Effervescence

The cat is out of the bag by now. This lady is divorced from the unemployable, disabled combat veteran. I am free from abuse. Yet no matter how I try to swing it, sing it, or write it out, a twinge of 50 fiery emotions surface when I speak of it. There is the happy and the sad, the egregious and the calming, the hopeful and the desperate. And my mind? Well I waiver. It's not copacetic but manageable with time. I don't believe time is really the healer -- the Lord is, of course -- but I'm not backing down. I would not say I am nearly as unstable as I was three months ago. Most don't know the full story, so I'll jot almost all of it down here. (I keep remembering things so this post may be under construction for some time.) I still get slapped by winds of "How could you?" (It's more like how could I not) and "Don't you miss him?" (No, not even a little, in fact) and "Would you remarry him if he repented?" (No, I definitely would not)

I don't want to start a blog out this way, but I need to be consistent in starting from where I am. The tones will fluctuate, but I'm not afraid of that. And I don't view myself as a victim, however anyone who reads this will see me as such.. I am who I am; love me or leave me. Yes, I am in counseling, and yes, my oldest is as well. 

So, these words [spoken by my mother, who was right] haunt me:

"If you marry him, he will die in combat or something and you'll be left a single mother. Wait a year."

I married him anyway. And he did die in combat. PTSD stole that man I married and he gave into PTSD with fervor. But PTSD wasn't even the tip of the iceberg of debilitating conditions. Multiple traumatic brain injuries, cognitive impairment, debilitating migraines, vertigo, black outs, seizures, paranoia, rage, major depressive disorder, a torn rotator cuff, bilateral hip arthritis, unexplained knee pain, back pain, and then, if you ask me, shadows of personality disorders as well. Dr notes read "Psychosis - NOS" which is "not otherwise specified." Too much for a 28 year-old, no doubt, but if you ask me (and you haven't because you are writing this to yourself), the worst disability of all is a bad attitude. It's the desire to live and flourish wasted away. It's a demon embodying what you once loved. And it took seven painstaking years, many moves, homelessness, unemployment, robbery from the government, hell from the VA and the DoD, unceasing efforts in advocacy, two miscarriages, and two full-term pregnancies. But then yes, I also became the single mother I saw in my worst nightmares. (My other worst nightmares involved standing before him while he put a bullet inside his brain or shot the kids up and made me watch --- both of which he was considering pursuit of). Now I am left with triggers from PTSD, anxiety, and a moderate social disconnect because as an ENFJ, I see the world so much differently than others. I'm enjoying learning about myself, however, and even though I am my own worst critic, I know that I am on the road to recovery. It turns out I'm fascinating, which... is fascinating! I may be my own worst critic, but I am never bored, and I laugh constantly.

My exhaustion is summed up as such: Through "sickness and in health," which really should read "Health and then sickness until you're dead," I stayed by his side as best I could, and I gave 500% of my life to helping him get "wounded warrior" resources and getting plugged in with transitional groups and affiliates and programs that he never really cared about, yearning for love he would not or could not give me -- maybe a mix of both. Through multiple witnessed suicide attempts, subjugation to the ways of a master manipulator, and mental, verbal, emotional, spiritual, and sexual abuse, I came out alive, but only because God ripped me out in a forceful way. I'd have been killed. For sure the children would have been killed as well. People asked me why I stayed many times over the last seven years. My answer was always the same: "I love him." And then they'd say "Well, I give you a lot of credit. Most women would have been gone by now." In my [self-proclaimed] lunacy, I took those spoken words as complimentary and inspiration, or a challenge, more or less, to stay. I am now the biggest disappointment to myself. I live with the wounds I incurred because I did not think it would get so bad and pushed myself to be strong enough to take it. Obviously my plan of action was not the wisest, but I didn't have a support system like I have no, so leaving wasn't really much of an option.

Words have been etched on my heart, my mind has been calloused, my heart ripped up, and my hope tested to the max. My faith is strong, and my foundation unshakable, but the scores and scores of scars I have pulverize my soul, the sting too great to live with, so I depend on Jesus, and counseling, and prayer, and safe outlets like this. I hate divorce, I hate what I became because of my reluctance to stand up for myself, and I find it ironic that the very great amount of respect he demanded has been shattered, irreconcilably so, because he demanded it so much. 

See, I respect a lot of individuals. I know some truly amazing men and women. None of them demand respect. They earn it because they are beautiful people and then there's a degree to which it's freely given, too. Tyranny is not part of the equation.

