
-Nikki Giovanni, a Virginia Tech English professor

Learning to Wait

2007-05-12T06:09:00.000-07:00

Learning to Wait ( ... and not just for me to Post Something...)
Psalm 25:20-21

What are we to think when God withholds His answer to a prayer? Most likely, you've wondered this yourself at some point. As creatures bound by time, we can find those ticking seconds very frustrating!

God doesn't see us simply in the here and now. He perceives the entire big picture at once--where we've been, where we are, and where we're going. And He knows the exact impact on our lives of every little decision, action, or blessing.

Does God want to bring something into your life that would absolutely destroy you? Of course not! He knows what may be a tremendous blessing later could completely wreck your life now. For this reason, He often pauses to give you time to prepare for that blessing.

Learning to patiently wait on God is difficult. Doing so successfully demands at least three things from us. First, we must be sensitive to Him. That is, we must nurture our relationship with the Father so we can hear Him when He tells us to wait. Second, we must trust His judgment. Does God know more than we do? Of course. Then doesn't it make sense to trust Him? Last, we must be obedient. If we try to accomplish something alone after God tells us to wait, then we're headed for disaster. God blesses obedience, even obedient waiting.

The Lord doesn't operate in a vacuum. He works within His relationship with you. Never forget He is actively walking with you, even when He withholds an answer to your prayer. It doesn't mean He's not there; it simply means He's looking out for you even more.

Running on Empty

2007-05-04T14:27:00.000-07:00

Thanks much for the thoughtful comments on the Ugly post. They were, as always, insightful and comforting. Not that I'm here for a big pity party, contrary to all appearances.

I even googled Abuser Treatment Programs which was suggested by a commenter, but that seems way out of my realm (thankfully); mostly drug-induced domestic violence and women in shelters. I filed that in the Things Could Be Worse category.

I know I live in America and it's our status quo to be run exhausted, but there's got to be a place and time when this lets up. At least I keep hoping. It's been well over a year now. Long term stress and excretion of stress hormones cannot be good for us physically, let alone emotionally.

Financially, we are drowning. blah, blah. Same story, different day. And stuff that needs money for repair just keeps on happening. I know this is no headline news, but it is crazymaking.

I just burst into tears last night over my printer failing, because there's no way to repair it or replace it, and I had been making some part-time money with a little business that NEEDS A PRINTER. So I have to refund money that I'd already spent to a customer who had paid me nicely for a job I only halfway completed. [insert shotgun blast]

I just had to go straight to bed, because I was far beyond thinking clearly. The Husband was supportive and tried to be helpful, but there are no solutions to this problem and I could not function.

The kids have had field trips this week, and I have to bum rides with moms I don't know since I don't have a car anymore. Hello, surface talk for hours on end. Kill me now. I endured it yesterday & leave for another round in a few hours.

Love my kids. Love being able to spend precious time with them at farms and museums. Dread having to ask The Beautiful People for a space in their SUVs and then converse As If all the way down, and all the way back. Surely this in no small way contributed to the meltdown-over-printer-death last night.

Oh, and the air conditioning quit in the house. Years we have had this system, and hello? you want to quit now? So we're stressed and hot. Fcuking perfect.

So, I'm running on empty. I manage to scrape enough coins to put a buck or two in the tank every few days, but my Low Fuel light is always on. I just want to get a full tank again. Space to exhale.

So Lord, Move. Or Move Me.

2007-04-30T06:19:00.000-07:00

I can't find the words to pray
I'm a little down today
Can you help me? Can you hold me?
I feel like a million miles away

And I don't know what to say
Can you hear me anyway?
What I need is for you to reach out your hand
You have taught me no matter what, you'd understand

Lord, move in a way that I've never seen before
Cause there's a mountain in the way and a lock on the door
I'm drifting away, waves are crashing on the shore
So Lord, move
Or move me.

I've looked every where to find
A simple peace of mind
I can't find nothing on my own
So I got to leave myself behind

Take up this cross of mine
Give away everything I hold onto
Lord, I know the only way is through this
Lord, I know I need you to help me do this

Lord, move in a way that I've never seen before
Cause there's a mountain in the way and a lock on the door
I'm drifting away, waves are crashing on the shore
So Lord, move
Or move me.

Out of this place of complacency
To a place of fellowship with thee
Cause I am weak but Lord, you are so strong
And you know it's been way too long

Lord, move in the way that I've never seen before
Cause there's a mountain in the way and I'll knock on the door
I'm drifting away, waves are crashing on the shore

So Lord move...

The Bad. The Ugly.

2007-04-28T03:41:00.000-07:00

Let's play What If for a second.

What if I were married to a man who -putting it mildly- was not nice to me over the years.

Who had been known to yell Fcuk You! Go To Hell! or call me a B!tch. Who had hit me or pushed me when mad. Who had thrown things across the room in anger.

Who made me feel unimportant, incorrect, disrespected, or stupid on a regular basis. Who, armed with his vast knowledge about me, was able to bury verbal daggers deep in my soul with pinpoint precision. Over. And. Over. And. Over.

Who was able to hurt me deeply with his words. Who attacked me as a person, the core of goodness that I am and can be.

Who scoffed at any effort I made to do something nice for him. Who immediately felt I was not doing enough, in whatever capacity, to make him happy.

Who belittled or ignored what was important to me. Who showed me less respect than a stranger on the street.

Who made me feel unsafe. Who frankly scared me in his volatility and unpredictability. Who would I see at the end of each day? The nice man or the mean man? Who made each entry to my home filled with inner dread. Who denied me a safe harbor from the outside world.

A man I could not trust to look out for my best interest if it conflicted with his. Who always protected himself first, to the detriment of my emotional safety or the marriage itself.

A man who would not guard my heart. Who would not place it on a soft pillow and keep it safe if I handed it to him. Who I could not confide in, for fear he would use the information against me when angered.

Who apologized through the years, but did not change.

Who was no Partner to me. Who did not encourage my Best Self. With whom, I felt more alone than in an empty room.

Wouldn't you tell me to Leave Him? Get The Hell Out? Have Him Arrested?

Now. What if this person is me.

My husband the abused spouse.

Harder to believe, isn't it?

I am ashamed that it is true. Mortified. Crushed. Humiliated.

He's taken much pounding. For years. He can't even pretend to trust me with his heart or his feelings. And he's had good reason to get to this point in the road. I've laid him low.

I could lace my words with excuses and justifications, and all the years I didn't see it.

But even after Seeing It, I have snapped like a rubber band right back to being a selfish, mean person. And who cares why? Fcuk Why. Half my blog is an exercise in Justifying The Why.

At the end of the day, I am proven to be irreparable. Because all it boils down to is a good man knocked down long enough and hard enough to have nothing left to trust me with.

Fair enough. I don't blame him. I cannot possibly. I've been here in this house, too.

I am toxic. Me. It's me.

And don't even fcuking comment about how awful his affair was, girlfriend, and you have every reason to be mad, hateful, or ugly.

Just save it. This so pre-dates affair.

My husband stood by me for years while I was flailing about, knocking the wind out of him.

I have focused so long on all that Is Not. Seeing the holes in the colander that drained the water out, instead of the pasta that was held inside.

His affair is the One Big Wrong Thing he did in a Lifetime of Right Things. (there are other Small things but in the interest of the Big Picture, work with me here)

By comparison, I am a Lifetime of Big Wrong Things with Scant Right Things.

Years of counseling, different therapists, journaling, prayer, have all been fruitless in changing this piece of my equation.

After I've done -or said- something mean to him, he has pointed it out to me, I have seen it (especially since December 2005) and apologized. And meant it, I promise you. But the damage was already done by my actions or words, and progress stopped. And then we recycle the pattern in some other fashion. Rinse and repeat.

I need a dog shock collar that zaps me before I'm an as$hole. To stop me from doing years-worth more damage with each incident. But I don't have that. And my Decent Person filter only works about 5-10% of the time.

And now I have a husband who doesn't trust me, won't talk to me about his real feelings for fear I will really screw him with them, and is scared of me, of what I will do to him. Has been at this point, or almost, for so long that he probably cannot separate out when the relationship was actually destroyed.

I thought cutting communication with my family of origin last year was a step in the right direction. I thought being a better, more patient, loving parent was a step. I thought counseling, praying to God, people praying for me, all these things would effect a change in my life.

I thought wrong. And I don't deserve this man to do any more 70-times-7 forgiving or trusting. If he was beating me, should I forgive him each time he hit me and come back for the next blow? No. I don't think so. Nor should he have to.

I had to come to the computer to work this out in words. To see it in black and white. I've had to stop typing several times during this post to just grieve. Hard. I fcuked up. Over. And. Over. And. Over.

I told him I wish there were more words for Sorry, like the eskimos have so many different words for Snow. I am so sorry, in a myriad of ways, but my words don't ring true anymore because my actions haven't followed up. I just want a Reset button on my life. And I don't get one.

I haven't been able to sleep. I lay awake thinking of all God brought me through as a child. He led me out of a horrible life to a road on the way to Happily Ever After. I didn't deserve it. I didn't understand it. I didn't protect it and keep it safe. I went on autopilot and ruined my relationship with the one person who ever believed in me.

And now he doesn't. Of course he doesn't.

And that breaks me open in pain and regret.

Although I wouldn't mind a bit of Comfort, as I'm good on Adversity

2007-04-22T22:38:00.000-07:00

Comfort and prosperity have never enriched the world as adversity has done.

Out of pain and problems have come the sweetest songs, the most poignant poems, the most gripping stories.

Out of suffering and tears have come the greatest spirits and the most blessed lives. -Billy Graham

Push

2007-04-21T05:05:00.000-07:00

Every time I look at you, the world just melts away
All my troubles, all my fears, dissolve in your affections
You've seen me at my weakest, but you take me as I am
And when I fall, you offer me a softer place to land

You stay the course, you hold the line, you keep it all together
You're the one true thing I know I can believe in
You're all the things that I desire, you save me, you complete me
You're the one true thing I know I can believe

I get mad so easy, but you give me room to breathe
No matter what I say or do, 'cause you're too good to fight about it
Even when I have to push just to see how far you'll go
You won't stoop down to battle me, you never turn to go

You stay the course, you hold the line, you keep it all together
You're the one true thing I know I can believe in
You're all the things that I desire, you save me, you complete me
You're the one true thing I know I can believe

Your love is just the antidote when nothing else will cure me
There are times I can't decide, when I can't tell up from down
You make me feel less crazy, when otherwise I'd drown
But you pick me up and brush me off and tell me I'm OK,
Sometimes thats just what we need to get us through the day

You stay the course, you hold the line, you keep it all together
You're the one true thing I know I can believe in
You're all the things that I desire, you save me, you complete me
You're the one true thing I know I can believe

-Push, Sarah McLachlan

Wind

2007-04-18T22:31:00.001-07:00

A few days ago, like many of you, we had a big fat storm. Snow and wind. Wind Wind Wind.

Gusts up to 70 mph (74 mph is considered hurricane force). This was serious business.

Trees fell. All that wasn't secured went flying. People lost power.

It left all things clean in its wake.

In our area are fields where cows and horses graze, now clean and unmarred. I already thought fields were generally uncluttered areas, but they were markedly brighter, colorful, and pure looking.

