Tag Archives: grief

One More Rant Before I’m Finished With These People

Posted on by Standard 16

This week, I had a conversation that left me annoyed and wondering why it is always poor people that threaten to get their lawyers

Yep. He still tries occasionally.

Yep. He still tries occasionally.

right on your butt. Chef’s girlfriend doesn’t seem to be the sharpest knife in the drawer, and now I’m getting an idea where she gets her weird ability to blame HER affair with my husband on ME. You are probably as sick of this subject as I am, but bear with me through one final rant about the insanity that my life was a few months ago. Call this a mental health post, if you will.

T’s mother, B, is just as appalled as I am that her daughter took up with a married man ( who is older than she is), and about once every two weeks, she tries to call me. I never answer her calls because really, what is there to say? I don’t want to chat with my husband’s girlfriend’s mother. Plus, I can never really follow what the woman is trying to say, except that she blames this whole sordid mess on Chef, and gives her daughter every excuse in the book for it not being her fault, including blaming their affair on me. What the h…….?

Here’s the thing. T is 29, as of yesterday. She is a Christian, and knew that what she was doing was wrong. Chef is to blame, but so is she. They’ve had a rather public thing going on since at least February of this year. That was long before I knew about it. That’s all I have to say about the matter. However, I don’t really understand why, but B somehow thinks that some of this crap her daughter has pulled is my fault too, and I just don’t want to hear it. This week, she cleverly restricted her number and called me looking for Chef’s phone number. I use my cell number for work, so I have no choice but to answer numbers during the day that I don’t recognize, and to say I was less than thrilled to hear from her is an understatement. She rattled on, and I hung up.

Later in the week,  she (T’s mom) sent me a text saying she forgives me and my family for everything. What??? I texted her back asking what that meant. Why should she be forgiving me? She told me to go to my husband’s house and try being nice to him from now on, and then he would take me back. She insisted that my problem was that I wasn’t appreciating my family enough. Seriously?

Wow. This is him in a nutshell.

Remind me again…why do I want him back?

Listen. I tried everything when all of this was blowing up. I tried being nice, understanding, and supportive. I tried being mean, angry, and insulting. I tried every emotion in the book, and guess what? Nothing worked because the one thing I wouldn’t do was let him have all my money to use on drugs. And since that is what T is doing now, I have no chance of “winning” him back. He has exactly what is important to him, and it wasn’t important to him who provided him with what he wanted. He isn’t in love with T; he’s said pretty insulting things about her when she got a little perturbed with him about his conduct. He isn’t in love with me, either. He wants his drugs. Period.

Why would I want to reconcile now? He has chosen a course in his life that doesn’t work for me. I don’t want to be an addict, nor do I want to be married to one. I don’t want to always be worrying about where my next fix will come from, or deal with him when he is in the throes of the same worry. I don’t want to have to move from place to place because I don’t pay my bills. I don’t want to take care of someone who won’t work. I don’t want to take care of someone who doesn’t want to get well. So, I haven’t tried to get him back lately,  because if we couldn’t succeed in this relationship when he kind of cared about it, we certainly won’t make it now that he’s obliterated any trust I can ever have in him. The time of Chef and Bird is just over, and I’m making a new life for myself. I would like the people from my old life to stop calling me. Enough. It is over.

To say I feel total forgiveness for T and her family would be a big, fat lie. I’m really humiliated and embarrassed by a woman carrying on behind my back with my husband. I’m embarrassed by the lies he told her about me, and I’m really rather appalled that T thinks that somehow she can write her scriptures and testimony of undying love for the Lord on Facebook while flaunting her adulterous union with my husband to everyone around her. Somehow, she has justified her position in her own head, and I have no choice but to accept that. I struggle less with forgiving Chef…I consider him sick. Plus, I have loved that guy for decades. But to have this person he cheated with send me apology texts that try to justify her position by making me a poor wife is sometimes a bit too hard to take. Having her mom do it for her is enough to make my brain bleed. I will eventually move into complete forgiveness, but these random texts aren’t helping. Leave me alone.

