Pregnant! Wowza - triggers!

Big new on the homefront. I'm pregnant! We are excited. I am not sick (yet). It is still pretty early, maybe 7 weeks. Last time I didn't get sick until around 8 weeks so we'll see. :) My last pregnancy was generally a good one. I was sick the entire time (except weeks 17-20) but I was so grateful to be pregnant after struggling with infertility that it really was GREAT!

There were some hurts I experienced during pregnancy and soon after baby boy was born that I thought I had worked through, but I am now thinking I had simply buried them. Since I found out a few weeks ago that I am pregnant I have really been on edge emotionally. All the emotions that I buried are flooding back.

See, I didn't start sticking up for myself and setting boundaries and demanding change until around 4 months after baby boy was born. So, the pregnancy was still in the full throws of dishonesty, vague answers, misleading, minimizing, and hiding behaviors by B. I knew he was looking at porn but I was ignoring it, and he was minimizing if I did bring it up, and I was ignoring my intuition. We were sexually active most of the pregnancy. A few times I was told that he didn't want to be physical because of how I looked. Ouch. And you know the six weeks after birth where sex is a no-no? Well, there were lots of favors asked of me to which I generally obliged. At the time I was just happy that he was finding me attractive again "because [my] waist was returning." Now, well, I feel like I was so incredibly used. I feel like I was blind and stupid for ignoring everything. I feel like I was just an object. I feel like I was only valued in accordance with my physical appearance.

When I started standing up for myself our marriage started getting worse. I'd heard that it gets better before it gets worse. Oh boy, does that ring true for us. We spent a year getting more distant, more volatile, and with me pulling more things out into the open. We started therapy a few months ago and stopped moving backwards and a month or so ago we even started moving forward.

I will say that for the last month B has been sober and very aggressively seeking recovery. Meetings, sponsors, contacts, phone calls, reading, studying, watching videos, the whole bit. He is doing pretty well and sticking to it so far and working on continuously being humble in response to my hurt. And maybe the added level of safety from him is allowing more emotions to come to the surface too.

Whatever the reason, the emotions are there and I am hurting and I am in pain and I am so so angry about all of it. It is so much easier to just keep him at arms length, keep my walls up, and not face the hurt. It is so deep. I don't know if I am ready to face it. I let one brick from my wall come down this morning and it was hard. We hugged for the first time all week.

Happy New Year - Resolutions

Image from the Library of Congress (http://www.loc.gov/pictures/)

It's a new year! I think most of us get reflective around the new year - contemplating our last year, the good, the bad, the happy and sad. We also tend to get excited at the possibility of a fresh start, a new beginning, and a renewed motivation. I'm no different and I do love setting New Year's resolutions. I've actually stuck to several in the past few years (and didn't stick to many more).

In relation to my dealing with B's addiction a LOT has changed in the past year. In the spring is when I decided enough is enough and set my first boundaries. I finally decided to just go after my own emotional health and well-being whether or not he was going to be sober or seek recovery. I read books, I joined a forum, I started a blog, I set more boundaries, I STUCK to boundaries, I talked and talked and talked, I told a friend for the first time, I reach out and met another WoPA in person (which was SO great and a source of so much strength - thank you Ashley from Memoirs of a Goddess in Training). I learned so much about the world of pornography addiction and the effects on the addict and spouse and family. I started working through the 12-steps of the Healing Through Christ manual. I feel that lots was done but I am still at the beginning of my journey. There is more healing yet to be found. On that note I've set a couple spiriutality/recovery-related resolutions:

1. Read my scriptures every day. It has to be at least one verse. I've never stuck to a daily routine for longer than a month or so but it makes SUCH a big difference so I am determined!
2. Work on step-work at least one every two weeks. I thought about setting the goal of finishing the steps this year but I think it shouldn't be quite so rigid. I just want to make a concerted effort to be consistent.

There is more I want to do but I believe is setting myself up for success so I'll stop there. I hope that all my WoPA sister's can find a moment of joy in their reflections of the past year and a sliver of hope as they look forward to a new year that is waiting to be filled with moments of strength, faith, and triumph.

The Picture from the Horrible Vacation

Image from blackdreamer.com

I say the vacation was horrible but it really wasn't. We had the opportunity to go to the Caribbean a couple years ago. The island was beautiful. The friends we were with were fun. The food was good. The water was clear. The beach was warm and clean. The sailing was spectacular. The snorkling was adventurous. But there was an undercurrent. That week I was hardly touched by my husband on our fabulous vacation. He was distant and closed-off and grumpy.

*Warning, this next paragraph could be super triggery - proceed with caution*

I knew in my heart what it was about. The beach, the sun, the ocean all afforded lots of opportunities to see beautiful, scantily-clad women. And when I say scantily clad I mean it - many of the beaches were topless-optional. Even the beach we were at the most which wasn't technically a top-less beach gave us a nice long look at two 20-somethings who weighed a buck-ten in their string bikini bottoms and bouncy, perky, naked boobs as they walked by slowly and turned around and walked by again. I'm SO sorry if that is triggery for you. It was my reality. So, it came as no surprise when B told me he was depressed because I didn't look that way and it made him feel distant from me and less loving toward me and why couldn't I just try harder. FACE-PALM. It should have been a GREAT vacation. One we will likely never be able to afford again. It was absolutely ruined by his addiction. The reason I'm thinking about it now is someone commented on a picture from that vacation on Facebook. The picture is in a beautiful setting with the sun-set behind us, palm trees, sand, and my husband's arm around me. We are both smiling at the camera.

Except, are we really smiling? There are no teeth in my husband's smile. And while mine looks fine when I saw it next to pictures where I am not in trauma mode it was OH SO CLEAR that I was unhappy and it was a forced smile. My eyes look sad. The corner's of my mouth aren't turned up quite as much. My shoulders are hanging. It brought tears to my eyes seeing that picture again and realizing just how sad I was in one of the most beautiful places I've ever been.

This is what makes me so angry when it comes to this addiction. So many things have been stolen from me. The fabulous vacation memories are stolen forever. I don't know that I'll ever go to a tropical island with my husband again. Seriously, never, ever. It was so traumatic. So potential vacations are stolen. Gosh darn I hate it when things are stolen from me.

As I think this though the following quote enters my mind. I remember when it was taught and it was said with great feeling - as I'm sure anyone who's heard Elder Holland teach can imagine:

"Don’t you quit. You keep walking. You keep trying. There is help and happiness ahead. Some blessings come soon, some come late, and some don’t come until heaven. But for those who embrace the gospel of Jesus Christ, they come. It will be all right in the end. Trust God and believe in good things to come." —Jeffrey R. Holland

I love this and I rely on it. All the things that are stolen from me are okay. Some blessings don't come until heaven, but they COME. I'm learning more and more to trust God, to rely on Him, and that He will bring me peace and happiness and hope ALWAYS.