And then when you saw the far edges of the fields, where fences or thick brush bordered the open areas: Trash. Debris blown up against them - dry cleaning bags, fast food cups, branches piled up where their exits were prevented.

I am reminded this week how much I need winds in my life. I may think I'm pretty cleared out, but I'm just so used to my own junk I get to where I don't see it. Only when the gale forces blow through my life do I see how much sh!t is blown up against my edges.

This past year (and a half, ugh) I would not wish on anyone. It's been chaotic, devastating, lonely, terrifying, exhausting. But it continues to clean out my junk. My edges are plastered with wreckage, but my middle field is clearer than it's ever been.

My husband would likely argue otherwise; I still defend and deflect as a Default setting in any uncomfortable conversation where I might be Wrong. My shields go up automatically, and he is tired of arguing them down again.

We don't have "normal people" arguments, and we never had from Day One. Because I don't know what that looks like. I did not grow up seeing any example of healthy conflict. You either screamed, verbally attacked the other person as a piece of sh!t, used LOTS of sarcasm, walked away, or hit them. You never admitted you were wrong.

I would give anything to hang around a healthy couple when they have disagreements. To witness this elusive holy grail in real life.

I feel completely handicapped here. I think of how frustrating it is for stroke patients who have expressive aphasia: they know in their brains the word they want to say, the concept they want to communicate, but they are physically unable to SAY IT. Their brains cannot bridge the gap from concept to spoken word. This ultimate frustration brings otherwise strong adults to tears. I have some secondary understanding of their struggle.

Last year, The Husband was at the grocery store and saw a twenty-something couple in frozen foods. They were arguing yet good natured about it, and eventually resolved their conflict - ALL in the grocery store! Within a few aisles! Sounded like a movie scene to me; that far removed from my reality. He ached for that kind of communication when he saw it, came home and told me about it, how he longs for it with me. I ache for it in the way you ache to win the lottery. You want it, bad, but you don't really know what it's like - so completely foreign to what you know day-to-day.

I feel like the biggest failure in the world here, because I want to be the girl in Frozen Foods. You have no idea. But I am clueless about bridging the gap between wanting to be healthy in conflict, and the fist that squeezes my aorta when I feel threatened.

I hate this part of me. Every time a brutal, yet ultimately cleansing, wind blows through my life in this area I think, This is It. I am going to finally be able to change, just because I want it so much. Because I am convinced that I am further along in my autobiography. But then, mere days later, not so much.

LOSER, my soul cries out. Fraud, pretender, hoax.

And then the insidious whisper: he would have been happier with she-who-shall-not-be-named. she was so much better than you will ever be. you will never be good enough for him to love.

Blow, wind, blow. Take this trash out of my field.

Death Cab for Cutie

2007-04-17T07:19:00.000-07:00

I once knew a girl
In the years of my youth,
With eyes like the summer
All beauty and truth.
In the morning I fled,
Left a note and it read:
'Someday you will be loved'

I cannot pretend that I felt any regret,
'Cause each broken heart will eventually mend.
As the blood runs red down the needle and thread,
Someday you will be loved

You'll be loved, you'll be loved
Like you never have known
The memories of me
Will seem more like bad dreams;
Just a series of blurs,
Like I never occurred.
Someday you will be loved

You may feel alone when you're falling asleep,
And everytime tears roll down your cheeks.
But I know your heart belongs to someone you've yet to meet;
Someday you will be loved

You'll be loved, you'll be loved
Like you never have known
The memories of me
Will seem more like bad dreams;
Just a series of blurs,
Like I never occurred.
Someday you will be loved...

...Someday you will be loved

Someday You Will Be Loved, Death Cab for Cutie

Gotta Keep 'Em Separated

2007-04-16T07:16:00.000-07:00

An old, old, old entry never posted...

I am weary of crying myself to sleep alone. I'm tired of being at work so much. I miss my kids. I miss having a life. A real one, with laughter, and flirting, and silent smiling eye contact, and touch. And TIME. OMgosh, ya'll, I physically ache from touch withdrawl. I'm tired of hugging myself in bed at night so I don't fly apart. I'm so sad. I need to increase my meds. I want to be something more than someone's pain in the ass. Someone to avoid each day. And each night. Continuously. Without end.

I know a lot of sh!t is my fault. I know it. But I'm tired of being so alone. Unloved. So, so tired. Just a bad night, long hours at work, not enough sleep. I'm sure people pay good money for the salty facials I give myself at night with my tears. I can't even see the fcuking monitor. A glance at his lower back in passing makes my heart hurt. I want to kiss his arms as they grip the steering wheel.

I want him to want my skin touching his. He does not. I am blessed to get a foot touching mine in the late night when he returns to bed. I am not being facetious. I am blessed to have it. I love to feel his skin, and if that is all I get so be it. I am just sad he may never want it again. That his Default mode is sleeping-with-his-back-facing-wife. Only when I leave the bed does he turn to face my side. Even while sleeping. It's that deeply ingrained to Avoid Me.

We live a life of halves. Our clean laundry barely touches in the hamper. His side. My side. I want it all mixed up together. He separates it. So I do, too. I smell his shirts before they go in the washer. I cannot even imagine him doing something like that. (Not with mine)

I see potential for so much positives, but it's like the bridge washed out and we just look at each other over the chasm and think, well, damn. that's too bad. When a quick look around and some joint effort would build something better.

I see other people light up when I walk in. He doesn't anymore. He goes dimmer. Other people used to comment about how I would light up when I saw him. Did he ever notice that? Does it matter?

Save a place for me
Save a space for me
In your heart
In your heart
-Tracy Chapman

You break me open
-Jars of Clay

I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past. -Thomas Jefferson

R-rated Random Musings

2007-04-16T06:44:00.000-07:00

Happiness is nothing more than good health and a bad memory –Albert Schweitzer

I grew up sexually abused. I've since learned that we 'survivors' have a universal habit of looking at our situation as Could Have Been Worse Than It Was.

I do it, too. Mine has always been: Well, at least it wasn't a blood relative (because it wasn't my biological father). I don't know why we do this, but we do. In order not to drown in the Awfulness of it all? To find someone who Had It Worse?

I don't know. I do know that about 10 years ago, I was a part of a group of sexual abuse survivors who met for several months. It was my first time with Real Life other people "like me" and it was eye-opening. It also reinforced my habit of 'downplaying' my abuse. OMGosh, these women had it SO bad. Fathers and brothers abusing them, their pasts so traumatic that most of them had gaping holes in their memories where they couldn't remember everything, most of them overweight in an effort to 'hide' themselves and their bodies from being attractive.

I, on the other hand, remained thin, had no problem remembering every second of my abuse vividly, and it was 'only' my stepfather not a "real" relative. (and because my mother didn't end up marrying him for years later, he really wasn't even 'related' to me at the time of the abuse). So I concluded again that It Could Have Been Worse.

When anyone hears that I was abused (it's precious few that know), and that subsequently had a problematic marriage they assume that I have "sex" problems. That my husband Wants It, but I must have some Post-Traumatic Sex Disorder.

As we all know here, that's not an issue for me. Not in my marriage anyway, but it was once a hill to climb.

I was pretty sexual early on; that seems to be the fork in the road for abuse victims: they either shut down their sexuality as 'dirty', or else go hog-wild to the other end. I threw sex around without much concern. The more the better. Oink.

Yet, I recall crying silently during The Act on more than one occasion. College, mostly. In the missionary position, I have some vivid memories of wanting to scream, to claw, to Stop It, (with a long-term boyfriend whom I really did love) -and yet I remained silent and wept secretly into his shoulder as I grit my teeth.

There was this one summer of unspecified angst, and then it somehow worked itself out. I have never felt that way again during sex. [With one exception, but it wasn't an abuse flashback, I was just having sex with someone who I wished was someone else. So that doesn't really count, but it was the same wanting-to-scream-while-crying-silently misery, so I'll include it here in my quest for full disclosure].

It did take me some years to quit being all about my partner's pleasure, to the exclusion of my own. That was just general ignorance -coupled with the desire for 'power' in the bed (residual from not having any power previously, I'm sure). Now I really love the idea of being 'taken' and controlled in a sexy, eyes-open, healthy-relationship type of way. So I've come full circle, I suppose.

I actually discovered my first non-faked orgasm completely by accident with my college boyfriend. So that's what the big deal was. Sex had been fun, but it got a LOT more fun that year. And I learned how to ask for what I wanted, which I learned (surprise) was pretty appealing. You know, I haven't done that kind of asking in many years. Shame on me. Something to change.

I think about that "bad sex" time occasionally because -in hindsight- I'm grateful for it. [Edited to Add: the time I'm speaking about here is the college-boyfriend-time. Needed to clarify] It was brutal, but it exorcised a demon out of me. I've never felt 'abused' before, during, or after consensual sex. That, I think, was a God thing. Only He could fix that so decisively. And I'm thankful to not have that issue on the table. Life's hard enough.

Small Enough

2007-04-14T20:37:00.000-07:00

oh, great god, be small enough to hear me now

there were times when i was crying
from the dark of daniel's den,
and i have asked you, once or twice,
if you would part the sea again.
but tonight i do not need a fiery pillar in the sky,
just wanna know you're gonna hold me if i start to cry.
oh, great god, be small enough to hear me now

oh, great god, be close enough to feel you now

there have been moments when i could not
face goliath on my own,
and how could i forget we've marched around
our share of jerichos.
but i will not be setting out a fleece for you tonight,
just wanna know that everything will be alright.

oh great god, be close enough to feel you now

all praise and all honor be
to the god of ancient mysteries,
whose every sign and wonder turn the pages of our history.
but tonight my heart is heavy
and i cannot keep from whispering this prayer:
"are you there?"

and i know you could leave writing on the wall
that's just for me,
or send wisdom while i'm sleeping
like in soloman's sweet dreams.
but i don't need the strength of samson
or a chariot in the end,
just want to know that you still know how many hairs
are on my head

oh, great god, (are you small enough?)
be small enough to hear me now

-Small Enough, Nichole Nordeman

Strange Things Are Afoot At The Circle K

2007-04-10T20:51:00.000-07:00

Things are happening here. God is brewing a strong pot of coffee; I'll let you know when He pours the cup what we end up discussing.

Pure love and suspicion cannot dwell together: at the door where the latter enters, the former makes its exit. -Alexandre Dumas

Marriage is like submarines: they only work if you are COMPLETELY IN. -Frank Pittman

We are told that people stay in love because of chemistry, or because they remain intrigued with each other, because of many kindnesses, because of luck. But part of it has got to be forgiveness and gratefulness. -Ellen Goodman

Beautiful Disaster

2007-04-07T21:53:00.000-07:00

Ya'll. Go download this week's free single from iTunes (hurry, before it changes on Tuesday).
I do believe he wrote this about me:

She loves her mama's lemonade,
Hates the sounds that goodbyes make.
She prays one day she'll find someone to need her.

She swears that there's no difference,
Between the lies and complements.
Its all the same if everybody leaves her.

And every magazine
tells her she's not good enough,
The pictures that she sees
make her cry.

And she would change everything, everything
Just ask her.
Caught in the in between
of beautiful disaster,
And she just needs someone to take her home.

She's giving boys what they want, tries to act so nonchalant,
Afraid they'll see
that she's lost her direction.
She never stays the same for long,
Assuming that she'll get it wrong.
Perfect only in her imperfection.