If I could tell him a few things, they would be as follows:

You did not deserve me. I spent a great deal speaking highly of you because the Bible says not to speak ill of anyone. I spent more time than you'll ever know praying for you, seeking reasons to admire you, looking constantly for godly qualities within you to praise. I did your grunt work, and I fought for you. No one on this planet would dare say differently because it's the truth. But I was so beautiful and so valuable and so stunningly set apart from this world that in order to make yourself feel anything at all, you had to manipulate, dominate, control, demean, belittle, hold me at gun point, threaten to take my life, threaten to cut my hair, sit me down and refuse to let me eat, push me, shove me, grab my wrists, humiliate me in public, scream in my face in front of the children, refuse to hold your newborn son, downsize any interests I had, immortalize yourself, and force me to sit still while you grabbed my head and shoved your dick in my mouth, because you were a man, you crazy misogynist, and you had needs and I owed. You thought causing me to gag was fantastic, because you let me go and sing in a choir. Bitch, please!!

It was either that or the manipulation I dealt with constantly, a guilt and shaming adventure to the end of the lonely road. But then that blowjob wasn't good enough, either. Why? Why were you so linear and so dark? Why the fuck did you lay there like a dead fish? Why is it that my best memory of you was our wedding night and after that it was a constant battle for one reason or another? You had enough energy before  jumping onto your computer games to tell me I wasn't satisfactory, but you never really sought to connect. Never "really." We had our better days, and I thought they were amazing because they didn't involve death threats when they happened! Isn't that sick? But frankly, I could neither give you my best nor even fake enjoyment of such an act while all I wanted was to be held, touched, loved, appreciated, heard, and prayed with. I felt like your whore, but unpaid, chewed up, used, and unworthy of anything real. I tried. You know? I really tried. It is no wonder that while many women go on a sex-crazed freedom spree post-divorce, I want nothing but the Lord. I don't even want to touch myself. There's no appeal for anything physical save a physique change, so that in the future, I don't have shadows of the past in my hips. In the future... so help me God.... I'll be restored, and someone is going to sweep me off my feet through a slow and steady friendship that builds, and I tell you what. Holding out for that day, oh, it's worth it. You aren't.

I remember the days you screamed so loud at me, cursing me out with your fists raised to throw punches, I was embarrassed to be seen with you in the house. I remember the time you tried to choke me on the couch and I had to kick you off of me. You came after me and used enough force that yelling "Stop!!!" provoked your service dog to break you off of me. Why am I so attached to her? Because she saved my life. The dog who wasn't known to be assertive or even bark had to get between you and your wife. WHY?! Then you yelled at her, avoided her completely, or closed the door in her face as she tried to be a service dog for you. Enjoy your miserable, lonely, worthless life with your unstable friends.

You knew how deeply and desperately I longed for a spiritual leader: a man who would look forward to affirming me, talking with me, worshiping the Lord with me, raising children with me, accepting me for who I really was, learning with me, growing with me, repenting with me, building faith with me, seeking the gifts of the Spirit, praying with me and for me, and actually loving me, both in and out of the sheets. The world is interesting and amazing and vast and funny and turbulent. It's meant to be explored! You knew I was romantic. You knew I was sentimental. But then you'd point your gun at my head, and laugh when I got scared. You showed me that playing simulator-style computer games in a future Russian fallout was more appealing than the softness and warmth of the woman "you loved." You told people I had seven affairs. What on earth is that? I've never had sex with another while married. I'm nobody's whore and never will be. I don't struggle with lust. I struggle with unfulfilled desires, yes, but I'm not going out to seek something that doesn't belong to me. Emotional attachments which have been broken do NOT materialize into reasons to abuse me for 9 months of pregnancy, pushing me down the stairs, claiming you know for CERTAIN that your second-born is not actually your own child. Paternity test, oh yes... I went to that extreme willingly, because you said your bitterness would die. But of course I knew better, and your bitterness grew worse once you found out the baby was yours, because the baby was disabled. Disabled babies are supposed to be taken out, according to you. You relish in an old and dead Spartan world in which the "weak" are done away with so as not to taint the race. But you're not even close to being of that people group. It's all in your head. You have no honor.

My worship isn't hindered by your shit anymore and by God's grace and self-discipline, my innermost yearning, my perpetual desire to be loved the way I'm supposed to be loved and worthy of being loved will be met, and my interior will be as beautifully tempered as the fading beauty of my outer shell.