There is always room for improvement in any marriage, and I am no exception. But it is a pure falsehood to say that I deserved my divorcehusband’s infidelity. No where in the Bible does it give a man permission to cheat on his wife, no matter what she is or isn’t doing. Ask Hosea. I’ll have to live the rest of my life with the parts of this I’ve done wrong, but I’m not going to fold up and die, and I’m not going to  make you feel better by accepting that some random adult woman couldn’t help herself from cheating with Chef because I was neglecting his needs. Nope. That isn’t what happened at all. I neglected to feed his drug habit, and she didn’t. She wins in this losing game right now, but I’m winning in the overall battle each day I don’t have to deal with all the pain and worry that comes from living with an addict who can’t shake his addiction. I am sad for Chef, and I want him to get the help he needs, but  I think if I’ve proven one thing in all of this, it is that you can’t help someone who just doesn’t want to be helped. Chef has to want to get clean. He just doesn’t right now. Period. Should he die of his use at this point, I don’t need to feel guilty. The question is, should you? Ignoring a bad habit such as this one is dangerous. How will you feel if he dies? Gets arrested? Goes to prison? These are the questions that would haunt me continually when we were still together, and I unfortunately don’t have the talent of laying my blame on other people. I own my own guilt, and those were the  problems that would haunt me all the time. Even now, I know I would struggle with the “what if’s” should something happen to him, but I also know that I waged one hell of a battle against all of this happening to both of us, and I have that to fall back on. It’s just out of my hands, now.

When I got sick of B’s texts, I finally wrote her a rather chastising one of my own about her daughter being the one who needs to be asking forgiveness, along with some angry referrals to some of her other messages to me (all without profanity, I’d like to note), and I got a call from T’s dad. Of course, I didn’t answer, but his message informed me that I needed to not be texting B or he’d call his lawyer. My first reaction was to be angry. I didn’t open up this dialogue! Then I started chuckling because it seems to me that it is always people who can’t afford a loaf of bread that throw around lawyer threats. Remember, I had to lend this family $500 to pay their rent, but now he’s going to pay a lawyer to make me not reply to texts that his wife sends me? Oh please. I wish I had enough money to afford a phone that blocks phone numbers. Forget lawyers. I have quite a list of numbers I’d like to never hear from again. Still, the threat was ludicrous, and I finally just turned the stupid phone off and enjoyed the rest of my day.

I know the T Family follows my blog, obviously for other reasons than what most people do, so I want them to know that I don’t want to hear from them. What is done is done. If you think this is my fault, suck it up. I don’t agree. I’m not going to help put Chef in prison so your daughter has to come home. I’m not going to apologize for not being nice to him and trying to win him back. The man, and your kid, are your problem now. Stop writing/calling me. And oh, please! Spare me your lawyer threats! I can’t believe you even bothered with that! It would mean so much more if I didn’t have the fourteen messages from B on my phone!!!! Are you kidding me??

Anyways, I’m sick of talking about this crap, so I’ll write another post later about how you meet love connections in the most random of places… :-) I have a date tonight, so I’m outta here! Have a nice Sunday afternoon!

– Bird

Why Do I Write In This Blog?

Posted on by Standard 41

One of my readers, whose site I really enjoy, wrote a somewhat chastising message about my blog being a downer. And I took the day to really think about what he had said, and it led me to the question — Why do I write  this blog?

The answer isn’t completely cut and dry. For instance, when I began writing this blog, it was mainly for my kid’s entertainment and because my husband’s problem left me alone a lot, and I just wanted something to do. Then, when people started showing up here, and then sticking around, I was writing about different, funny things that had happened in my life. I myself love to laugh, and when things in my life are stable and good, I laugh all the time. But, as things in my life got harder and harder, I used this blog to vent, rage, and grieve. Have you ever tried to write something entertaining and funny when you don’t feel it? It doesn’t work, and always falls flat. It seemed though, that the more truth I wrote, even if it was shadowed by the pain and anger of what was going on in my life, the more people seemed to be able to relate, and wanted to share their stories as well. Everyone has a story, and most of us live through something that is hard. Most of us don’t belong to the Noodle Salad Club.

I agree with the comment that my blog has become somewhat hard to read, even for myself, and I am going to try to get back to writing about happier things. Believe it or not, I’m thinking that isn’t going to be all that hard any more. I’ve had a couple of really good days, and though I am still living in a precarious, unstable place in my life, I’m starting to find things to laugh about again. I no longer fear answering my phone, or shiver at every knock on the hotel door. I don’t have any idea what two weeks from now is going to look like, but I have a peace about it anyways. God hasn’t let me down at any point during this whole mess, and I’m kind of excited to see what He’s going to do for my family and me next.

My brother Ernie brought my two cats, Milo and Sebastian, back to me, and I live in a hotel room with two adult kids, two dogs, two cats, and me. I feel like the captain of a warped Noah’s ark. Sebastian, the Siamese cat, is still trying to figure out when the rich family is coming to get him…He’s so stuck up! We spend a lot of time in here, and we’ve actually developed a routine that I’m starting to feel comfortable in.