And she's not a drama queen,
She doesn't want to feel this way, only seventeen
but tired

She would change everything for happy-ever-after.
Caught in the in between of beautiful disaster,
But she just needs someone to take her home.

'Cause she's just the way she is, but no one's told her that's okay.

-Beautiful Disaster, John McLaughlin

Piggly Wiggly Has Nice Cakes

2007-04-04T20:30:00.000-07:00

Come, my beloved, let us go out into the country, let us see whether the vine has budded and its blossoms have opened, and whether the pomegranates have bloomed. There I will give you my love. Song of Songs 7:12 NAS

We decided the week before to get married. Secretly. Just Us. Two hours drive to a beautiful setting.

We booked the scene, the minister, and the time slot. We went to our courthouse to get the marriage license and giggled the whole time. I called the wedding 'consultant' to ask for local recommendations for a florist and a cake.

"Piggly Wiggly has nice cakes," she told me.

We laughed about that for years. I eventually got the number of a real baker and a real florist, and had white tulips and a beautiful cake-for-two delivered to our hotel pre-ceremony.

He came to my house at noon in a kelly green polo shirt, with a cooler in the backseat of his car. Champagne and two flutes chilling for later.

We drove a few hours, changed clothes in our hotel (listening to Enya and James Taylor) and went to our site. It was beautiful and windy. We were married.

We laughed through the ceremony, when I always thought I would cry at my wedding. I handed somone my camera, and have several snapshots that define Happy.

We walked around the water after it was over, and to a multi-star restaurant for a take-home dinner order.

After a delicious meal, and a delicious husband, we left the hotel for air near midnight. We climbed the concrete steps of a historic building and sat with a tall view of the water. He held me as the breeze blew.

It was Thursday, April 4th.

The best day of my life from beginning to end.

Past Sins III

2007-04-02T19:22:00.002-07:00

An affair is the embodiment of entitlement, fueled by resentment and lack of respect.
An infidel will remain unreachable so long as their sense of entitlement exceeds their ability to reason.-a wise internet sage

Part I
Part II

Well, hell: I'm on the Personal World Tour of Disgrace and Shame, might as well continue the quest to show you more completely unappealing sides to myself. (I'm your if I can't be a good example, let me be a horrible warning gal right here. One stop shopping.)

Where were we?

Oh, yes: the 'excuse' we used to get to Glenn's house alone (fight with my boyfriend, his wife out of state for the week). Yes, he kissed me to distraction once we were there, and I kept thinking I would draw the line at intercourse. That personal dialogue never wins out though.

I can think of several times in my Lost Summer(s) of my 20's where I sternly told myself "no sex" -then completely caved in by the end of the evening. And this night was no exception. I am no one's shining example of willpower, let me assure you.

We spent several hours at his house, and then he brought me back to my house where I quietly slipped into bed next to The (sleeping) Boyfriend, hoping I didn't give myself away. A little bit of Guilt, but more a Hoping Not To Be Caught.

And thus started an adventure of escapades. Lots of sneaking around, white lies, etc. Leaving my car somewhere and riding with him, so my car wouldn't be at his house during the day. I was in school, he was in a sales job - we were more flexible in our stealth-ability. He came home from a business trip a day early, I met him at a local hotel. I would page him "6969" when I was free, and we would meet in all kinds of crazy places.

OMGosh, I cannot even begin to tell you all of them without sounding like a story for the Penthouse Forum ... the zoo, a cemetery, an empty playground, the hood of the car, the beach, the back of a taxi in Hilton Head, the list goes on. He put poems on my windshield, sent me anonymous flowers.

We would still go out as a group and, under cover of the loudness of bar crowds, he would say amazing things in my ear right at the table. In full view of everyone, and yet no one knew. I was hooked on the secrecy, the danger. Ya'll know.

We even played tennis together. His wife and my boyfriend were better players then we were, so they encouraged us to be a Mixed Doubles team (what a double entendre) at a lower-ranked league. All summer. Sanctioned time alone. No mutual friends on our team. It was crazy easy to practice and play (another d.e.), several times a week.

And I rarely thought of the Big Picture; what we were actually doing and how wrong it was. I'm not sure if I ever did, until the end of it. And even then, I wasn't the one who was married -so I still wasn't fully cognizant of how big this breach was. The gulf between Right and Wrong.

See above quote about infidelity: their sense of entitlement exceeds their ability to reason. That would be me, I think. And I imagine my husband as well. He said recently, again, that he never meant to hurt me by it.

And I believe him, because he probably wasn't even thinking about me in the Big Picture sense. I know from my experience that I sure wasn't thinking about my boyfriend or Glenn's wife much, insofar as what we were doing would hurt them deeply. Wound them gravely. Especially her. Now I am her.

Payback's a b!tch.

This is Me

2007-04-01T20:35:00.000-07:00

Working so much I cannot breathe.

Ignoring the wolf at the door.
~~I will not lose my house. I will not lose my house. I will not lose my house.~~

If You Want Me To

2007-03-26T05:43:00.000-07:00

Painting by Larry Dyke, Walk Through The Valley

The pathway is broken,
And the signs are unclear,
And I don't know the reason why You brought me here
But just because You love me the way that You do,
I'm gonna walk through the valley
If You want me to

Cause I'm not who I was
When I took my first step,
And I'm clinging to the promise You're not through with me yet
So if all of these trials bring me closer to You,
Then I will go through the fire
If You want me to

It may not be the way I would have chosen,
When you lead me through a world that's not my home
But You never said it would be easy,
You only said I'd never go alone

So When the whole world turns against me,
And I'm all by myself,
And I can't hear You answer my cries for help
I'll remember the suffering Your love put You through
And I will go through the valley
If You want me to

If You Want Me To, Ginny Owens

Tire Spikes

2007-03-25T09:36:00.001-07:00

[Hey, I appreciate the comments from my slamfest. Very much. But it was helpful to take a look at myself from their point of view. I'm good, thanks. Oh, I am so not the hero, Mr. PhD. Not by a mile. Ask my husband - although thanks for the shoutout.]

Insanity has been defined as doing the same old thing over and over and expecting different results. -unknown

Jeez, ya'll. I went back to look at this blog from the beginning, got to about October of last year and hit the brakes, discouraged. I'm sure I'll keep reading later but why the hell are you?

I am a fcuking yoyo if you look at the Big Picture. Self-aware one day, Ignorant the next. Thoughtful one day, Selfish the next. Have a plan one day, Emotionally lose control the next. What a gigantic PITA I see overall.

I'm emotionally unpredictable. So much so that my sweet little family is uncomfortable, and tiptoes around me if I am moody (which has been often). I control the household with fear. Is she in a good mood? Will she be nice to me or not? That makes me sick. Look: I was all excited last September about changing my tone of voice, threw myself a little blog parade about it. There's been no permanent change there: just had an issue with that two days ago with my daughter. Sh!t.

What the hell is all this therapy for, if change is a)slow and yet b) not long-lasting. I'm convinced that all this going-back-in-time-to-relive-past-traumas in therapy is pretty much a load of sh!t for actually moving forward. It firmly plants you in the past. I know all the crap that happened to me in my childhood. I know my issues. I know how I got here. I know why I am wired the way I am. Fcuk that, now let's FIX it. I need solutions, how to change my world NOW.

This belief is backed up by at least one well-known therapist, Michele Weiner-Davis:
It's my belief that couples in crisis don't have the luxury to analyze how they were raised in order to find solutions to their marital problems. If your therapist is focusing on the past, suggest a future-orientation.

I agree: I am not on board that all this going back is where it's at. If so, I would have long ago been the Poster Child for a changed life, I've been in counseling of some sort for years on end. I'm just funding their annual vacations.

It's like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. The ship is going down, people. Let's get on a life boat, to safety, and then analyze why the ship sank and go salvage what we can from it.

I can't find the exact quote, but Davis doesn't believe in ignoring the past issues once the marriage is OUT of crisis. Address the crisis first, then go back. Makes sense to me.

She also says: Know that most marital problems are solvable. Don't let your therapist tell you that change is impossible. Human beings are amazing and they are capable to doing great things- especially for people they love.

This is where my rubber hits my road. If I loved my husband (and by extension, kids) enough, I should be doing my "great things" for the "people I love", right? Perhaps the "people I love" most is me. And so I spin my life and actions/inactions thusly. I can't just keep overreacting in the name of What's Not Happening in My Marriage. God, what a mess.

More from Michele: Just keep in mind that forgiveness isn't a feeling. It is a decision. You decide that you are going to start tomorrow with a clean slate. Even if it isn't easy, you make the determination that the alternative is even harder, and that you are going to do what you must to begin creating a more positive future.

I have made that decision, several times in the last year, and then backslide based on emotions and impatience. I have to keep my eyes on the goal instead of the immediate. I am one to extrapolate that What's Happening Now is What Will Always Be Happening. It's inaccurate, and a self-fulfilling prophesy. I think my husband does this too, and we both keep doing the same things, and yet thinking we will change (see above definition of Insanity).

At one point (albeit an all-too-brief one) I really thought we were getting somewhere in this marriage post-explosion. There was a window of connection and positive movement last May (pre-blogging) then it dissipated. When I think of what I want with my husband, I think about last May - not pre-affair. There was an openness, connection, and sweetness that was starting to appear between us. That time is where my lingering Hope For Us springs from, despite all evidence to the contrary.

And then the relationship faltered, stalled, and shifted into Reverse. And ran over tire spikes. Blew every tire on the damned vehicle. We seem to have accepted that our car won't run, since it's been such a long time since it started. Hoping that the tow truck will arrive by telepathy, or some such crap.

[We've talked about it since, and neither one of us is quite sure what factors were in place that made those positive interactions real. Or else we'd be re-creating it.]

We're waiting for the right feelings before we do the right actions. And that's just bullsh!t and backwards. Part of our solution is that we need to ACT as healthy married folk do and trust the feelings to FOLLOW. It's like reading the Bible, to me. I know I should, and I drag my sorry ass over to do it when I'd rather be checking my email or doing something less important. But I MAKE myself do what I ought, and AFTER I've done it I FEEL better. I am not feeling particularly close to God before I do it, but afterwards I DO feel closer. Action first, then feeling. Makes sense, right? So why can't we just GET ON THE TRAIN?

Because: ultimately I'm scared to death to be hurt again, crave reassurance I don't have/doesn't stick, and stay in the state of partial dread that I may hear the words that he wants out anyway.

Because: ultimately he is uncomfortable in my presence, having to police my emotions, never knowing when I might 'blow'. I exhaust him; he's past putting in effort because it's not rewarded. I appreciate it, and ten minutes/two hours/one day later I've forgotten it because it wasn't enough, and I'm disappointed in what we still don't have. All we are not. Terrified it will never Compare To. And therefore, it doesn't. What you focus on expands.

At this point we are lost as to how to hit the "reset" button. If this marriage is supposed to be Over, at least I want to run at it well and hard before I call it a day. To hold hands and just Jump. Both of us. We are so wary to do it now. Because it's been 'bad' for longer than it was 'good' - that if we commit to jump, it still won't work. Or that one of us will pull the ball out from under us, a la Lucy and Charlie Brown.

There are layers upon layers of emotional complication, and I just want to somehow Wipe It Out, and say fcuk it, let's go.

