6 People and Lotteries

While contemplating who to share my story with I re-found this:




People Who Do NOT Deserve to Hear My Story: 

1.The friend who hears your story and feels shame for you.  She gasps and confirms how horrified you should be. Then there is awkward silence. Then you have to make *her* feel better.

2. The friend who responds with sympathy, "I feel so sorry for you," rather than empathy, "I get it. I feel you.  I've been there.  Wanna see a shame cyclone turn deadly throw one of these at it, "Oh you poor thing!" or the passive aggressive Southern version of sympathy, "Bless your heart!"

3.The friend who needs you to be the pillar of worthiness and authenticity.  She can't help because she's too disappointed in you.  You've let *her* down.

4.The friend who is so uncomfortable with vulnerability that she scolds, "How did you let this happen?"

5. The friend who is all about making it better and out of her own discomfort refuses to acknowledge that you can actually be crazy and make terrible choices. "You're exaggerating.  It wasn't that bad."

6. The friend who confuses connection with the opportunity to one-up you. "That's nothing! Listen to what happened to ME!"



"I'm looking for the person that loves me not despite my vulnerability and imperfection but because of it.  I'm looking for what I call my "move the body" friends. I'm looking for the folks who are going to show up and wade through the deep with me."

One or two in a lifetime and you're lucky.Two or three, LOTTERY.

Guess what?!

I think I've won the mega-all-time-superstar-lottery-of-the-galaxy! I love my Warrior Sisters who walk through all kinds of deep with me.  All at different levels.  And I am SO BLESSED!!


"You have to earn the right to hear MY story.  It's an HONOR to hold space for me when I'm in shame." 

(PS- I"m working on this myself- I'm still not there yet-- but I am so grateful for the opportunity to grow- When you know better you do better. Thank you Miss Maya.)

Sometimes I wish...

Sometimes I wish that when we fight we'd scream and yell and GET IT OUT! But we try to be calm and collected and rational (which is hard with emotions).  I like to keep my sailor tendencies in check (as in swearing like a...).

I told my husband that I feel like he's being passive with his blog (pot/kettle maybe?)(and actually I didn't flat out tell him, he read it in my journal) despite it being under his real name because he hasn't told anybody about it.  It feels like he's just waiting for someone he knows to stumble across it and say, "Wow that's hard, let me walk with you while you do this." Instead of him saying, "Hey guys, this is hard.  Will you walk with me while I do this?"  Been there.  Done that.  Done waiting.  So there are people in my real life that know about this blog.  And sometimes I get an email saying, "Hey I read your blog...you ok?"  Here's the thing though.  His recovery is HIS recovery, HIS journey.  I CANNOT dictate what it should or should not look like (though I'd love to).  I recognize that.  Which is precisely why I did not tell him and why I wrote it in my journal.

Should I be the Pot or the Kettle?

I really don't know where I'm going with this.

I am exhausted.

Emotionally drained.  It's been a long week.  Talked to my Stake Relief Society President about pornography and my life and it was lovely.  Healing to be heard.  But draining.  My therapy session yesterday was great.  And also draining.  Next week my husband is leaving town for a week and I'm trying to keep it together.  To not totally wig out.  But I kind of am.  Because the last binge of pornography for him was on a business trip.  Followed by a month of lying.  I'm hoping to meet up with him at the end of the week and we'll do a little family vacation.  But man, I am STRESSED.  He's been doing well lately and I'm grateful for that.  But I still get triggered and freak out.

Today has been a lot of BREATHING and listening to beautiful piano music and thinking, praying, journaling and talking with some friends.

Waiting and Wading

After my drama yesterday of finding things in youtube histories and my shaking anger (so badly that I pulled something out between my shoulder blades and can't turn my head to the left because of a pinched nerve-no one can tell me this doesn't affect me) I sent hubby an email (because a chat for this sort of thing wouldn't be appropriate at work) and we talked when he got home from work.  (More in depth after the kids had gone to bed).  I was SO afraid that he would try to deny it.  At one point he did downplay a bit saying that he didn't remember every incident and the date they happened on (I get that- but don't down play this mister). So we talked and talked and talked (we're like stationary pioneers) I read him the NY times article and that seemed to shed some light on things.  Lots of apologies.  I appreciate apologies and perhaps I'll truly accept them when I see the change.  He's trying. He is trying to be honest with me. Right now I just kind of have to wait.  Because it takes TIME for him to prove that he means what he says.  And because I've been either so deeply burned or burned too many times I'm waiting.  Waiting for the other shoe to drop.  Waiting for the shoe to not exist.  Waiting to see what he chooses to do the next time he is triggered.

I do wonder why I felt like he was an honest guy when we first started dating.  Was he?  Or was I too trusting? What's wrong with me that I would seek him out?  And I really hate that.  I hate that now I have to second guess my whole life with him.  The last 8 years.  8 years full of what ifs. How would I have acted or reacted had I known? Was there anything to know?  Does it matter? It is past.  Over.  Then why am I dealing with it now?!

I don't want you readers to think that I hate my husband.  I don't.  I do hate the lies. And I have been betrayed.  And that is deep.  I want to believe that he's a good guy.  That he really IS the guy that I love.  Right now it's hard to sort out how much is the addiction and how much is him and what that all means.  And it's really hard for me to see through the rage.  I'm so much more angry than I've EVER been.  Which is normal.  (So glad I'm not just crazy.) Thanks to AddoRecovery and some new friends I know that. So it's hard.  I'm also waiting for the anger to pass.  For me to have waded through all of it to the other side.  What's on the other side of the anger pool of muck?  I don't know.  And not knowing is a little scary too.

Yard Waste

I hope you'll notice the precise cropping of the photo labeling the trashcan as BS.  I thought it fit. 

     We have a bush in front of our house that I'm not really a fan of.  I can't bring myself to tear it out until I find something I like better so for now it stays.  But I don't like it.  It gets very overgrown and Sideshow Bob looking.  (Forgive me, but that is truly what I think when I see it.) 

(Image courtesy of Wikipedia)

So today I was done. I was done putting up with the ugly.  I was done pretending I like it- or at the very least don't dislike it.  I got the gloves, the pruning shears and took to work.  It was some hard work.  Pokey parts.  Sneezing: that was unexpected.  Looks from people driving by wondering why on earth I'm hacking at that bush. Right now the bush looks uglier than before, but I know it'll grow back.  

That's what we're doing in our marriage right now.  Hacking at some of the ugly stuff so there's room for fresh greenery to grow.  And labeling it for what it is, namely B.S. It's pokey, and hurts.  Sometimes it makes me feel unexpected things.  People who don't know my feelings might wonder why I'm hacking at our marriage.  

So it has room to grow.  And because I'm tired of looking at it and pretending I like it like this.