I See Cycles

There is a season for every thing.  It is interesting how I'm seeing and recognizing cycles in my own life and experience.  One new-ish cycle I've only recently come to truly understand is one of the most troubling because of the great (negative) impact it has on my whole family.

The sin cycle.  Okay, so that's super general.  Let me get more specific... my husband's BIG sin cycle.  There are the daily sins... those make an impact, but don't cause seismic shocks that the whole family is jarred by.  It's the big sins... like lying, stealing, adultery through porn viewing... these are the BIG sins I'm thinking about.

I've realized that when my husband does something big there are a few things that happen.  First, when I find out about it, I become full of righteous indignation (especially those that hurt our family) and freak out to one degree or another.  Then I usually get depressed because, ultimately, there is NOTHING I can do to improve the situation.  I cannot stop Beauty Man from lying.  I cannot stop him from stealing from our family.  I cannot stop him from looking at porn.  Oh, trust me... I DO try.  In doing so I experience a punishment for the wrong he has committed... in trying to make sure he doesn't hurt me again, I am limited because I "must" police him.  I "must" because it's part of trying to feel okay with all the crud I have to deal with and trying to lengthen out the days between one earthquake and another.  Anyway...

Next, Beauty Man starts to focus his negative feelings on work instead of dealing with what he's done wrong.  He projects his distain on his job.  Eventually he either quits or gets fired.  Usually sooner than later.  It's so freakin' obvious.  I see it clear as day - now that things are lining up as they have at least 4 times before. Why has it taken me so long to see this horrible cycle?  I have to believe it's because I just didn't want to see all the connections.  Seeing them doesn't enable me to alter the situation.  I can speak encouraging words until I'm blue in the face, but my husband won't hear them as long as he is determined to be down about something.

That's one of the big differences between us.  When Beauty Man gets "down," there's no gettin' him up until he's darn good an' ready.  Now me... if someone tries to cheer me when I'm down, I'm all for it.  I may sink down when the cheerer is no longer around, but I'm not one to TRY to stay mad when there is happiness to feel.  Ya know?

So, I wonder how many of you see cycles in your life?  Are there any like this that you see plainly, but have no ability to alter at all?

Licking My Wounds, the Legion

This is another continuation post.  I know... it's getting old to not get the whole thing all at once.  This is the last one that is specifically part of the whole story of the Can in the Bag and all that jazz.  I highly recommend starting at the post in which I began to tell about this particular dead body and then mosy on over the the subsequent postS.

Perhaps this is the point!  Maybe my whole life I've been prepared to become Monster Girl!??  I mean, it's not been a bad thing.  Ever since I had the idea for FrankenMonster Marriage I knew I simply must be called Monster Girl here.  And I felt really quite liberated and powerful in a joyfully peaceful way.

But for weeks before knowing I needed to start this blog and become Monster Girl in my heart, I experienced pain more on than off.  And it has continued since, just not in the unmanageable and daily tearful way of the early days... before the empowerment of accepting my monsterness.  I literally cried every day for at least a week.  My poor kiddos. They tried so hard to do things to help me feel better.  They really are my gems!

It hurt so bad I wanted to hurt the outside of me to alleviate the inside pain.  I actually wanted to cut my hair off (bald) after pulling it out sufficiently.  I'm telling you what I wanted to do.  I didn't do it.  My hair is one of my few "pretty" physical attributes.  It is down to my butt, brown and is the only thing about my physical appearance that people ever compliment.  I'm really totally okay with that... it being the only thing peeps compliment... but it's also something about which I feel an attachment... I feel able to sort of hide in my hair.  And I just wanted to pull it out and cut it off to hurt me after I found my husband watching porn.

In addition to the hair pulling and cutting... I wanted to cut myself.  I've NEVER understood that behavior before.  I do now.  All I wanted to do was cut my skin and watch the blood roll down and hope that some of the pain inside would roll out of me with it.  Yes, I do realize this sorta really doesn't make any sense... but this is how I felt!!!  I didn't do, but I sure wanted to.