You would insist that I have dinner on the table at a certain time while instead of going out job hunting, you sat in front of computer games for 10-12 hours a day for years while we were on state aid for food, back-ordering and painting over-priced tabletop models as a means of escape from the shame you felt from having been torn apart from your love of combat in theater, but then it was me. It was my fault I spent $40 on produce that we needed and therefore that was the reason your precious motorcycle was repossessed. I took the heat for that one because you spent $2k on online games! But no no, that $40 was the deal breaker, to feed your wife and your child. You had to escape from your family. I must not have rubbed your feet correctly or moaned loud enough. I know you preferred a porn star. I'm not. I don't go tanning. I actually eat food. I save sex for the confines of wedlock. My breasts are real. But you know, porn doesn't love you. It's as numb as you are. Maybe that's why it tempted you. There was no challenge and no spiritual friction between your lost soul and another, you cold, heartless, unkind bastard.

You know nothing of God, though you claim to believe Him, you lack love, you lack work ethic, and you're a thief. You're no leader. You're a poor representation of what the white, Christian male ought to be, and you should be dismissed of your honorable discharge from the Marine Corps. Marines don't "do" what you did. You spoke of God's law with such eloquence you could have turned a rock into gold. You could have caused a poor man to budget for your opinions, you so highly carried your lofty self. Such mighty speak for the laziness you flaunted.

Here is where I fell short: I took so much of the verbal and mental and emotional abuse it was easy for me to be carnally taken for a time by another, or another, or another --- flattered by kindness that I did not know in my own home, honored by quality time given even just online. I was the sucker I never wanted to be, and I beat myself up repeatedly because of it. I went to counseling because of it. I pushed and pushed and pushed myself to be OKAY with your tyrannical ways just to prove to you that I was not what you accused me of. I am not so easy now, but that's because I caught wind of the pattern I was in: Abused wifey tempted by nice guy who was nice in the wrong context to the wrong woman because the woman was married, even though maybe she shouldn't have been... and abusive husband made her pay for it. I'm not sure I'd say you did well by making me pay for it. Payback's a bitch, isn't it? It's ok. Now you may have whatever your dark heart desires.

I began to believe years ago that if he was so bent on harpooning me with his words, I must really deserve it, so I focused inward. I focused on keeping myself "in check." It was never enough, however, and I repeatedly heard "You say you're sorry but you haven't dealt with the issue." I'd say "What more than repentance do you require?" And I always heard "For you to deal with it." "Well, what's it look like to 'deal with it' in your eyes?" I honestly think his idea of making me pay was killing me. I think he fantasized over the idea. He wished he died in battle. No, he lusted after a shattered dream. Wonderlust consumed him. We tried different counselors, but it always came back to me. I remember when one counselor said straight to his face "If you don't repent, no matter how much she tries to avoid leaving you, she'll hit her breaking point. It's just a matter of time as to when that point will be. Don't play with fire. Be the godly man you preach about."

What I heard at home was, "You're a complete failure." "You'll never be what you claim you are." "I know your sins and if you do me wrong, I can shout them from the rooftops until you learn your place." "You are nothing more than a cheap whore." "Don't walk next to me." "You want a hug? What have you done to deserve a hug?" "Why do you need to go to school? You don't need to be educated to have kids." "You don't know anything." "You're wrong. No matter what, you're wrong." "I thought women were supposed to be good at this." "You think you have it so tough. Be happy I let you live in my house and breathe my air." "You think I don't love you? I let you spend my money and sleep in my bed." "What makes you think you have control over your children? You can't even keep yourself from crying when you're upset." "Cry-baby. You're so weak." "Women are all emotion and no logic. I think God made women to give men sex. And when you think about it, why else? We're lonely, we get aroused, we want to fuck. We do the hard work. We don't need you otherwise. You do make great salads but I don't need those to survive. The military taught me all I need to know." Etc etc etc....

Yet I believed if I had enough faith, if I JUST had enough faith, he'd be healed. I could proclaim it and it would happen. God answers when we knock. I knocked... for seven years, and we had some good times, but the cycles became worse and worse. I had to stop speaking of him so highly because I would only make myself look stupid for doing so. I became deluded by his delusions. That's how it goes with abusive situations. You start to believe everything they tell you, in spite of the pit in your stomach and the feeling that there's a hand squishing your brain all the time, preventing you from believing in yourself enough to think your own thoughts. I no longer had secondary PTSD. I had PTSD of my very own.