Look at this promising comment after a post from The Husband's Story last year:
I agree with all you said. It's so not worth it. I'm so glad I made it. When I went to couseling, they told us, "Write love notes (just little ones) and leave them places for each other, give her flowers even when you don't feel like it, say I love you even if it feels empty. My husband and I did that and we slowly started to fall in love again. The actions came before the feelings. Now we are doing so much better.

Short of a brain/emotional transplant, I am going to have to rely on doing the right thing being its own reward. No unmet expectations derailing me. Just me & God for a while. As it should be. I always start out strong, and then -pfft- poop out from loneliness, exhaustion, or a wayward thought that ambushes me.

So promise yourself, that no matter what the reason, you will not go another day blaming your partner and feeling lonely. Make peace. Make up. Make love. I promise you that the benefits of deciding to forgive go far beyond anything you can picture in your mind's eye at the moment. Your decision to forgive will create a ripple effect of exponential changes in your life. -Michele Weiner-Davis

Do, or Do Not. There is no Try. -Yoda, in "The Empire Strikes Back"

The Other Side

2007-03-22T21:04:00.000-07:00

The deepest love I've experienced is on the other side of forgiveness -David Martin

If you put it out there, you're going to get Smacked

2007-03-20T21:58:00.001-07:00

Ouch.
Way back when I first started this blog last summer, I put it out there on blogrolls, Technorati, Top Blog Sites, etc.

Yes, yes, to shamelessly get traffic here, in the (misguided? self-important?) hope that people would get something from my story. I also submitted it to be reviewed on the above site. They might give a positive shoutout to 1 out of 10 blogs. Maybe. And they can be mean as hell about the rest of them. And it's no secret. But, in the interest of getting started, I submitted my blog for review.

Obviously, I was a dumbass.

It was reviewed yesterday, and duly hated. I was bored the very second I started reading this whinefest.

Oh, don't take it personally, you say? Riiiiight. My whole story here is as personal as I've ever been. That was the point of starting it. I sat in a corner and ate my hair for about an hour and then realized some good issues in the smartass-ed-ness of the reviewer (and subsequent comments) so I wanted to 'man-up' and face the music. Let's address a few, shall we?

"I can't tell if she's a strong Christian or making fun of one who is."

Oof. Anyone agree with him? I'd like to know. Perhaps because I swear like a sailor here? You can love Jesus and say fcuk (oh, FYI, I do misspell my bad words on purpose in order to not show up in internet search results). Now, whether or not I should be all 'sh!t' and 'fcuk' while being a person who reads the Bible, prays, and loves Jesus as my savior, I don't know. I'm sure that's not ideal. I'm just who I am.

But it did disturb me that I may be thought of as 'making fun' of Christianity. I think that's more the perception of Christians as 'holy' and 'above it all' and not struggling through Real Stuff, so I couldn't possibly be one.

Wrong. Thanks for playing. Next.

And in the comments section, this bit of snark:
Reading a while I keep waiting for her to explode or something, and we'd end up with exploded over-analytical chick goo all over the walls. Her story is somewhat interesting, but I'm not sure I want to know that much about a person. I'd rather they fake it and smile and look cool, then go have their meltdowns privately. Society runs better that way and it makes my life easier

Damn, ya'll. Isn't that interesting? No, really. That is exactly what I was like, the whole "fake it and smile and look cool" while having my "meltdowns privately". I think that is a lot of what is wrong in our society. It may "run better that way", but most of us are coming undone trying to fake it longterm. I totally got what he was saying, and I used to agree, and now I SO disagree with that sh!t.

Having said that, there's no need to bust out with TMI and "exploded over-analytical chick goo" (ha! that made me laugh, even though it was meant to be a slam) upon first meeting people IRL, but being Authentic is important, although sadly unnecessary in our culture. I guess it's up to you how Real you can stand to be in this life. Surface is easy, I know. I'm great at it. But it comes with a price. Eventually.

And you know, I did get a LOAD of referred traffic yesterday. So the original goal was obtained, even if people came, read, judged, and left. So be it.

Oh. My. God. And I thought I was introspective. This chick is fascinated with herself. It was nearly impossible for me to stop reading this blog - and now I'm going to go sit in a corner and think about my thoughts and my feelings about this.

Dude, I guess we're all fascinated with ourselves on some level. But the irony is I ignored myself for so long that the pendulum is swinging the other way for me in the aftermath of a Catastrophic Life Event and I guess it does look like massive amounts of navel-gazing. Oh, well.

I did get one positive comment on that site, and hooray, what a relief in maelstrom of slams.
the second one, though...love it. i can see how it could be tmi for a lot of people, but i have to have respect for someone who puts themselves really out there like that, and the story is interesting to me. maybe it's because i'm a chick, but i dig her.

Thanks.

Rules of Engagement

2007-03-19T22:47:00.000-07:00

"Pooh?" whispered Piglet.
"Yes, Piglet? said Pooh.
"Oh, nothing," said Piglet.
"I just wanted to be sure of you."

Piglet and I have something in common here. ::poke, poke:: just making sure you're there.

Only my poke is a sharp stick. In the eye. Or soft, tender flesh.

Like a bull in a china shop, I am completely out of hand. The tinkling of glass is heard initially, as I inadvertently drop a few things, and then ::CRASH:: sh!t is falling to the floor in great explosions as I turn around in spaces too small for my big emotions.

I end up arguing, hard, with my husband, when I just meant to poke him gently to be sure he's still there. It is never gently. At least not until after glasses have been shattered and I'm aghast at the mess I've made.

And then I just want to hit the imaginary "Reset" button and poke him gently, after my Monster emotions have been spent, and they are now sleeping quietly in the corner. And he, being a logical man, is dumbfounded. Are you f-ing kidding me? Get the hell away from the crazy, unpredictable person. Run, do not walk, to the nearest Exit kind of dumbfounded.

It is rare to have my husband's full-on undivided attention/extended eye contact unless he's upset, pissed off and arguing with me. That's a years-old thing now, and I've discovered a well, then, if that is how I get your time, I'm going to do it bit of a scenario.

And after said-argument's denoument, I feel closer to him in the big picture. Even though he likely feels miles away. I know it doesn't make sense, but it's been true after just about every argument we've had (with the exception of the Dark Time). When I realized this, I mentioned it to my counselor. Who, amazingly, didn't gasp in horror at my incongruence. She was quick to enlighten me with the Why.

I've engaged him, which is what my heart cries out to do. Yet, I've engaged him negatively. And at great cost to the relationship and long-term goals of intimacy. But the status quo for my husband is to be dis-engaged from me, unplugged.

I am searching to "plug in" some way, any way, and if I can't engage him positively, by God we end up arguing. It's awful, emotional, I am usually crying, it's fcuking exhausting to both of us. It goes on and on, and when it finally ends, I am left upset but feeling connected on some wackjob level.

I can't tell you how laser-guided missile accurate that was to hear.

While it's not pre-meditated, or intentionally cruel, it's my slippery slope. Motive doesn't matter when you end up in a bad place (the road to hell is paved with good intentions and all that).

And it usually happens after a prolonged period of disconnect, or when I have reached my emotional limit of Feeling Alone and Neglected.

And despite my inner groanings of 'growth' sprouted in my last post, we just had this very scene tonight. For hours. And my bull in the china shop was crashing all over the place. At my worst I hit him (in the shoulder) and threw something (small, unbreakable) across the room at the peak of frustration.

My eyes are still puffy from the boohoos. Monster emotions were at DEFCOM 5. No one should have to internally flinch when you're in the room, you know? For God's sake, this is how I grew up. This is the steamer trunk of baggage I have brought with me and unpacked in my own house.

My emotions are labile (ya think?). The conversation started decently and then -perhaps because my subconscious radar registered that he was not plugging in- it went south.

I am NOT proud to tell you this. To reveal more of the deepest, sewage-y Yuck I still have gurgling around in my psyche is galling. I am knotted all up inside.

But I want it out there. All of it. I have for a long time, but that's not as easy as it sounds. I try to tell (a select few) friends that, yes, I had my part in running my husband away. (Caveat To Prevent The Flood Of Indignant Emails: yes, it was ultimately his mistake to go outside the marriage for a false solution, and he had his own faults in the demise of the marriage, etc. but HELLO? do you see his side even a tee-tiny bit?)

They don't believe it. Not truly. I'm the Beauty Queen. I'm all surface. I'm funny and charming and enthusiastic (the flip side of which is Monster emotions and china-shopping bulls). You can't know me. And the one person who really did see my Ugliness, walked away for a time.

But he is also still here. And at my basest, insecure depth, I cannot begin to understand why.

Excuse me, I have to go brush off my knees. And elbows. Again.

It's not how many times you try and fail, it's how many times you fail and try again. -unknown

Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart. And try to love the questions themselves. -Rainer Maria Rilke

Ch-Ch-Changes

2007-03-18T09:25:00.000-07:00

When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves. -Viktor Frankl

In my clay feet of defensiveness and all-over protective gear, this seemingly easy task is crazyhard. I can read the books, see the picture, talk the talk. Walking the talk is a whole different ballgame.

But it's coming along.

Slowly.

And not without grand fcukups on my part. When frustrated, my Default settings are B!tchAboutIt and AttackWildly. I've fallen into doing that several times in the last month, re-setting the Spousal Goodwill Toward Wife meter to square one, or zero, or negative. I don't know where I stand at this point without a 6-week progress report.

Last week I had a few chances to put my money where my mouth is in the Change department.

One morning, things went bad. I had worked the night before, a long difficult shift, came home from work to find the house locked tighter than a drum, kids in PJs, husband still sound asleep. And school started in five minutes. He woke up apologizing, we scrambled to get them ready and instead of me getting to bed, I schlepped them to school myself. ::yawn::

Was I pissed and wildly inconvenienced? Absolutely. And normally, I would LET YOU KNOW ABOUT IT, BY GUM.

But, as I was driving to and from school, I turned it over in my brain and looked at things.

Just about any time I have screwed up big time, my husband has been amazing about it. He never makes me feel like sh!t. Never. He is supportive and okay with me in a crisis of circumstance. Always.

So, I pondered how to be that way myself. He didn't intentionally, or with malice, sleep in just to piss me off. Previously, I would have reacted as if he had, with a dammit, man, can't you do anything right? kind of undertone. This is definitely a FOO-learned behavior. And it's got to go.

He had their clothes laid out, backpacks ready, and lunches made - getting ready fast was much smoother than it would have been otherwise. I mean, we had the kids dressed and in the car in about ten minutes. So I focused on how he had them super organized the night before. I was grateful for him, and my attitude shifted.

By the time I arrived home, and he started the Repeating Apology (no doubt in anticipation of the bi-otch I would normally be), I was able to snuff it out by telling him how much I appreciated the fact that the kids were basically ready to go the night before from his prep work, he had made it easy, that was great of him, it was no big deal, it all turned out fine. And I wasn't Faking It. I had worked internally toward true OkayWithIt-ness and AppreciatingMyHusband. And I went to sleep. In a much better place than the old me would have been.

Scene Two:

We're at a sports event. It's been a fun day. I turn to say something to him in the crowded arena with one child between us. Call his name. Repeatedly. He is faced away from me watching something else. He's only 1+ seat away and doesn't acknowledge me. I keep saying his name loudly and he finally turns to me with an aggrevated, "What?!"