'Surely,' I thought and still feel, 'I'm hideous even with my hair.  Elsewise, he would not seek to view another naked woman instead of coming to me who lay a short walk down the hall.  Yes, I'm hideous.  My husband has proved it to me.  He would rather obtain an erection by watching another female than being with me.'  These and other horrible thoughts have run through my mind and tormented me as a result of finding my husband watchin porn.  Writing poetry about these feelings really helped.  I'm gunna share one next time.  I hope you like it a little.  It's raw me... not lovely, but really real.  And safe... cause I don't think cursing is helpful... it requires more energy and thought to describe in productive ways than to hurl curses regardless of the medium, in my opinion, anyway.

I still feel repulsive.  And we have had sex since all this went down.  I might, in a few moments during and/or immediately after the act, feel some bits of acceptance and attractiveness... but it goes away super fast.  I feel tremendous shame.  How could I not be enough for my man?  For surely, THAT is the problem.  I'm not enough.  I'm not pretty enough, sexy enough, smart enough, thin enough...  I'm not enough so he clicked into a movie to watch others have sex.  Never mind that I am totally available and waiting to have intercourse....

It's just too much.  There are all these thoughts and feelings and trying to express them doesn't convey the profound nature of the turmoil.  Words just fall short of capturing the essence and extent of how this has impacted my psyche.

I'll keep trying because I feel compelled to do so, but right now I need a break.  However, I do consider this the official end post to the Saga of the Cat and the Bag.  K?  I hope you feel some sense of completion herein.

REMEMBER:
If you know who I am, shhhh.  I need to live in anonymity.  Monster Girls like me prefer to hide in the dark because we are so very hideous.

Taking the Cat out of the Bag

Have you ever done it?  Taken a cat out of a bag, I mean.  Heck, have you ever got one IN a bag?

I haven't.  So, I'm just imagining what it would entail and what the consequences might be.  I do have an active and vivid imagination, though!  So, I'm thinking that one who would be so brave... or foolish as to put a cat in a bag would sustain numerous wounds regardless of the outcome of the endeavor.  IF such an one were successful, I would imagine that said person would rather let the cat stay where it was than deal with trying to get it out again.

This is where you find me.

I got the cat in the bag and have been loathe to get it out or even let it get out.  But it's coming.

Just know that I DO, in fact, KNOW that lots of other women have faced this same challenge.  I'm sure with more grace than me!  I mentioned a girl a while back... I'm going to share more about her in a while.  Anyway... She coule be my twin.  She is not, actually, but we're so similar she could be!  Anyway... she, just as one example, is dealing with the problem I'm trying to share in this post, too.  It's just difficult!  I guess a bit like stepping into the sun after a confinement in the dark and cold.  It's eventually a gift and relief to be in the sun, but it's a bit miserable and painful right at the beginning.

So,  I was trying to get rid of the internet at our house because I found my husband watching porn.  I realize there are lots of folks (guys AND girls) who would scoff or mock me for the pain this discovery has caused.  But like all doozies, this is a multi-faceted gem of darkness.

Before I explain further, I have to tell you aobut some really religious sort of spiritual stuff.  I haven't written about that part of me so much here because I don't want to "turn anybody off" to reading my story.  What I'm goint to share is absolutely pertinent to the story of my husband watching porn, finding him doing it, and all the resulting fallout for me.

For three or four months before I saw him looking at porn with my own eyes, I heard whispers to my mind that Beauty Man was doing it.  I asked him, point blank, if he was.  I even told him I heard (he KNOWS what this means) he was  and asked again if he was.  Each time he told me he was not, had not, did not... however he said it, he always said no.

Back up to the very beginning of us.  That's been long enough, now, for us to have four children with the youngest being around 1 year old.  I found him looking at porn way back in the beginning.  I was a different person back then.  It bothered me.  It hurt my feelings some.  I felt slightly mistrustful of him, but I believed him when he told me he would stop.  I asked him to stop because it hurt my feelings.

Skip forward a few years.

He promised me that when we found out we were preggie, he would quit smoking.  He did.  But then, unbeknownst to me, he started up again.  I knew it, though.  I heard the whispers (not audible, but to my mind).  I heard the Holy Spirit tell me what he was doing, but I would not believe.  I didn't want to believe my husband was lying to me.  I WAS told and warned, though.  I asked him point blank, numerous times.  He lied in reply.  Repeatedly.  And for years.