To our son he said "You're stupid and weak." "Shut up. SHUT UP!" "You're not a boy. You're not even good enough to be a girl." "You don't deserve to eat." "You can't read." You're not my son right now." "Go sit under your mommy's apron, you little shit." "Do you need your ass beat again?" "Shut up or I'll beat the shit out of you." "You don't need more affection. You need to do right because you're TOLD to, boy! You don't need a hug! You need to be STRONG! Quit crying! STOP IT NOW or I'll smack the tears out of you!" "Shut the FUCK UP!" "Get away from me." "Go talk to someone who cares." "I want to take you hunting but your mother wants to sabotage the family."

I was property. I was never his equal. And... I sort-of liked it, because I'm submissive. My personality enjoys being controlled to an extent, so I actually thought I was doing right and was willing to continue to submit, thinking I was in God's will, praying I'd be a perfect wife eventually. His prayers? Forced. Faked. Thrust in and pulled out, like a cold speculum on a hard metal bed. I'm not afraid to be graphic. Too much information? That's imagery. It's mine. I own it. Read it or leave it.

Countless times throughout my marriage men would approach me discretely to tell me that if their wife or prospective wife was less than half of what I was, they'd be the happiest man alive. I've heard "Your husband married up," "married out of his league," "I don't know how he got you," "What do you even see in that guy?" and "Does he treat you as well as you deserve to be treated?" so many times. Each time, I'd crumble a bit more and a bit more of the mirror would shine on a part of myself I was reluctant to see. Eventually I'd wipe my hand down my cheekbone and wonder where on earth I was hiding -- without makeup. What I thought was beautiful at one point was scarcely "okay," and who I was --- was just;

Caregiver. Homemaker. Tireless worker who worked enough without pay to give everyone as much time to nap as they desired while I'd lick the dishes clean if I didn't have time to run to the store to buy a new sponge. It sounds extreme and it was. I was everything for him. I paid the bills, I sought the disability increases for the means to pay the bills, I got on my face before God when there was no way we could, and God opened doors through many people at many times. I think people had a clue, but then also had no clue. God's a protector, you know?

I "loved too much." I was the classic example of an abused, battered wife. But I was strong. My strength was hailed. I couldn't give people more than a tiny piece of what took place because I was so upbeat no one would have pegged me as anything other than a fake. But my faith never has been fake. I'm outspoken about it because the only salvation I know of, it remains. 

But, foul stench of an ex, I wiped you when you could not reach. Bathed you when you could not sit upright. I tied your shoes, I buttoned your shirt, I pulled up your pants, I held your cup so you could swallow, I clipped your nails, I shaved your beard, I took showers with you so you wouldn't fall from a blackout, I walked with my arm linked in yours no matter how angry you were perceived as being by the general public, I looked out for you when you had too much vertigo to give into your paranoia in public, I undressed and dressed and administered medications and helped you walk and listened to you talk about the darkness you hated but was all-consuming. I encouraged you the moment I saw you sink into your black house of depression again and again. I memorized Scripture so that when your faith failed you, I could offer you some solace. I looked into homeopathy because you hated how the chemicals in the VA's prescribed narcotics affected you. I scheduled my entire life around you, and you never complained about it one bit. You were happy to take it and complain when something wasn't right. When you'd have moments of giving back, you then wanted the red carpet rolled out beneath your pedicured feet, some funds set aside for new ballistic gear, and hot, steamy sex on demand. I could go on.

I did it for lost love. You had this uncanny way of making me feel dirty and then almost causing me to enjoy feeling so dirty. It must have been that smile and how you know I have a thing for strength, for height, for protection, for warm hugs and sturdy arms.But the smile faded, and your excuses multiplied, and your gave yourself over to the grave. Grace evaded you and so did God from your life. You lost your joy, you lost your hope, and you found reasons to be angry, wasteful, daring boastfully to speak of how you were always "trying." ALWAYS "trying." Never doing. Your phrases got old. 

I stuck it out but I hit my breaking point.

"Trouble and anguish have found me out, but Your commandments are my delight." -Psalm 119:143

It wasn't until the day I heard what you said that my entire world crumbled. "I am going to beat her like the Muslim bitch she is." And to think I was at home while you texted it to a trusted friend. Thank God our trusted friends are mandatory reporters!