[insert divorce papers here]

I was so put out by then, I said "Nothing" and turned away. And proceeded to spend the next 15-20 minutes trying to salvage my attitude and re-gain my center. I had been having a good day. I do not need to let this one thing send me over the everything sucks, my life is over, my husband can't stand me edge. It was a long and protracted internal battle, but the good guys finally won. My Default settings were overridden, and my outlook improved. But, damn people, it was hard work. Would have been much easier to let that one perceived meanness take over, to quit talking to him, or slap a retort back into the fray.

A lot of this negative manifestation (or not) is up to me and my attitude. I don't mean to sound like a self-help book, but it sort of came to me on the way home that night that I am going to have to make a lot of internal effort that no one will even be seeing.

I think I've been just 'waiting' for things to change, my situation, my marriage, my husband, my attitude, everything. In sort of a passive mode, as if understanding the issues, praying about it, and knowing what should change would change it all.

I came to a (long-overdue) realization that I am going to have to Always Be Working At It. That this is going to be an Ongoing Effort On My Part. For a Long Time. And trust me, I'm going to fall down all over the place making mistakes here, but the fact that I just finally owned that part of the puzzle was something in itself.

Reading over this post, it sounds less significant than it was. Oh well. Some posts are only for me anyway.

There's your work, the other person's work, and God's work. All you are responsible for is your work. You cannot do the other person's work OR God's work: it's impossible. And anyway, you're only responsible for yours. -unknown

Let's Talk About Sex...

2007-03-18T07:43:00.001-07:00

Okay, okay. This post has garnered some strong emotions in the comment section. Mine included. Please feel free to add to the discussion there, help a girl out.

I do want to clarify that the man I quoted in that post was separated for years, plural, from his wife before they were reconciled. And there was NO adultery on either part, so his point of view is not skewed by anyone betraying the marriage in a sexual manner.

I think perhaps I should have clarified that for you from the get-go, even though I happen to agree with him regardless of what happened in my marriage.

It was an issue before the adultery with us, and continues in the aftermath, the irony of which is almost unbearable at times. I'm completely befuddled. And feel continually chosen against. Daily. Nightly. Over and over. Let's face it. I'm an anomaly here. I have the higher sex drive, UNstereotypically, as the female in my relationship. I was the 'betrayed' partner who actually WANTS physical intimacy in my marriage. My whole situation is off-kilter, compared to many of you. End of story.

I subscribed to a daily Christian email for wives, to encourage us how to specifically be more generous and caring. Because, hello, I realize I was not treating him well for a long time and I'll take all the help I can get. Half of those emails are instructing the wives to be more sexual to their husbands. Obviously, I am a freak of nature, if you believe the media. I don't need that advice, thanks.

My husband is a great guy; you would really like him if you met him. I guarantee it. He's a guy's guy, but also relates well to women. He's thoughtful, witty, smart and kind. I really enjoy him. He's also hot, and when he puts his mind to it he can kiss me like no one ever has and take my breath away. Literally. Cannot breathe.

But he doesn't. Put his mind to it. Some days he barely acknowledges me physically. I cannot remember the last time he tried to take my breath away. As a physical person, who loves to touch, this is hard to reconcile. Not only with my idea of a marriage, but with the man I did marry. And I didn't just marry someone less than ideal and hope it would get better; I married my ideal person. In every area. He was all that and a bag of chips, for a time.

So. That's difficult for me. It just is, and I am sick of apologizing for wanting/needing sex in a marriage. I have a physically able and sexy husband. Just out of reach.

I remember reading somewhere that when you're having it, sex is 10% of a marriage but 90% when you're not. I would love for it to take its proper place in my life at 10% instead of the big elephant in the room. And it's not just sex. I'm including physical affection of any kind, touches, kisses, hugs, special eye contact, verbal flirting. I'm convinced that if it were happening, my almost insatiable desire would decrease to a manageable level.

I no longer am comfortable wanting such things, and paralyzed to initiate any of it. How this all shakes down psychologically: I don't feel like a priority to my husband. I haven't for a long time, and the continued status quo reinforces my low status (below children and other-things-to-do) rather than reassure me of anything positive. It's not just a physical thing; it never has been. I want to be important to him. Walk the talk.

As I said in one of the comments I made under the post we're talking about: I just can't accept that this status quo is how God planned it, or that He intends to keep us here. Our God is a passionate God. I am made in his image. Insert Flap A into Slot B.

Your lips, O my spouse, drip as the honeycomb; honey and milk are under your tongue ... Song of Songs 4:11 NKJV

Drink and imbibe deeply, O lovers. Song of Songs 5:1b NAS

I am my beloved's, and his desire is for me. Song of Songs 7:10 NAS

An Invincible Summer

2007-03-15T12:24:00.000-07:00

In the midst of winter,
I found there was within me,
an invincible summer.
- Albert Camus

Flatline Sex Life

2007-03-13T10:02:00.000-07:00

Well, that last post was a whine-fest, so I'll get out of my own head and let someone else do today's whining portion.

With his permission, this is what a wise man wrote to a woman who didn't want to have sex with her husband. He shared his point of view, in the hopes that she could understand what her own husband felt in a sex-starved marriage.

And after reading what he wrote, she got it. Really got it. So one man's stuggle blessed another person. That's what you hope for, second only to setting right your own.

Here's how I feel about my wife not being able to be intimate. I feel like I have a disease, like I'm not good enough for her, like there's something wrong with me, like she doesn't like me or love me, like I'm shackled and stuck in a cage that I can't get out of. It makes me want to divorce her, and go find a woman that'll want to have sex with me. A woman that enjoys a good orgasm, and isn't afraid to show it.

You see, one of the biggest turn-ons for a guy is a woman who's turned on. It's not a porno kind of thing, it's a sharing of the love thing. It's a communication that is deep and very hard to describe, but it lets us guys know that we are needed, loved, and appreciated, like a warm piece of fresh baked apple pie. We come away with the satisfaction of knowing that our woman just recieved the fullest of the love we can possibly deliver.

Being refused good sex is the ultimate rejection. It's like a kid pouring his soul into a work of art, or writing beautiful story, and being super excited to show it to his mom, only to find mom uninterested or not even care to see it. Makes you just want to tear it up and throw it away.

Personally, it's the cruelest thing I've ever had to face. I'd much rather have her be rude, ugly, short tempered, air headed, etc. Just about anything but frigid.

Sex should not get mixed up in personal differences. It should be like brushing your teeth, you do it every day no matter if you're mad or sad or whatever. Don't get it mixed up with all the other confusing emotions that are running around.

Just have a glass of wine, dance naked in front of the mirror, whatever you need to get you a little warm, and then give that man the whole of you! Teach him how to bring you to climax like only YOU know how to climax and scream outloud how good it feels.

It's a blessing from God to you and your spouse. Keeping your spouse from good sex, is keeping them from one of the greatest blessings that God has given a marriage.

Middle of The Cake

2007-03-12T03:29:00.000-07:00

I just want to live happily-ever-after every now and then. -Jimmy Buffett

When trips to the library & free time were more readily available, I enjoyed the author, she's very fun. (click photo to travel to amazon.com) She wove some words together in this book that I took away with me, and use mentally a LOT:

The protagonist reflects on attending a stress-reduction seminar where they were instructed to imagine a safe and comforting place. She figured everyone else was envisioning warm beaches, and she couldn't find comfort in any of the standard imagery. She writes:

The place that I went, the place that I still go, was the warm hollowed-out center of a Bundt cake. It is usually gingerbread, though sometimes that changes. Sometimes it's gingerbread crowned in a ring of poached pears. The walls that surround me are high and soft, but as they go up they curve back, open up to the light, so I feel protected by the cake but never trapped by it. ...I press my cheek against the cake, which is soft as eiderdown and still warm. This isn't a fantasy about food exactly, at least not insofar as I want to eat my way through a cake that's taller than I am. It's about being inside of cake, being part of something that I find to be profoundly comforting.

She goes on to say

It was a laugh to think I was stressed when I signed up for that workshop. ...I remember it now and hang my head in disbelief. I want to go back to that person I was, take her by the shoulders and shake her. "Look again!" I want to say to myself. "You are standing in the middle of paradise." [emphasis mine]

Or as I nutshelled it, I was in the middle of the cake. But I was so obtuse I lost perspective for all that I had in my hands already. If only I had looked harder at myself, and my relationship(s).

I put my head in the sand, ignored the signs that I was in some poor patterns of behavior as a wife, parent, person. Ignore, ignore, stay busy, put priorities in all kinds of dumbass places (hobbies, busy-work, affirmation for tasks/committees), avoid relational intimacy, la la la.

In the aftermath of my life imploding, I realize almost daily that I was in the middle of the cake. I just want to sit in a corner and eat my hair when I think about it. I had so much, squandered vast potential. I'm trying not to lose hope of finding the cake again, even a cupcake.

Dammit. I crawled out of a very fcuked up childhood/adolescence and managed to knit together a decent human being.

And then, unbelievably, found the person who was my happily ever after. Cheesy as it sounds, it was all that. He was everything I ever wanted - and believeyoume I had kissed, etc my share of frogs to know. People commented that I lit up from the inside out when I saw him.

Then as times got stressful or difficult, as things in all progressing relationships will, I emotionally pulled away and attacked the one person who was on my team. For a long time.

I knew no other example of how to be, but I couldn't help it is of small comfort over here by myself. And I'm paying the price. Even now, when I know what not to do and why, I still grind against my Default settings.

My safe, loving, comforting places are gone, and I struggle with losing my soft spot to fall. To rest my loving gaze. To have it returned.

And lately, the heavens seem as brass. :::tap, tap::: is this thing on?

I was in the Middle of the Cake.

Past Sins II

2007-03-09T03:29:00.001-08:00

Um, so.

Last time I just set up the scene: what my life was like, and how I could remotely get to the envelope-pushing place with a man who was (a) married and (b) I was also friends with his wife. Eww.

I'll be telling you all about it, the rise and fall of the forbidden relationship, in an effort to pull it out and examine it from this faraway distance. I need the perspective, and I need to purge it. At least I think I do. And here's why.

I still see that time through a glass darkly. I know it was wrong, but I also filter it through my then-perspective, which makes me lean toward 'excusing' or downplaying my behavior somewhat (so that I can live with myself? I don't know).

I really should be over vomiting in a corner about what I did back then, but I cannot quite make myself because - get ready - it was fun.

As I told you before, I loved dangerous, and my secret self still longs to be swept away in excitement and danger (obviously, the ideal is not a fcuking married-to-another man but back in the day of young and ~~stupid~~ truly all-about-me, that's where I was). It's like it wasn't 'really' adultery because we were all so young, or always out partying, or they didn't have kids, or insert your own crazy-ass excuse here.

Oh. My. Dear. God. Isn't that awful? I am creeping my own self out. I was (and still am?) so absolutely screwed up, but I'm saying it out loud. You have no idea how tempting it is to highlight and delete all this text so you will never know such bad sh!t about me. I sinned and I am remorseful. Kind of.

Yes, if not for grace, I would be completely going to hell.

Even after all that has happened to me (being the married woman whose husband was unfaithful), my point of view in my own adultery is still skewed. I heard a song a month or so ago that reminded me of Glenn, and immediately - without the time to censor myself - I smiled inwardly at the memory of a good time. (I am a little nauseous telling you this, because I realize how horrible and hypocritical this makes me).