The truth didn't come out until he'd move me away from my parents and brothers.  He'd lied to me for 3 years by then!  And since?  (I hear you wonder.)  That's part of the huge problem in this FrankenMonster Marriage!  He's NEVER completely stopped lying!!!!  Not only has he lied, bu he's also stolen money from our family.  He's still more in a habit of hiding the truth than TELLING the truth.  It's very painful for me.  Remember how honest, how truthful I like being?

The story isn't complete, but I really must take a break from the telling.  I'll resume very soon.  Promise.

The Parable of the Window

Pre-Post Note:
YEAY!  I'm posting a week later than my last one!  YEAY for some all vitories.  Okay, so it's not on the day I'm trying to do it regularly, but still.  Baby steps ARE steps!  :)

Last time I mentioned sharing with you a Parable I've written.    I call it: The Parable of the Window, which you can see is the title.  Obviously.  :)  Now, this Parable has to do with my Love Languages, my man, and how he does or does not speak my Love Languages.  If you don't know anything about Love Languages.  I encourage you to read the book entitled: The Five Love Languages.  I've been reading a blogger I really like, so the link for that book will take you to her Amazon store.  Every little bit help!  I hope, if you're interested in that (or any book), you'll search for what you want through her store, which you can find by the links I've included and also on her BLOG.  It is a really great blog!  Of course, I may like it so much because she writes (and maybe thinks?) similarly to me.  At least, that's how it seems by what she writes and how she expresses herself and the way she names things.  I just think it's always fun to read from others who seem to be kindred spirits!

On to the Parable:

I am in an air-tight room.  There is no ventilation ducting to this room.  The door is sealed tight.  There is one single window in this room.  The seal around it, too, is airtight.  Only one person has the ability to open the window.  My Beauty Man, my husband.

When he opens the window, he allows fresh air to flood the room (my heart and life).  He opens it by touching me lovingly, speaking to me kindly and encouragingly.  He can open it by calling to say hi and tell me he was thinking about me while he's at work.  He opens it when he rubs my feet or shoulders - especially when he does so without being asked.  He opens that window when he gives me specific compliments about the things I'm trying to do, my appearance, something that he loves about a food item I've prepared.  There are myriad ways he opens the window.  But it is not held open permanently.  Opening it requires effort on his part.  When he stops making the effort to hold the window open, it falls closed and seals air-tight-shut again.  Oftentimes, my man not only stops holding the window open, but also leaves the room entirely... shutting the door firmly on his departure.

Leaving the room is figurative because my husband hasn't physically left me in any permanent way.  But every time we have a disagreement, he usually stomps off in a huff.  This is one form "leaving the room" takes in our marriage.  He also leaves the room when he refuses to have a conversation.  Or when he refuses to answer a question and says, instead, "I don't know," or, "I don't remember."  Clearly these are unacceptable answers.

And I am left alone.  Initially, I often don't realize he's actually departed.... he sneaks out as often as he stomps out.  I'm just so relieved to breath again... and he takes my state of distraction as his cover for walking away.  When I realize he's gone, I usually (especially in the beginning), would just think something like, "Oh, he'll be back soon!  He won't stay away long!"

But then he does.  And I start to really miss the fresh air... I miss his presence and his effort.  So, I start to knock on the door.  I almost always start with soft knocks... trying to get his attention.  Eventually it moves to louder and louder knocking and on to pounding on the door... just hoping to get my man's attention in hopes that he'll come visit my room and open the window.

The room IS air-tight, please remember, so eventually I start to feel difficulty breathing.  My breath comes with greater and greater difficulty.  I stop pounding on the door.  Actually, I stop trying at all.  It is at this point, at some stage of me sitting in a corner of my room (or lying in foetal position about to die of asphixiation) that my man comes in the room and opens the window.  Almost every single time...  I'm about to die in our marriage before he does anything about it.  :(

You may wonder why I don't open the door myself.  You might ask, "Does the door NOT have a knob on it?"  Those are appropriate questions, I suppose.  I hope, though, that you are not married if you ask them.  If you are, perhaps you simply have a different idea of marriage than me.  That is, of course, totally possible.  For me, though... if I open that door, that means I'm looking for some outside source to affirm me in ways that ONLY my husband should be doing.  And, honestly, I would rather die in my marriage than break my covenants, which I have made to my God and husband.  So, I don't touch the knob, though there certainly IS one.