So, I do apologize for the sad turn that this site has taken, but I won’t apologize for writing the truth about what  is going on in my life, because in the end, this blog has been a catalyst into understanding myself, my feelings about all of this, and a record of each lesson I’m learning through all of this. If it is entertaining or helpful to others, that is a bonus to me, but if it is too much for people to read, I completely understand them walking away. I certainly wish I could have walked away from this whole rotten year…. :-)

Hopefully, tomorrow I can write about some of the dorky things that we do around here to keep ourselves busy, and I hope that you all won’t give up on me just yet. I appreciate all of the people who take the time to return, and frankly, you made my little trip through hell bearable. I do love you all very much!

– Catherine

Ceasing From Anger; Forsaking Wrath; Waiting on the Lord

Posted on by Standard 30

Today, I woke up very, very sad….again. I’ve been doing better, and it is my thought that some of that was this moat of anger that I’d put up around my

Better days.

heart for the last week or so. I, like my son, have always held out this tiny bit of hope that Chef would hit such a rock bottom, that he would be moved to at least truly apologize for all that he has done to this family, and takes some steps in the right direction to prove to us we were important enough to him to try to help us heal. Maybe not reconcile, but at least show some emotion that would say he felt bad about the pain he has inflicted on not just me, but his children as well. We kept expecting the old Chef to suddenly wake up somewhere in there and be horrified by all that he has been saying and doing. My girls didn’t hold out that hope at all, and for some reason, they seem better for it. It is like they’ve accepted that the old Chef is gone, and this new one is not one they care to know. But DJ and I just seem stuck. I would give my right arm to feel like the girls do, but while I’m healing up and feeling better most days, I have mornings like this one where I am very sad all over again. Chef used to write me love letters and I keep finding them all around me. Words that once made my heart sing now just mock me. They are everywhere! Stuck in my bible, in my briefcase, even in boxes of stuff that I packed up in a hurry to leave the house.

I cried out to the Lord today, asking Him how long can this go on? Yes, I’m usually feeling better, but days like this feel like set-backs to me. And I feel somewhat ashamed that he has moved on from me so easily, ashamed that I’ve been so easily manipulated by him all these many months, and yet I’m still stuck in this mire of grief that I can’t seem to get out of. He called the police on my precious daughter Rebekkah– not because she threatened him at all, but because he couldn’t get her to be manipulated into his point of view and he will go to any lengths to not hear the truth. And you’ve gotten to know Rebekkah through this blog….she calls it the way she sees it, and she is not easily intimidated.  Many, many times, I’ve heard the wisdom of Jesus come from her mouth, and she is not a good one to talk to if you aren’t willing to hear the truth. She is 100% the most honest person I’ve ever met…Ever. She can not be manipulated from her course. She is steadfast, and this has always caused a problem between her and Chef. Chef’s girlfriend, T, was once Rebekkah’s friend, and they had talked for hours about the Lord, so Rebekkah felt betrayed by this girl too, and she wasn’t shy about pointing out that T spent her whole life going to Christian schools and church 5 days a week, and seemed to have gleaned nothing from it. Trust me. If I ever do something this destructive and sinful, Rebekkah is someone I’d avoid at all cost… :-) Chef went to the lengths of calling the police to have her removed because he did not want to hear what she had to say.

And yet, as protective as I am about my children, I still can’t thrust this man completely from my heart.

I’ve now seen him with his new girlfriend, calling her some of the same sweet names he used to call me, protecting her , and it feels so betraying and twisted because he was the same way about me, and yet, here I am, still crying over all of this. I guess I feel foolish because I believed him all these years, and yet he kept none of his promises to me. I don’t trust easily, and I did trust him. I believed him. I planned all of my future dreams around this person, and it was just all a big lie. My spirit feels crushed all over again.

So, I picked up my bible after crying my heart out, and this is the scripture that I read.  I know most people don’t like to read whole long scriptures, but I think it is important you try to read every word.

“Do not fret because of evildoers, 

Be not envious towards wrongdoers.

For they will wither quickly like the grass and fade like the green herb.

Trust in the Lord and do good; Dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness.

Delight yourself in the Lord; And He will give you the desires of your heart.

Commit your way to the Lord, Trust also in Him, and He will do it.

He will bring forth your righteousness as the light and your judgment as the noonday.

Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him; Do not fret because of him who prospers in his way, because

of the man who carries out wicked schemes.

Cease from anger and forsake wrath; Do not fret; it leads only to evildoing.

For evildoers will be cut off, but those who wait for the Lord, they will inherit the land.

Yet a little while and the wicked man will be no more; and you will look carefully for his place and he will not be there.