As soon as the pleasant thought passed, I thought Does my husband have involuntary warm fuzzies when a song plays, or something reminds him of her? Before he can censor it because it was "bad", does he have a happy thought of her?

For a microsecond I could go there. I could understand it.

And yet in the very next second, my betrayed, self-righteous, hyprocritical self got all uppity and whatnot that he could dare have a warm thought of her. WTH is that? One-sided, selfish, and self-protective: that's what the hell that is.

Chasing Lions

2007-03-07T08:01:00.000-08:00

Quit living as if the purpose of life is to arrive safely at death.

Set God-sized goals. Pursue God-ordained passions. Go after a dream that is destined to fail without divine intervention.... Stop repeating the past and start creating the future.

Don't let what's wrong with you keep you from worshipping what's right with God. Burn sinful bridges. Blaze a new trail....Worry less about what people think and more about what God thinks. Don't try to be who you're not...

Quit holding out. Quit holding back. Quit running away...

What if the life you really want and the future God wants for you are actually hiding in your biggest problem, worst failure, or greatest fear?...

When we don't have the guts to step out in faith and chase lions, God is robbed of the glory that rightfully belongs to Him.

And the truth is this: The greatest regret at the end of out lives will be the lions we didn't chase.

I'm convinced that many of us are one chase away from our dreams becoming reality. I can't promise it will be a short or an easy chase. In fact, it will probably scare the living daylights out of you.

But where you end up in life really does trace back to how you react when you cross paths with a lion.
-from an article by Mark Batterson in the Jan-Feb 2007 issue of Relevant Magazine

Past Sins

2007-03-02T19:23:00.001-08:00

I, too, committed adultery. Only I wasn't married back then. He was.

I met him in a group of people I hung out with after college. I had moved to a big city and fell into a fun crowd of co-ed singles for several years.

We'll call him Glenn. He was a flirt. He was in a very long-term relationship. Everyone knew he flirted outrageously; it was just part of his personality, his charm. He was funny, and I enjoyed both he and his girlfriend, Lucy, as part of our crowd.

One night we had closed down a dance club and were piling into someone's convertible to find a greasy spoon for an oh-so-early breakfast to prevent the onslaught of sure-to-come hangovers.

We were climbing in and around each other to find seats; who would sit down in front, who would get in back, who would risk a blue light sitting on the backs of the seats with the top down...

It was very dark. Glenn climbed over me and -whoa, jack- kissed me on his way to sit down. My boyfriend hadn't yet climbed in the car.

It was a real kiss, long enough for me to know he meant it, and he would do it again if he could. Real enough to hide that information from The Boyfriend.

My best friend saw it happen and we laughed about it later - in an oh, that Glenn kind of way.

But I knew it was dangerous. Dude, I loved dangerous. I craved attention and affirmation. But the difference with me is that I didn't actively seek it like a needy, desperate girl at a frat party. Quite the opposite. I presented myself as independent, bubbly, fun, and totally self-sufficient, thankyouverymuch.

But should you happen to really dig me, I loved that. Fed on it. It tickled and massaged a deep need within me, and I felt alive when someone - or plural someones - were obviously attracted to me.

So.

Many months after The Convertible Incident, Glenn & Lucy became engaged and then married. We all traveled to the event and made merry with our friends.

Glenn remained his charming, party-boy self yet also a sweet, romantic husband. On each month anniversary after their wedding day, he gave Lucy the corresponding number of roses. We all continued to hang out together - bar-hopping, game nights, cookouts, supper clubs. The usual.

I remember entering a bar one night and going upstairs as Glenn was coming downstairs. He kissed me (for real) on the way past me. We laughed and I continued into the bar.

I cannot accurately recall the next step down the slippery slope. Harmless flirting had continued among all of us - it was just our way as a group. Not unlike the cast of "Friends", some of us had dated several in the group throughout our years of hanging out.

I think a Superbowl party was where the conversation turned a corner. I recall Glenn giving me his beeper number if I was interested in pursuing anything. I didn't use it.

Then my abandonment button got pushed.

A group ski trip to Lake Tahoe was planned and there was no way I was able to go. I had returned to school and was getting a second degree. A week out of state was out of the question. My boyfriend, however, was on the trip roster. I was selfishly hurt that he would plan to go without me, would even consider it.

Left Out, the thing I hated most, was upon me and I had no control/recourse.

Adding salt to my wound - the trip dates fell over Valentine's Day. To his credit, The Boyfriend left me a present and card to open, and called several times during the trip.

Didn't matter.

I was beside myself with abandonment issues the whole time. Left out, inferior, left behind. I can't begin to convey the inner turmoil I had over this stupid-ass ski trip. Of course, now, so many years later, I understand why this situation was extremely crazy-making.

Tahoe set me up to be vunerable. Even when the group returned home, I could not emotionally let it go. I exuded an undercurrent of *pissed-off*-ness. (if my husband is reading this, he's probably nodding his head in all-too-familiar knowledge of what that looks like)

The Boyfriend and I were not getting along. One night at a club, he was reminiscing about the trip with two girls who had been there and I began seething. Perhaps smoke was seen, I cannot be certain. I picked a good fight and he ended up leaving for home without me.

And. It just so happened that Glenn was out that night.

And. His wife, Lucy, had traveled to the west coast on business.

And. He offered to give me a ride home, post-argument. I was living with The Boyfriend; Glenn & Lucy lived two streets away from us.

We stayed out late at the bar. On the way home, Glenn asked if we could stop by his house to check on his dog. Sure, I said. I was in no hurry to get home, believeyoume. **Danger, Will Robinson**

So, we went to his house and I was petting the dog 'hello'. Glenn came up behind me, turned me around, and kissed the hell out of me.

Unexpected (yet well-timed) passionate kisses are my Achilles' heel. (My husband actually found this out the night he met me: dude can kiss like a house on fire. My heart's all skipping beats just remembering that) Putty, I tell you. Yummy stuff. And talk about not being left out. That was good medicine for what ailed me at the time.

Fairy Tale Dreams

2007-03-01T21:09:00.000-08:00

'You know how when you're a little girl and your mom reads you fairy tales before bedtime, and you fall soundly asleep after the story, dreaming of being in the fairy tale? I'm off to tuck myself in and dream of castles and crowns...and someone loving me that much, like in the story.'

If words could fall like raindrops
From these lips of mine
And if I had a thousand years
I'd still run out of time
To express my love for you
I cannot even start
All the words now fail me
You have to read my heart. -Jeff Thoren

Honor and Cherish Her

2007-02-27T20:40:00.000-08:00

I wanted to introduce you to this book properly, but had to share this bit from the middle of the book first. I don't know why, just go with me.
This is a great book. The subtitle is: The Love She Most Desires, The Respect He Desperately Needs
True, that.

I started this book waaaaaay before the adultery, but our marriage was already being admitted to the Relationship ICU with multiple diagnoses of neglect, lack of communication, disrespect, and lack of intimacy. I was half-heartedly trying to get some answers. But. I was still asleep and blind in my way, and just stopped reading somewhere in the middle. It has been on my nightstand for almost two years now. I picked it up recently to add to my lineup of simultaneous reading, and I have brand new eyes reading it believeyoume. You can link to the amazon.com page by clicking on the photo.

There's a "crazy cycle" to marriage relationships. In a tee-tiny nutshell: If she feels unloved, she is disrepectful. If he feels disrespected, he is unloving. It's simple but so true.

Much more to follow on the basics there, and I'll talk more about what I learned in the post about this book that should have preceeded this one, but whatever. My blog. My rules. My brand of crazy, here.

Chapter Fourteen
Esteem - She Wants You To Honor and Cherish Her

Over the years, many men have come to me and said, "You know, Pastor, my prayer life isn't what it should be."
I respond, "How are you treating your wife?"
"No, no," the husband hastens to explain. "My prayer life isn't where it ought to be."
"How are you treating your wife?"
"No, no, Pastor, I'm saying my prayer life; I'm not talking about my wife."
I smile and say, "I am talking about your wife."

...Tucked into I Peter 3:7 is one more phrase that every husband should heed. Peter adds that the reason the husband should treat his wife in an understanding way, as a fellow heir in Christ, is so that his "prayers will not be hindered." That is why I would often tell men who came to see me for counsel that, if heaven seemed silent to their prayers, perhaps they were not honoring their wives as God intended.

These men were sure they were doing all the right things, walking in integrity, and serving the Lord, but when they prayed, the heavens semed as brass. They kept wondering, "God, why aren't You hearing me?" And as we probed a little deeper, we often saw that the answer for these men was that they weren't living with their wives in an understanding way that honored and esteemed them. As soon as these men started obeying Scripture, their prayer life improved.

...Your wife does not want to chair the relationship but she does want to be first in importance to you. This is what Peter means by "show her honor" (I Peter 3:7). Your wife wants to know that you have her on your mind and heart first and foremost. This is what I mean by "esteem"; when it's there, your wife will feel treasured as if she's the most loved woman on earth. Also, she will want to respect you in a similar way that the church reverence Christ. Remember that your love motivates her respect, and her respect motivates your love!

I Was Sleeping

2007-02-27T13:30:00.000-08:00

I Need to Wake Up

Have I been sleeping?
I've been so still
Afraid of crumbling
Have I been careless?
Dismissing all the distant rumblings

Take me where I am supposed to be
To comprehend the things that I can't see

Cause I need to move
I need to wake up
I need to change
I need to shake up
I need to speak out
Something's got to break up

I've been asleep
And I need to wake up
Now...

I am not an island
I am not alone
I am my intentions
Trapped here in this flesh and bone

And I need to move
I need to wake up
I need to change
I need to shake up
I need to speak out
Something's got to break up
I've been asleep
And I need to wake up

Now

-An Inconvenient Truth, Melissa Ethridge

Mea Culpa

2007-02-25T04:15:00.000-08:00

They call it PMS because Mad Cow Disease was already taken.
-Author unknown

Success of a Voyage

2007-02-23T12:44:00.000-08:00

It is not the going out of port, but the coming in, that determines the success of a voyage. -Henry Ward Beecher

And we climbed out and walked away

2007-02-21T06:34:00.000-08:00

These photos were taken (many hours after the snow melted yesterday) by my husband, who is also amazed the children and I got out of this car on our own.

My small children are the bravest kids on any block, I am so proud to know them.

We slid off the side of a mountain, rolled over, slammed against a tree, looked at each other and calmly climbed out of the broken window, up the mountain, and down the road until flagging a car. They were amazing.

God hit a big RESET button in my heart for what is truly important. Miracles happen every day.

God wants you to persevere even while you do not see what you are believing Him for.

...those who participate in this life with an attitude of Thanksgiving, will receive its full promise. -John Mcquiston II

At My Most Beautiful

2007-02-19T20:36:00.000-08:00

This wise woman has said exactly, exactly, exactly what I think here. OMGosh, ya'll, I could put this on billboards across the nation, I feel so strongly about it:

I don't know about you but I am pretty sure that I wouldn't have learned as much, as fast, if this hadn't happened to shake up my life. I realized at one point during this that my husband is the only person on this earth that could hurt me deeply enough to start me on this path of discovery.