There have been lots of times when I've been sitting in the corner... at some stage of dying or about to die-ness that I look at the knob a lot and wonder what it would be like to turn it and go outside my little room.  I know this is dangerous territory.  I am working on NOT looking at or contemplating that knob when things are at their worst.  Every once in a while, though, it has been kinda good that I looked... cause things actually do NOT look greener on the other side when I have.  Not overall... there might be patches of greener... but not the whole lawn... at least... when I've tried to see without seeing.  And since that's the closest I'm gunna go to checkin out that grass... well, I think THAT sort of knob-lookin' has done me good.

So, that's my Parable.  Definitely NOT amazing and minimally put as The Master parable-teller's.  But it's mine.  :)  Monster Girls can be pleased with their silly efforts, too... can't I?

You Can Call me "Monster Girl"

I haven't had the question yet (I don't think anyone knows I'm here), but I imagine it'll come, so I'm going to just go ahead and tell ya so you don't have to ask.  The question I've imagined goes a little something like this: "Why are you called Monster Girl?"

Honestly, it has everything to do with one of those hopes... or beliefs... that died.  I'll give the details on THAT and then link back here later.  Suffice it to say that since the most recent and really very gorey death, I've felt like a horrible, ugly, shameful monster.  Yes, I DO, in fact, know that these feelings have been inspired by the enemy of my soul.  I know this intellectually.  The truth definitely has NOT sunk down to my heart yet, though!

Compared to the American ideal of beauty, I am rather monsterous, really.  You may disagree if you could see me.  But since you can't and won't.... probably ever... well, you'll just have to trust me on this.  I don't look like a hottie.  I'm not sexy.  I'm definitely NOT "One Hot Mama."  I'm nobody's (no, not even my husband's) idea of any kind of pin-up girl.  I'm just not.

I am easy to get along with... for most people.  Not my husband (obviously - else this blog would never have come into my life as a sweet secret and lifeline out of depression).

By-the-way... did I mention that as soon as I woke from the nap I took right after I had this idea, I felt like a switch... like a light switch had been flicked on?  It's true.  I felt excited and purposeful.  It felt really rather strange to feel so very "done" with depression as I felt then.  I got up quickly (not my normal mode since that episode of depression hit), got dressed, got kiddos moving and we went out for only the second time in weeks - except for Sunday  services at church.  Those don't really count as "going out," though.  So, I feel wonderful!  I'm so glad to have this new place to meet Sisters in this fire*!

Remember: shhhh, don't tell anyone who I am if you think you know or you Do know!  Please.  :)

*Malachi 3:2 But who may abide the day of his coming? and who shall stand when he appeareth? for he is like a refiner's fire, and like fullers’ soap:

The Choice (poem)

I'm gunna be
     in a wrecked marriage.
So the question is:
     will I be miserable in
     this wrecked marriage?
OR
           will I be happy in
           this wrecked marriage?
     The choice is mine alone.

The marriage will be
              wrecked
          so long as Beauty Man
                 refuses
          to make the necessary
                 repairs.
          No matter how often
                 i try
          to get him to look under
                 the hood,
          none of it matters if he
                  refuses
         to see what is there
                  when he looks.

So, I need not be miserable
             THOUGH
that is definitely the easier emotion to
              feel;
given the circumstance.

           So, I must choose happiness
                 each moment.

Self-Introduction

Have you ever felt like everything in your world was falling apart, only to realize, upon closer contemplation of the situation, that the only thing falling apart was your marriage?  Well, I have... pretty recently, too!  :-p

I decided to open this blog totally anonymously so that I might feel free to really get into the nitty-gritty of dealing with my FrankenMonster of a Marriage.  The idea for this blog came to me after a good hard fit of crying, sobbing the ugly cry, after yet another painful interaction with my husband.