But the humble will inherit the land and will delight themselves in abundant prosperity.

The wicked plots against the righteous and gnashes at him with his teeth. 

The Lord laughs at him, for He sees his day is coming.

The wicked have drawn the sword and bent their bow to cast down the afflicted and the needy,

To slay those who are upright in conduct.

Their sword will enter their own heart,  and their bows will be broken.

Better is the little of the righteous than the abundance of many wicked.

For the arms of the wicked will be broken, but the Lord sustains the righteous.

The Lord knows the days of the blameless, and their inheritance will be forever.

They will not be ashamed in the time of evil, and in the days of famine they will have abundance.

But the wicked will perish; and the enemies of the Lord will be like the glory of the pastures, They vanish —

like smoke they vanish away.

The wicked borrows and does not pay back, but the righteous is gracious and gives.

For those blessed by Him will inherit the land, but those cursed by Him will be cut off.

The steps of a man are established by the Lord, And He delights in his way.

When he falls, he shall not be hurled headlong, because the Lord is the One who holds his hand. 

I have been young and now I am old, yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken or his descendants begging bread.

All day long he is gracious and lends, and his descendants are a blessing.

Depart from evil and do good, so you will abide forever.

For the Lord loves justice and does not forsake His godly ones; They are preserved forever, 

But the descendants of the wicked will be cut off.

The righteous will inherit the land and dwell in it forever.

The mouth of the righteous utters wisdom, and his tongue speaks justice.

The law of his God is in his heart; His steps do not slip.

The wicked spies upon the righteous and seeks to kill him.

The Lord will not leave him in his hand or let him be condemned when he is judged.

Wait for the Lord and keep His way, And He will exalt you to 

inherit the land; when the wicked are cut off, you will see it.

I have seen a wicked, violent man spreading himself like a luxuriant tree in its native soil.

Then he passed away, and lo, he was no more;

I sought for him, but he could not be found.

Mark the blameless man, and behold the upright;

For the man of peace will have a posterity.

But transgressors will be altogether destroyed;

The posterity of the wicked will be cut off.

But the salvation of the righteous is from the Lord;

He is their strength in time of trouble, The Lord helps them

and delivers them; 

He delivers them from the wicked and saves them, because they take refuge in Him.”

Psalm 37

I guess lately, I’ve been fretting and envious because I don’t have a lover to comfort me or tell me that I’m innocent, or that I didn’t deserve all of this to happen, or blah blah blah…I’ve been lonely for my husband for a year now, and yet he has someone he lies in their arms and is comforted. I know that sounds self-pity-ish, but it is just the truth. I’ve been with this man almost my entire adult life, and now, I have a whole different kind of life, and I don’t feel safe or stable in it. I always feel a little afraid. I get moments where I could use a man telling me  he thinks I’m pretty, or smart, or a good mother, or that he is going to make everything okay. These are things Chef once did for me, and now does for someone else. Talk about painful!

I know that people say make Jesus your husband now, but frankly, I don’t really know how one would go about doing that. Jesus is my Lord, and I do know that every single time I’ve needed something, He has provided it. I do trust He has all of this under control. But for right now, He can’t hold me physically. He can’t wipe away these tears with His hands, or stroke my hair and comfort me. He does wrap my heart in peace and comfort at times, but I miss sitting across from someone I know cares about me and telling a funny story, hearing about his day, or talking about the kids when they were little, and all the myriad of beautiful things people who have been happily married for decades talk about.

Today, I’ve cried already, and now I’m going to go on with my day. Life marches on, and time stands still for no man, except Joshua..once, but I’m thinking I’m not ranking with him. :-) But, this blog helps me to sort out how I feel and to put into words the sorrow that I still feel over this loss, and I appreciate that people care to listen, encourage, pray, and support me and my family — and even Chef.

Thank you for that.

– Catherine

How I Make It Rain In Tulsa

Posted on by Standard 34

I have a lot of things in my life to praise God for. I have my precious children. I have my absolute best friend in the world, Audra. I have my brother Ernie and his girlfriend, Diane.  I have those wives that keep checking up on me…I love all of you!!  I have a large network of people praying for me and encouraging me through this disaster area I call a life right now, both on-line and in person. I can only wallow in self-pity so long because in comparison with other people going through similar circumstances, I’m very, very fortunate.

I don’t know what men go through that triggers this weird need to destroy everything they’ve worked for in order to start all over again. I’m not sure I even want to anymore. But, as the jilted wife, I can tell you, this blows. Last night, I thought I was coming out of my skin. I knew he was being unfaithful all along, but to have tangible proof in hand is a hard pill to swallow. And poor Rebekkah…seriously, what were the odds we’d end up at THAT bar?? The poor girl felt horrible.