I’ve found a way to make you
I’ve found a way
A way to make you smile

I read bad poetry
Into your machine
I save your messages,
Just to hear your voice
You always listen carefully
To awkwards rhymes
You always say your name,
Like I woulden’t know it’s you
At your most beautiful

I’ve found a way to make you
I’ve found a way
A way to make you smile

At my most beautiful
I count your eyelashes secretly
With every one, whisper I love you
I let you sleep
I know you’re closed-eye watching me,
Listening
I thought I saw a smile

I’ve found a way to make you
I’ve found a way
A way to make you smile

-At My Most Beautiful, R.E.M.

To Say Thanks

2007-02-19T06:16:00.000-08:00

For reasons that don't concern ya'll, this song has a visceral effect on me. Even before the words start, the first bars of music are powerful enough to squeeze my heart. Tightly.

It's effect has been consistent and unchanged over time, so I thought I'd share the lyrics. Actually just heard it within the last few hours on my iPod random shuffle.

It was a song I had liked before, but I can remember when that changed: exactly where I was, the date on the calendar, the view from where I was sitting (literally and figuratively) when this song became alive to me in such a gut-wrenching way.

Hello, Mr. Dark Cloud
Never thought that we would meet so soon
Never thought I'd bundle up in June

Funny how the fog rolls
Funnier that I'd know who to blame
Never thought I'd have to own this pain

If all that's good and true
comes from heaven
Then what's a girl to do
when it rains?

And I'm sayin' why, why, why, why?
I'm shakin' a fist in the dark,
and I'm askin' why, why, why, why?
Why does it keep getting harder
To say thanks?

Tell me what's a girl to do...

Even fields of flowers
Dressing in their best because of You
Knowing they are blessed to be in bloom

But what about November
When the air is cold and wet winds blow
Do they understand why they can't grow?

And I'm sayin' why, why, why, why?
I'm shakin' a fist in the dark,
and I'm askin' why, why, why, why?
Why does it keep getting harder
To say thanks?

And I could not pretend
to know the difference
Between the storms You send
and those I find

-To Say Thanks, Nichole Nordeman

Take, Eat

2007-02-18T19:45:00.000-08:00

The following is a mish-mash of words I've read from all over the place that have spoken to me about myself, my husband, marriage, and all the usual suspects.

Mat 16:24 Then Jesus said to his disciples, "Those who want to come with me must say no to the things they want, pick up their crosses, and follow me.

Jesus carried his own cross. We had nothing to do with that. Like Jesus, we have to carry our own cross, whatever that cross may be.
It's only through experimentation that you will discover what God wants you to do. You can't learn anything about the grace of God without being in a community (i.e. alone).
If you are alone, you can't learn to bear the burdens of others, love others, forgive others and learn from others.
-from the blog I Will Not Eat The Darkness

*Forgiveness means giving up all hope of a better past

*You hurt him then. Today he hurts himself with this knowledge. He makes himself miserable with the facts of the past. You are not hurting him still, he is using your past actions to hurt himself in the present. Things like this should not be held over another's head. Either he gets over it or he doesn't - it's his problem to deal with, and if he wants to make you a part of the solution, he can ask, but you can not solve this problem for him. In time he will have to accept his part in the mess and forgive you for yours.

*There is enormous love in forgiveness - and forgiving is something that needs to happen on a regular basis.

*I began to see how I loved the self-pity, holding the moral high ground and the self-righteousness I had in our marriage crisis. It really struck me and I confessed it to God.

*God answers prayer. It seems he delights in answering the prayers of people who are seeking to humble themselves and become more Christlike.

*The situation won't change until someone in the situation changes.

*Maybe the best is still to come.

Abandonment, Real and Imagined

2007-02-17T00:20:00.001-08:00

This book was recommended by my counselor, and I'm no stranger to the written word on emotional baggage, surviving past pain, etc ad nauseum. But this book communicates differently to me, insofar as it's not dry or un-relatable-to (ah, new vocabulary words abound).

I have been nibbling on this book since last summer in fits & starts. Life has been so exhausting that I haven't read straight through a book all at once in over a year (with one exception, & I'll share that with ya'll in another post).

There have been many many insightful, valuable, and relatable points made, but here's one I read a few days ago that I scrambled that very second to find a highlighter:

And the more intense the abuse we survived, the more intense our fear of abandonment.

I am all over that statistic.

My mother was married three times.
1st husband (my real father) I never really knew. Last time I saw him I was four years old. My mother didn't make an effort to foster our relationship, or one with anyone on that side of the family. We moved far away, and I suppose it was too "inconvenient" for her to maintain ties, so to them we just disappeared. After I was an adult and was able to find him, we communicated briefly . He died suddenly when I was 8 months pregnant, and I found out he secretly "took" my high-dollar inheritance from my grandmother, his late mother. I also found out that my grandmother hoped to find me again right up until she died, and kept two 8x10 photographs of me as a toddler in her home (that I now have). I did find cousins I had never known, and that was a blessing. But also very sad to me: as an only (read: lonely) child, I missed out on these relationships as a young person, and the feeling of 'belonging' to a large family.

2nd husband was wildy abusive and emotionally unstable. He hit walls, he hit me. I don't think he hit my mother, but she did miscarry a pregnancy during that marriage. I recall being whipped with a vacuum cleaner hose for missing a mutliplication flash card in 3rd grade. Fun times. Again, my mother was too wrapped up in her own internal survival to worry with my well being much. She said the final straw was him having come to bed after tucking me in, and he was visibly aroused. I don't remember any sexual weirdness from him, just violence, but it's bloody ironic it was my mother's final straw for that marriage, when she wouldn't leave the next one and he was raping me every weekend.

3rd husband was actually a non-husband. They lived together for about 15-20 years until the year I got married, and then they got married, too. Bring in the psychologists, b/c I don't even pretend to understand that move. First time I realized they were an 'item' I arrived home from school to discover them having sex in my bed. MY bed. WTF? And of course within a few years, I'm being sexually molested. Regularly. Bring on all the baggage, confusion, and shame that comes from that crap.

And these are just small pieces of my childhood. My early life was a recipe for chaos and mass confusion. When I look back, I'm actually pretty impressed with myself that I am not as fcuked up as I should be. Thank God.

Speaking of God, you can make the connection that anything resembling a Father Figure in my life was unsafe, unstable, and plain Bad News. God had some bad PR with me for a looooooong time. He also, in my limited knowledge, had abandoned me.

My mother's lack of protection and safety are a whole other series' of posts. I held on to defending her, in my mind, for a long time - as she was the only constant I had in my life. As I grew up, and especially once I had children of my own, I got crystal clear in how horrible of a mother she was on a very basic level.

Help yourself to my FOO abandonment issues. This fundamental issue bled into all other relationships in my life. To this day I have broken-heart-type emotions over being "left out" of anything. Compounded by being the 'picked on' kid in elementary and middle school. Just what I needed, on top of the horrors happening in my house.

As a single adult, I partied like it was 1999. After college I made friends who went out all the time, spent summers on their boats on the lake, traveled to the beach, golf tournaments, formal fundraisers, football games, thoroughbred cups, community events, many-splendored happy hours, you name it, as one big group. And, by God, I went to everything possible, no matter whether it was financially difficult or inconvenient, because finally I had some control over not being "left out" of things. I craved being connected, being included. I still do.

You see why adultery hit me so below the belt, don't you? It's the ultimate abandonment, disconnect, being left out. And my husband was the one person I unconditionally trusted, which was a first for me. Regardless of what was going on in our dysfunctional marriage, I never worried about infidelity. Never. He was my rock. I would have laughed in your face had you suggested it to me. I actually did laugh when it was first mentioned to me as a reason he may have said we needed to separate. Ha ha

My early life set me up for this devastation to be the very thing that sent me over the edge. And it damn near did.

But.

There was enough providence in place to pull me back. Not without grave errors on my part, acting out of emotions, and flailing madly for a bit. I have to tell you though, it's so much better to be wide awake than sleepwalking through your life.

I am oddly thankful for the chance to figure this out, wrestle with my God, my beliefs, my past. I'm learning so much.

After all I've been through already? This is going to take me down? Please. He who is in me is greater than he who is in the world. Bring it on.

And ... Since It's Valentine's Day

2007-02-14T14:10:00.000-08:00

Love builds bridges where there are none. -R. H. Delany

Ain't All Sunshine and Rainbows

2007-02-13T05:57:00.000-08:00

The world ain't all sunshine and rainbows. It's about how hard you can take a hit and keep moving forward. -from the movie, Rocky Balboa

We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them. -Albert Einstein

Should He Stay or Should He Go Now? If He Stays There Will Be Trouble, If He Leaves...

2007-02-12T14:30:00.000-08:00

The obstacle is the path -Zen proverb

Okay. So let's say your whole life as you know it is over.

Ended abruptly.

Bam.

And friends abandon you. Avoid you as if your situation might be contagious. Or perhaps being associated with you would be frowned upon. People you've spent most of your time with, worked closely with for years.

And also your wife. You find out she's betrayed you by turning you in to your higher-ups without confronting you first (very non-Matthew 18, and shame on her). Would it have changed the outcome? You don't acknowledge that it would have, but it still was wrong. Plus, she sent copies of your adulterous emails to friends, during the dark times. Very wrong. Betrayed and exposed. Wife = not safe.

And then, in the darkest days of your life, your phone does not ring.

Christians, who teach and preach to love each other, hate the sin not the sinner, forgive and walk with others, ignore you. You scare them somehow. They cannot overcome their own discomfort and reach out to you.

Going to church on Sunday becomes "Running the Gauntlet"

This goes on for over a year. It is painful. It is ongoing. People assume you are over it by now. Everyone else has moved on. Any positive change is slow, and fraught with setbacks each time you think you may be getting your head above water.

You pass the entrance to your former workplace each day. You dread going to the grocery store, the pizza place, McDonald's. Because every fcuking day you see someone who knows you. Someone you worked for, or someone who worked for you. Someone who knows your secret shame now public. Even people you didn't work with, you wonder Do they know? Do they judge?

But you rely on God loving you, as best you can, when other 'tangible' people do not. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Life is hard.

Then another blow rocks you, from a former co-worker that inadvertently sets you back again.

Can you keep living here? In this small town where you inwardly cringe each day, anticipating another blow to your heart? Is God trying to teach you something? Do you think perhaps by now you get it, thank You God, You can stop with the pain now? Or there is more bending of the knee to be done? It's very confusing. And exhausting.

Is it okay to think about moving away from here? Finding a job elsewhere? When previously, you loved this town, this home, this school system, this life? Your children are content beyond belief, protected in a God-provided bubble of loving family and friends. Is it selfish? Or is it a necessary step for rebuilding yourself?

You are tired. You need affirmation. You love your children. You are a good and decent person, whose one bad decision detonated the blast that destroyed everything.

Do you stay? Do you go? Do you trust any decision you make ever again?

Awake

2007-02-11T08:00:00.000-08:00

I regret none of this, it hurts and it is painful, but I am awake, and I know what I want.

When the soul wakes up... get out of the way.

Standing

2007-02-09T13:44:00.000-08:00

Source: Wise Internet Sages

Do you know what the evidence of your faith is?

It is when things all around you seem to be going to hell in a handbasket, the wind is blowing, the rain is falling and the debris is crashing into you...and yet you stand there - looking - looking THROUGH the wind trying to see to the other side of the storm...because that is what you know is coming...the manifestation of your faith.