After deciding to write here anonymously, I also decided to do it sort of secretly.  By that I do NOT mean a horrible "secret," but really the kind of sweet secret you get to hold between the time you find out you're preggie and when you tell your hubbie...and then the time between holding that sweet secret together and tell the world.  THAT kind of secret.  ^_^  Only this time, I rather think "gestation" may be the duration of my life.  Hopefully what's left of it is LOTs and lots... so, we have time to become good friends... sort of... in an anonymous sort of way (on my side, at least)... here in internet land.

So, why FrankenMonster Marriage?  Well, I don't know if this is just me being weird... I don't know if anyone else out there has had feelings like the ones I've had and I'm going to share... ... ...but if YOU get it... I hope you'll comment so I might have the chance to feel not quite so alone.  That would be so super truly awesome!

I guess a long time ago I had these hopes.  Expectations too.  Most of them (I honestly think ALL of them, but I'll say most just to be safe) were born of words from my Love's mouth.  So, I liken those hopes and expectations to living breathing human beings.  They have slowly died of various maladies over the years.  Most, though, have died as a result of a knife in the back in the form of lies revealed.  They almost all died in moments of profound betrayal.  Every one of them murdered by their best friend... my husband.

So all these individuals (still "only" hopes and expectations, of course) died.  Muerto.  At one point, a nondescript morning back in November 2011, I think, I realized that the morgue was plump fulled up.  I also realized that I was depressed.

Now, I know depressed because I've been around some LONG "blocks" of it before, if you know what I mean.  (You know, like someone might say, "I've been around the block a time or two."  You know.  Right?)  Anyway...  I've experienced hormonal depression, PPD (some might argue this is hormonal, but in my experience it was so much more extreme that I label it seperately), and situational depression.  I do not enjoy being depressed.  I'm definitely no Bella of Twilight fame.  Would that my man had only the problem of being among the walking dead, needing to suck blood to live, and being too handsome for life.  Hmmm...  maybe he is in a way....  among the walking dead, I mean.  :)  I'll have to investigate that train of though in the future!

Back to the depressed thing: I don't like being depressed.  Realizing that I definitely WAS depressed was really freaking depressing!  See, in the past, it's taken as long as MANY months (read: a year and more) for me to kick my butt OUT of depression and that's just the time it took to get OUT... not including the time I was in the hole... abyss... at the bottom of a cliff in a broken mess... you know, already depressed and just didn't realize the problem.  So, when I realized (that morning in November) that I was depressed, I felt myself grasping at strings by which to pull my far too fluffy self out of the dark.

Then this idea came to me to share my brokenness in all its... BROKE-ness.  That felt promising.  My mind and heart grasped the idea...  no mere string... and toyed with it to determine how to use it to best advantage.  For some reason... oh, yeah... it's because I actually feel like a monster as a result of the reason for the despairing sorrow I felt that morning; so I was thinking of monsters and trying to imagine one that felt appropriate.  Frankenstein popped into my head and it felt like a perfect fit... with a slight change and some additions, of course.  Thus: FrankenMonster Marriage was born; amid the dead bodies in the morgue of my mind.

The morgue full, I realized I simply must figure out what (if anything) I might salvage from all that dead material to fashion something new.

This is my place to purge... to think... to share and hopefully hear from others in similar circumstances.  This is where I'm going to try to think stuff through, write some poetry (cause that form of writing just lends itself to emoting, at least it does for me), and hopefully all of it will make it easier for me to choose happiness each day.  I'm going to try to figure out what can be used from those bods in the morgue to form this FrankenMonster of a Marriage and then toss the rest.  I'm going to do all that only here.  No one else need know I have a monster of a marriage... or that I feel like a Monster Girl....

I'm gunna try to write each Monday.  Yes, I do actually know today is not Monday.  I'm not saying I'm ONLY going to write on Monday.  Sheesh.  ;)  I'm just sayin' I'm gunna try real hard to write each Monday, at the very least.

One last thing before I close for today:  If you know who I am, or think you do, please do NOT tell anyone.  If you think you know who I am, feel free to write to ask me if you want to know for sure.  I will be honest.  Even here where I'm trying to be a bit circumspect, I'm being almost completely honest both in comission and omission kinds of being honest or lying.  Regardless, please don't tell anyone who I am whether you think you know or you do know for sure who I am in the real world.  K?  Thanks bunches!!