What's my next move? I have OPTIONS.

On a forum I participate in, I shared that I recently caught my husband in a lie. One friend asked me, "What is your next move?" (thank you Daisy!)

It let me come up with more specifics about what I was going to do and articulate more clearly what my actions are going to be moving forward. Much of what I listed were things relating to old boundaries, and habits that I know bring me peace. The wonderful thing about this exercise was the reminder that I HAVE OPTIONS!

We, all of us, have options. We might be powerless over the addiction and we are powerless over the actions of others but we still have lots of power. We have power over ourselves and our actions and our choices. I have options. I am not trapped. I feel trapped sometimes and my options aren't necessarily ideal, but I do have options and I can help make myself safe and whole.

Isn't it beautiful that we have power that can't be taken from us? Isn't it so wonderful that our Heavenly Father gave us agency, and that this agency can not be taken from us? As I have worked recovery, been to therapy, worked steps, learned from women wiser than myself, and relied on the Savior, I've found more confidence in myself and my ability to make good decisions. I've discovered more of the options that are always before me.

My options aren't ideal. My husband has been caught in a lie and there is fall-out to deal with, but it can be dealt with and I have tools and I have options.

I am woman. Hear me roar. :)

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.

Recovery principles are applicable to everything!

Today has been kind of tough for various reasons that are unrelated to addiction. I have been feeling angry toward my significant other over the way he poorly handled a situation the result of which is added work on my part.

When I got to work I felt myself wanting to do anything but work or think about the situation. My recovery though kicked in and I was able to recognize that I was feeling negative emotions and I was feeling the desire to numb with mindless pinterest searching and netflix and food.

It made me kind of happy to see progress in my own life from recovery. It might not be addiction related but the principles of recovery are so all encompassing that they are just LIFE recovery. They are just excellent tools to make us all better equipped at navigating life with more emotional, spiritual, and mental stability. I'm certainly not perfect, and I'm pretty sure I will watch Netflix on one monitor while I work on the other but even recognizing the workings of my mind and emotions so quickly, almost as soon as they got started, is good and is healthy.

I LOVE recovery work. I love the 12-steps. I love all I have learned from the wonderful women that I run shoulders with figuratively. I love all that I am learning in therapy. I love that I am feeling more confidant in my parenting ability because of the knowledge I am gaining - at least I have some tools to help teach my child about emotions, sexuality, pornography, and boundaries. God is full of mercy and love and is ready to pour goodness, knowledge, and peace into our hearts as we make room in our hearts for those blessings.