Restoration

You feel like a candle in a hurricane
Just like a picture with a broken frame
Alone and helpless
Like you've lost your fight

But you'll be alright

Cause when push comes to shove
You taste what you're made of
You might bend, till you break
Cause its all you can take
On your knees you look up
Decide you've had enough
You get mad you get strong
Wipe your hands shake it off

Then you Stand, Then you stand

Life's like a novel
With the end ripped out
The edge of a canyon
With only one way down
Take what you're given before its gone
Start holding on, keep holding on

Everytime you get up
And get back in the race
One more small piece of you
Starts to fall into place

-Stand, Rascal Flatts

That's How the Light Gets Through

2007-02-08T20:26:00.000-08:00

Ring the bell that still can ring, forget your perfect offering. There is a crack in everything. That's how the light gets through. -Leonard Cohen

sunrise today:

Right actions for the future are the best apologies for wrong ones in the past.
-unknown

Sat in Any Chairs Lately?

2007-02-08T20:12:00.000-08:00

When I started this blog last year, I had the intent of telling 1) The Story of Me and 2) why I started this introspection: the bomb blast of the adultery. My husband was amazing, I think: in the middle of his own pain and mistrust, he agreed to start sharing his part of our story here - since our perspectives are so different on separate sides of the blast.

We both had gaping wounds, each inflicted by the other. Both. Of. Us. I cannot emphasize this enough. Gaping, bloody ones with jagged edges. The kind of wounds that have to heal from the inside out, and will not knit together in a pretty thin line.

We were trying to process our new-to-us lives the best we knew how, while walking around like those zombies from Michael Jackson's "Thriller" video. We were in counseling together. We talked more, instead of just the necessary running-the-household-and-raising-kids conversations. There was guarded effort toward a better marriage on both our parts. We were not moving very fast, but there was wee snail movement toward a different and better relationship.

We each bemoaned the fact that I'm doing the best I can ... I'm doing all I can do ... Our counselor called bullsh!t on that right quick-like. We were each doing what we were willing to do at that point in time, but we were not doing everything we could have done for each other. Doing so would have involved a leap of faith that would cause extreme discomfort for each of us, considering our FOO and individual baggage.

Relational intimacy was hard for us in the best of times, much less in an aftermath of emotional gore like we were experiencing. Therefore, we wanted better, but could not/would not make the leap to getting it.

It's akin to an analogy I heard about faith in God; I think this was a Frank Peretti anecdote. He spoke about believing in God in the same way you believe in that chair across the room. Yes, that's a chair, it has four legs and a seat. Looks sturdy.

Yes, but will you go SIT in it?

You can lip-service all day, and intellectually drone on about the engineering of the chair and how it is structured to hold you up. But when the rubber hits the road, will you go over there and trust it to hold your weight?

There's the test, I think. And while I failed it for most of my life, I'm seeing how not sitting in the chair, from a place of relative "safety" across the room, is ultimately not in my best interest. Comfortable is not working.

I need to leap. I need to sit in the chair and trust it to hold me up. God is big enough to hold me and my baggage. He won't drop me. I know that intellectually. I do believe it. But I haven't walked over to sit in the chair. I haven't leapt in my faith. Shame on me.

I didn't leap in my marriage relationship, pre- or post-bomb. I waited to see if it was safe. I'll step here, if you'll go first. If you will, I will. Oddly enough, our relationship together started as a testimony to leaps of faith, of love. Probably the first and only time either of us stretched like that, before or since. And doing so rewarded both of us. It's astounding, in retrospect, how love moved us big time. Mightily.

Then it got less and less comfortable to make big steps. Always glancing out of our peripheral vision at each other: what's he/she doing? because if he/she's not making an effort to [whatever], i'm not stepping out by myself. Ugh. It's exhausting to look to someone else to guide your steps (or your non-steps).

Eventually we quit sharing our hearts at all. Married to a relative stranger. Familiar only in the routine of life, but not where it counts. Ya'll know.

Do I need to be looking to another person to guide my steps? No. I need to look away from the other side of the bed and look up. That's where my hope is. I'm just now figuring that out in a real way, not just a yeah, i know that kind of way.

When my husband was actively posting here, and we were routinely discussing our relationship together IRL, it was okay to blog the adultery and stories about him - or at least fairer. And while I hope it isn't always the case, he no longer posts his story/firsthand wisdom here, and we don't discuss Big Picture Issues daily. Because of that, it seems less 'okay' to blog about those things currently. I could be wrong, but we'll go with it for now.

I do want to tell you more about my husband as a person, what made me love him from the get-go. What contributes to why I still can. Just so you don't know him only as 'the adulterer'. Because that's not fair, and not who he is. I've posted a lot about my pain, because, hello, it is very real (see above reference to jagged wounds). But so is his.

I don't intend to go down the rabbit holes of my marriage and adultery specifically as the Main Plot Point to my blog. That's not to say I won't talk about either, or both, in relation to my story, or throw some lyrics into the mix that mean something to me personally. But I have a plethora of my own issues to work through, back stories of crazy-making and poor judgments that contributed to my unique chaos, and eventually helped lead to problems in my marriage. That's what I intended to do initially, and I hope to get back on track. Stay tuned.

Freeze Frame

2007-02-06T04:53:00.000-08:00

Okay, let's pause from the bad drama and let me share some of the best kind of drama.

This is probably the most awesome how-I-met-my-husband stories ever, and it actually parallels The Husband and myself in a few places: mainly the explosive lightening bolt between us, what do we do with all this sudden emotion, and the secret wedding (drugs and immediate sex, not so much, but wow a great story).

OMGosh, I read this in the wee hours of the morning and just wanted to laugh, cry, and throw up all at once. I went to bed with some tears, happy memories, and hope.

Then I wake up to comments and emails flying all over Stepford. Never a dull moment.

I'm guilty as charged.

I have no excuses for the dig (a new step for me; no deflecting, it's my fault). My emotions hit "publish" ahead of my best judgment.

I apologize publicly to The Husband, who is also a great catch.

Slaying Goliath

2007-02-03T04:51:00.000-08:00

Yeah, I'll take a little of this, thanks.

David and Goliath

Look at your marriage problem as a Goliath in your life. Be like a David, you will defeat the enemy. Don't fear. Our Mighty Awesome God WILL, WILL, WILL, come through for you. No matter what the situation is, God will come through for you.

If it looks BAD, IMPOSSIBLE, UNFIXABLE, DISTASTEROUS, DEAD, these are things our God specializes in. Let it be bad, God can fix it. Let it seem like it is impossible, yes, He can fix it. Let it seem unfixable or disastrous, these too, He can fix. Friends, NOTHING, NOTHING, NOTHING, NOTHING, is hard for God. Believe this - NOTHING, NOTHING IS HARD FOR GOD. He will do it for you. Don't worry about it. Give it to Him.

Believe God can change it. All things work together for good. God can use bad things and turn it into good. Believe this.

Sticky Red Dots

2007-02-02T05:27:00.000-08:00

Way back before I had children, I was introduced to a kids' book by Max Lucado about creatures called Wemmicks. I only read the entire book one time, about mmmm...8 or 9 years ago?.... but completely remember the concept.

These little Wemmick creatures walked around and put 'stickers' on each other: a red dot for negative, a gold star for positive. So these guys would be walking around with lots of negatives and/or positives, and would be judged by how others saw them.

One Wemmick walked around with no stickers on him. The others were mystified. They would try to put red dots or gold stars on him, but they slid off of him. Wouldn't stick. This one guy did not care about how others saw him, because he knew Who Made Him, and how special he was to his Maker, so nothing 'stuck' to him. That's the nutshell version. I never forgot it.

The same concept works in our lives, with a twist.

The adultery plastered red dots all over me, and I looked down at them and felt completely unworthy as a woman, person, wife, YouNameIt. I felt like one big heartbroken Loser.

But in the midst of it all there were God McNuggets - i.e. gold stars - scattered around. Gifts of hope in the middle of the deepest despair. But they didn't stick, and I needed them to. I focused on the red dots, not the gold stars. And I lashed out of from a place of hurt and loss of control.

Why do we believe the worst about ourselves? Why, when I am thinking about a particular car, that is mainly what I see. For example, the new Toyota FJ Cruiser. I dig this car, and now I see it everywhere because it's what my internal radar tracks. Same with negative self-images. I heard second-hand a few weeks ago "If she does find herself single, she would be an amazing catch" and I immediately pfffft'd that comment. Because, hell, if I was such an amazing catch wouldn't The Husband know it? He's a smart guy. Maybe I am a great catch in the wrong net?

Red dots abound.

The Moon

2007-01-30T03:10:00.000-08:00

Back in the dark days of the affair, The Husband and she-who-shall-not-be-named had a thing about the moon. Mainly, that they were far apart, but could still see the moon together no matter what. Cue cheesy music, I know, but ouch, man.

So, of course, the day after the "reveal" I've taken the kids to the inlaws to get them away from our personal Ground Zero, and am driving back home at night. The moon is amazing, huge, beautiful - and Dummy Me calls The Husband. He answers and I say "Can you see the moon from where you are?" and he can't even answer me for about ten seconds, because he thinks it's her.

I of course don't know any of that until later email hacking uncovers it. So, of course the moon then turns into something Bigger Than It Is. You know? Another signpost in my life that Reminds Me That SHE Comes First! THEIR Romance! He Loves HER! Even THE MOON is all about her.

And, hello, we live in the mountains: the Moon is always beautifully showcased. "Look at me!" Look at me!" screamed the moon for a few months. (Fcuking moon)

Slowly, that changed.

One night I was driving home, and the moon was pretty and I didn't immediately cringe inside.

Then, another night, I looked up and thought God did not make this moon for those two people alone.

And then, eventually, look, isn't it pretty tonight with no Ick attached to the thought.

It's been a year since the moon mocked me relentlessly. Now it's just a moon again. Things can change. Hope doesn't disappoint.

I love introspective men

2007-01-26T22:06:00.000-08:00

The following text is from one man to another, as they try to get under the surface and understand their wives. They could be describing me (or the pre-aware me), before I decided to face and figure it out. And also parts of The Husband, I think. A work in progress.

This sounds like my wife. Something in her past is driving her fears and her need to control everything. While she knows she has these fears, the counseling did help her to better see how they manifest in everyday life. She could not really see this before, and it is important, I think, that I bring this to her attention when she starts acting that way again.

If your wife is like mine (and I really think she is), then her whole life has been spent protecting herself from reliving some trauma she experienced as a child. So she has this tough shell around her that she KNOWS she perpetuates (she flat out admitted as much, didn't she?) She probably believes she is a good, generous, caring person and cannot understand how she could be seen as so mean by you or others (at least as she rationalizes it in her mind). She probably thinks she is just a victim of circumstance, doesn't understand why she is villanized, blah, blah, blah..

You, like me, have a certain amount of rescuing behavior, again probably from your FOO. Being the nice guy is really trying to be accepted and loved, not because you don't think your deserve it, but you know no other way to get it. Your wife needs a protector against her fears. You need to rise to that role, meaning she needs to see you as capable of confronting the dragons in her life. The problem I had with this idea is that when I would do so, it took control away from my wife and her anxiety would set in. So on one hand my wife wants me to take control to protect her, but she does not trust giving up that control to me (or anyone else) because it is just too scary. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. This where the counselor helped my wife to understand the catch 22 she put us both into.