So I Married a Gay Man.....

It's been 125 weeks (that's almost two and half years....) since my husband disclosed his same-sex attraction. We are beginning to thrive. We are starting to really live again. I hate that it has taken this long, but then I realize that it really hasn't been that long.  We are go-getters, hard-chargers, get-it-done kind of people. And well, this isn't something you can just get done. It's a slow, often painfully slow, process. And we aren't at the finish line yet. We still have a lot of work to do.  There is light at the end of the tunnel. And the tunnel doesn't seem so long and narrow and cramped anymore. So we will keep walking towards the light.

 It's been a while since I've posted, but I haven't stopped reading! I have long been a fan of the Hole in my Heart Podcast .  So, I was eager to read their new book and preordered it. Though it wasn't exactly what I expected it was a good read.  The main point of the book is that marriage is a metaphor of Christ's love for the church. And anyone, even someone that is not naturally attracted to their spouse, can participate it the metaphor. An Impossible Marriage: What Our Mixed-Orientation Marriage Has Taught Us About Love and the Gospel by Laurie and Matt Krieg is a story about a difficult point in their marriage and what they learned during that time. They alternate telling the story, revealing their unique individual thoughts, feelings, and experiences.   The part of the book that resonnated most with me was about not using sex as a barometer of oneness in our marriage. Laurie explains, "I wish I had understood then that the number of times we have sex is ...

My husband and I have used several forms of accountability check-ins over the past year and a half.  Most of them form some sort of acronym that is easy to remember.  I wrote about one of of our favorites, SPERM - which stands for Spiritual, Physical, Emotional, Relational, and Mental.  We use these categories to discuss how we are doing in each area. I've also come to realize that the same categories can be used to define self-care.  We need to make time for ourselves and yet too often I find that we overlook many aspects of self-care or limit ourselves to one or two very narrow categories.  At least I know I have. Since we are women, let's rearrange the letters and go with PERMS.  (Anyone else admit to having a perm in the 80's???  Just me?) P- Physical:  What can you do to care for yourself physically?  Get plenty of sleep Exercise, take a walk, stretch, yoga Eat well & stay hydrated Take a bath, shower Go to the ch...

If you have been in the church for any length of time, you are familiar with the story of Lazarus.  Jesus raises his friend Lazarus from the dead after being in the grave for four days.  That part is significant because this wasn't the first time that Jesus had raised someone from the dead, but when he did it shortly after death people explained it away - maybe they weren't really dead, you know? - but it's hard to explain away four days in a grave. The sermon at church this morning was on this miracle of Jesus.  And even though I've read and heard this story numerous times, I started to cry. "Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. So, when he heard Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was." - John 11:5-6 ESV It's easy to gloss over that because we know how the story ends.  Lazarus will live and be reunited with his sisters.  BUT they did not know that!  So when Jesus shows up four days after he dies, both sist...

It's been 90 weeks since my husband disclosed his same-sex attraction. That's over 20 months.  Creeping up on two years. Most days I feel like a normal person with normal problems.  Our cycles of craziness are less and less frequent.  I am generally peaceful and hopeful.  I still have doubts.  I'm never quite sure if I can relax yet - or should I brace myself for more ups and downs. We are less and less focused on his SSA, though we both are still connected to the Brothers Road community and have plans to attend more events this year.  Right now we are working on rebuilding our marriage and our life together.  We've been able to protect our children through the madness but we have not done as well personally. Recently my husband made a playlist of love songs for me.  I thought he'd maybe come up with five.  It was actually a long list.  It was heartfelt and made me cry happy tears.  See, too often I think he doesn't think of...

Chemistry - once my favorite subject in school and my almost major turned minor in college.  I've always loved it.  But now I really hate that word. Chemistry - something my husband doesn't have with me, but apparently feels with other men on occasion.  It's not that he wants that to happen.  In fact, it makes him crazy.  And depressed.  That's why he has avoided men for most of his life.  But that didn't work out well and so we are trying something different.  And sometimes different is scary.  Truth be told, most people that have been married for over two decades probably don't feel chemistry anymore.  I can't really say that I feel that for him either.  But I used to.  He used to give me butterflies.  I just feel incredibly sad thinking that maybe he never felt butterflies with me.  Also, I don't really understand him.  After I got married, I stopped noticing other men.  Only once in our entire ma...

Have you ever been going about your normal routine and WHAM you are crying uncontrollably or just overwhelmed by sadness?  You weren't sad a moment ago.  You may or may not even know what prompted it.  But all of the sudden you feel like you can't even move.  Just me?  Alrighty then.... I recently read an article about grief that made me feel a little less crazy.  The article is specifically talking about grief after death, but as I've mentioned before we now know that all grief works in similar ways.  I have been experiencing what is known as a STUG, a Sudden Temporary Upsurge of Grief.  A STUG is unexpected, threatening, and intense.  It can be accompanied by crying, nausea, vomiting, racing pulse, and feeling like you can't breathe.  Some people compare it to a panic attack.  It leaves you feeling agitated and frightened.  And rightly so - that's an intense physical reaction to grief. Getting through a STUG is very sim...

Sometimes I look back and wonder how I made it.  Some days it's a wonder I'm still breathing.  But I did more than survive.  I continued on with life during the crisis.  I went to work, took care of kids, made dinner, cleaned, went to church, and on and on.  Only by God's grace was I able to get out of bed and face each day.  Here's how I did it. 1.  Prayer - I started every day with prayer.  There were times when I just couldn't pray anymore and that was ok, too.  Sometimes I just cried to God, literally just cried because that's all I could do. 2.  Music - I listened to music everyday.  Some of it was encouraging and some of it was just cathartic.  I mostly listened to worship music but also to other Christian music that resonated with me.  Nothing secular -not that I have anything against it but I just needed to soak in Godly music. 3.  Old friends - I needed friends that have known me and my husband for year...

Last weekend my husband and I attended a marriage retreat for mixed orientation couples.  The part I was most excited about was finally getting to meet one of my best mixed orientation marriage friends.  She and I have only ever talked on the phone, we've never met in person.  It was so much fun to hang out in real life!! Then came the actual retreat.  We went into the weekend feeling good.  I was not prepared for all of the hard work we were going to do!  The first night ended terribly.  Every single marriage exercise we participated in ended in an argument.  It was NOT pretty.  I decided it was a mistake to even be there.  We had some one-on-one time with a wiser couple and went to bed exhausted. The next day we were able to see some of the bad communication habits that we have developed in the past year.  The stress and anxiety of the past year had really taken a toll on our communication.  I was able to identify my tend...

It's a new year.  Finally! I have been wishing 2019 to end since it began.  Seriously, since January 1, 2019 I wanted the year to end because I sensed it would be a terrible year .  The worst year actually.  And it was.  My fears were all confirmed and it was the worst year of my life.  But it's finally over. In the weeks leading up to 2020, I kept hoping that I would wake up feeling something way better than dread - hope, joy, anything positive would do.  Instead, I woke up feeling nothing.  Just a normal day.  Nothing good and nothing bad, just neutral.  Not what I wanted, but I'll take it. Now I just have to keep moving forward.  This year holds a lot of changes for me and my family.  I am truly looking forward to all of the changes.  It's a fresh start.  Maybe the good feelings will come with time.