I think I needed to see that letter. It was painful, but now I can move on. He obviously has.

This morning, I’m peaceful and calm. It is simply over. I feel like David when he was praying that his and Bathsheba‘s son wouldn’t die. He dressed in sackcloth, and weeped, begging God to save his child. But when the child died, he got up, cleaned himself off, and broke his fast. It freaked everyone around him out, but I get it. The marriage is just over, over, over. Why weep and cry for it now?

I’d apologize for my little freak-out post, but I don’t think I need to. Sometimes, honesty is just so uncomfortable. If just one husband ever reads what this does to his wife, the pain that is seared right into our souls, and decides not to act on his own fleshly desires, it’ll be worth it. Same goes for wives. We shouldn’t be hurting one another.

I called Audra last night, and while we talked, I finally gave up the last vestige of hope. I’ve been grieving a person who simply doesn’t exist anymore. The things that Chef has said and done over the last year are just the opposite of what my husband would ever have done. The fact that he gets some joy out of hurting me is enough for me to walk away. Hurting people is never in God’s plan for us. We are supposed to treat each other as we would want to be treated. No one wants to be cheated on, lied to, or left behind.

He has set down a path that I don’t want to be on anyways. I may be dealing with hard emotions right now, but I can look myself in the eye in the mirror. My conscience isn’t clouded by adultery, lying, or secrets. I have given in to fear and anger a few times, and I’ve apologized to the Lord for those things. But, something in my spirit knows that the Lord knew how much this hurt me, and I feel His mercy every time I turn around. He is probably sadder about all of this than I am, if that is possible!

If satan could have planned this all better, I just don’t know how. That the girl is a proclaiming Christian is just a smack in my face. The bigger slap is that I gave this girl money last year to pay her rent. I have this thank you note written in the exact same handwriting that this love letter to my husband is written in, and it makes me feel grieved that she somehow thinks God will bless what she and my husband are trying to build. But, as angry and hurt as this makes me feel, I’m choosing to forgive both of them. I don’t want to walk in their shoes. My husband destroyed our marriage, and who he did it with is irrelevant. So, even though I don’t feel it at all, I’m choosing to forgive both of them.

On another note: All you Tulsans, I would like to point out that each time I’ve thrown my husband out, we have gotten rain in Tulsa. In fact, only those particular days have we gotten one drop of rain!!  Last night, I threw the man out of my heart, and we got a nice little thunderstorm. Weird coincidence? I think not.

–bird

The Conclusion I Didn’t Want To Come To

Posted on by Standard 103

I haven’t written in a while. It is hard to write when your heart is so heavy, but at the same time, I feel like I’ve started a story on here and I owe people a conclusion.

Things had seemed to be going so much better for the last month, but I was being fooled, yet again. Satan landed the fatal blow on my relationship this week, and as I type this, my heart is well and truly broken completely.

Most people in the world have experienced some sort of heart-break, and I know I’m not writing about something unique. But sitting here, with an inventory of all the dreams I had harbored about the future that included Chef, knowing full well that those dreams won’t be coming true, it is hard not to feel like the only soul left in the whole world. It is hard to be so centered around another human for 21 years only to have that rug pulled out from beneath you. Now, everywhere that I look, there seems to be a painful reminder that this chapter is over. In fact, the whole book is finished, and now it seems I need to begin writing a new one. I just flat don’t feel excited about a new life. There is a lot of grief in giving up this relationship.

I’m refusing to allow myself to become bitter, though it would be easy to hate him right now. But bitterness is a bad seed, and it infects not only the person that has justifiable reasons to be bitter, but everyone in their life as well.  Instead, I’m trying to praise the Lord through my tears, knowing that He is collecting these tokens of my pain in a jar in heaven. No, satan. I am not angry at God, nor will I curse Him…ever. Instead, I’m praying that God mercifully grant me some comfort. He has already answered some prayers about my finances, as Chef left me with a mountain of financial problems right now. A very good friend I met on here who is going through something similar has been a very compassionate ear for me to cry into to. I do so appreciate you, Victoria.

Every time I cry out, Jesus is there to lend me hand, helping me to cope with the grief of a torn soul. But, as with any other wounds, it takes time to heal, and now I just need to make it through each day, second by second, until the pain eases to a manageable level. Why does time always drip by so slowly when we feel like this? It seems kind of cruel to me.

I just ask that you all pray for me.  I feel lonely, sad, hurt, betrayed, and afraid. Talk to me, sisters and brothers.

– Bird