I remembered "I promise to encourage you all the days of your life. I promise to love you. To hold you. To cherish you the way you deserve, my Queen."

You said, "I should have taken him [your own flesh and blood] out in the hospital when I had the chance."

You're a mongrel. A beast. You're despicable. I shook my head profusely at my sister's house on her couch, at my one safe place at the time, and now a month out from the finalized divorce, now I crumble. Now all I want to do is sleep. Now I smile and it's realer than real, and I laugh and it's honest and true, but I am SO broken that I am doing this all by myself. Truth be told, I have been a single mother since the day our firstborn was born, and you know it. Because you claimed to love children but then when you had your own, it was more fitting in your eyes to bruise his little face before he was a few weeks old. And yelling "shut up" seemed fatherly to you. Your son's memories of you are far from angelic. You belted him until he could not cry because he'd been screaming for too long. You had him carry weights back and forth in the back yard for 30 minutes while drilling him because he didn't tie his shoes fast enough. You threatened to take a belt to me if I stood in the way of how you disciplined him, because it was my fault he wasn't perfect, because I was a shitty wife. You bruised his back and legs so badly I had to reschedule doctor appointments. You made him stand naked in sleeting weather outside, chugging water bottles until his face turned purple. WHY?! You sat down with us twice as a family in his whole life to play games. TWICE! I don't even think he'll remember those two times unless I remind him. And he's a cute kid, too!

Do you have any idea how much time I have spent instructing him to honor his father and pray for him regardless of how mean you were? But he doesn't even ask for you because his time as "Daddy's little helper" was never had. You were home every day and while you were home, you were as good as dead. Instead of just hugging him and kissing him and building towers with blocks and painting pictures of cars and playing with worms and frogs, you told him to have a plan to kill everyone he meets. You put a seed of murder into my sweet boy's heart! Go fuck yourself, you heartless bastard. Stay away from my precious firstborn son!!! I LOVE HIM and I will work with him through his challenges and love him forever and ever! But you? You are what horror movies are made of. You did worse to him than what you complained of your own father doing to you.

And I was too afraid to report you. Shame on me. But it's reported now. To the VA. To the FBI. To CPS. To the Vet Center. To the service dog organization. To the domestic violence crisis line. To the police. It's why you have shied away from treatment and why you ran. It's why you're on the other side of the country now. It's why you know you have NOTHING to stand on and you walk around with a limp, drinking yourself stupid with whiskey and coke, talking about getting random chicks in hotel rooms. It's why you lost, son. You lost. It's why I have sole legal and physical custody of the children and you will never see them, so help me God. God served justice rather quickly and your lack of remorse speaks volumes. "My family left me," you said.

You're clueless.

I hate your sin. I hate your cold, cold heart. You claim you lost. Yes you did. What family deserves such treatment? Your fraud against national organizations screams, your desires, your lack of goals, your delusions.... what women would want you? I have friends who hate you because of what you did to me. They see the mess I'm in, and they read between the lines, and they hate you. Destroying my photography and taking 13k wasn't enough for you, was it? You had to take our firstborn's bed. You had to go and take his money out of the wallet you made for him. Vital records? You have them all, too. Everything you have is because I helped you get it, because I believed you were as disabled as you said you were. But ohh, you were clever enough to do the damage you did. Where's the worst part? You don't think you've ever been abusive. You're sick. You're fucking sick. I haven't even written everything down that you did. 

I have not figured love out, you see, because I must come to terms of how I could so quickly fall madly in love with someone only to see it become what I've just mentioned. I don't know how to wrap my head around that. I hate him. I don't understand how I can preach what I know is true, that love never fails, and know that my own did. I don't know how to explain to the Lord that I believe He dwells richly inside me but not where my marriage was. There is a massive gaping hole in my theology regarding this, and as a result, my mind and my heart are mangled. I am too afraid to approach my pastor on the issue. I need to however, and I will not let my fear get the best of me.

I am currently sour. I'm more tart than a kitten trying to poop out a lemon head. The sweet side of me is not completely destroyed, but today, and I'm not sure why today (maybe why not today is an appropriate question), is rough.

I will cling to God. He will help me. He always has, always will.

For behold, those who are far from You shall perish.

You put an end to everyone who is unfaithful to You.

But for me it is good to be near God; 

I have made the Lord God my refuge, 

that I may tell of all Your works. 

Psalm 73:27-28 ESV