It’s been almost two weeks since my first therapy session after the second separation. I scheduled the session because of feeling consuming rage. It was constant and in direct conflict with my yoga practice and spiritual beliefs, which have love at the center of actions. Breaking car windows and spray painting liar/cheater was what I wanted to do. I wanted to set his belongings he left behind on fire in the front yard. My mother kept pleading with me not to do things that would land me in jail. I conceded she was right, but I couldn’t shift the anger out of my spirit with scriptures or asanas.
So there I sat on the couch over looking the lake again wondering how the whole person I had become months earlier was now this shattered being. I remembered what whole felt like; good, peaceful, happy. My present was total despair. Why had my husband even bothered to come back to do the same thing to me all over again?
As I sat sipping ginger tea overlooking the lake my therapist said rage is caused by hurt. He gave me a moment before asking what was causing the hurt. I didn’t have an answer and we agreed to pray about it in the next session.
Abandonment hurts like hell. Your husband demanding that you remain faithful while he dates and takes late night calls and texts hurts like hell. When you’re called a murderer because you had a miscarriage that hurts like hell. When you’re told that his spiritual mentor has told him something remarkable and it compares you to the stench of a dead, rotten seed that hurts like hell. Every other pastor I come into contact with calls me a gift and daughter of God.
I had asked for quality time and support, small things, and never received them. I really shouldn’t have been blindsided. I was standing right in front of his face when he told her he’d call her back. I was shifting in the bed as he answered the middle of the night IMs . “It’s from Africa,” he said. I watched him iron clothes hours before he was to meet her, but he only took minutes to prepare for our anniversary dinner.
What hurts the most? Shame. Shame hurts like hell. I have two sons watching me go through this. It’s embarrassing to be treated this way in front of them. My entire family knows my husband left again. They are trying to very politely say we told you so. We told you he was just using you. Everything negative, we told you so. “Move on Kathryn. You’re pretty and smart. What is wrong with you?”
I don’t really know. I think the solemnity of vows has something to do with it. I keep apologizing to God for having to break a promise. Promises mean something to me.
If I were a boy…..songs can really express pieces of feelings you’re trying to connect. I married a manipulator who never takes responsibility for his actions. Colleagues that have taken the time to pray for me ask me why did I tolerate emotional abuse. I don’t know really. I just loved my husband, but he will accuse me of never having done so. Even now as I sit listening to a snoring puppy that he abandoned me with. He will say I added no value to his life, that he wasted nine years.
Everything hurts. A broken marriage, my oldest son’s rebellion, being overworked. I feel like everyone is always demanding something of me, but very seldom do I get anything in return.
I went to church last weekend looking for Jesus. It was a desperate search. Even if he didn’t say anything profound I just needed to know he hadn’t abandoned me too since I had sacrificed our relationship trying to be one with my husband. There is a reason to heed the warning of being unequally yoked. You eventually lose yourself and your identity. But God. He did have a word for me through his prophets that evening. It was not what I expected.
Isaiah 61:1-3 is my hope right now. God gives beauty for ashes and the oil of joy for mourning. May he comfort all those who weep from broken hearts.
The Unconventional Life 