Full Disclosure (True Confessions?)

Before anyone thinks that I'm trying to say I'm without fault, let me clear some things up. None of this is offered as an excuse for anything I've done that was sinful. There have been three main areas where I've been sinful. Each of these areas, I've repented and asked God and Hyde for forgiveness. I'm confident God has forgiven me. Does this mean I never slip up? No, but I quickly realize when it is happening now and act to correct it.

So, the three areas...Anger/lashing out, Respecting his Role as Leader, Keeping my Tongue under Control.

Anger: For the first five years of our 11 year marriage, I failed to keep my temper under control. I would curse and lash out physically when Hyde would refuse to talk to me or would put his hands over his ears and say things like "Blah, Blah, Blah" or "I can't hear you". Was he immature? Yes. However, that is no excuse for my behavior. It was sinful and I fully admit that. I would also threaten divorce. I never intended to follow through. Hyde called me on that fact one time about 6-7 years ago. He told me to either divorce him or stop bringing it up. I realized how childish and manipulative I was being by using this word. About 6 years ago, we began worshiping with a new congregation of Christians. For the first time in my life, I felt like I finally had found where I needed to be in my life, spiritually. (Is the congregation perfect? Of course not, it is made up of people. However, I have grown more spiritually than anywhere else. Is it just my age? Maybe? I really think this group has played a role.) I also decided it was time to go back on anti-depressants. This was also about the time that I finally found out what was causing some health issues and was able to resolve those issues. (I will discuss this in greater detail because it plays a huge role in our marriage.) All of those things resulted in being able to get my anger under control. At least with the cursing and the hitting. I bit one time too. There have only been one or two "slips" since this time and none of those have been within past four years.

Respect: A couple of months after we married, Hyde took a job with a tiny hometown newspaper. He would often be at work until 2 or 3 in the morning. I didn't like this and made it known. It was so early in our marriage and I hated being apart. (How I wish I still had those feelings.) I begged and eventually demanded that he quit this job. This was way out of line. I should have respected and trusted that he would do what was best for us as a family, even when I disagreed vehemently. He decided to go to law school later that year. I had already completed law school and passed the bar. When I was in law school, I cheated on my fiancee with my study partner. I feared Hyde would do the same to me. On my first business trip (ever!), I was in a strange city all alone and I couldn't reach Hyde. He called several hours later in a jolly mood and told me he had been out with his study group, which happened to consist entirely of women. I freaked and accused him of cheating on me. Afterward, I apologized and said there was no reason to believe he would do to me what I had done to my ex-fiancee. Shortly before finals, Hyde decided to quit law school. He says, even to this day, that I made him quit. (In reality, I begged him to at least stay through the end of the semester.) This was 1999 and I still hear about both of these things. There were plenty of other areas where I did not respect his decisions. One area was with regard to bankruptcy. Again, I'll discuss this in more detail in a minute. This respect thing is an area that I just don't know how to fix. With the previous issue, it was clearly apparent that I was no longer hitting or cussing. I struggle with how to show respect. He says stopping things is not enough. I need to show actual positive actions but won't give any suggestions. He tells me that I should just know how to show him respect. Where have all the older women gone?

Controlling Tongue - That is wrapped up in the two issues above. This is the area I struggle with the most even today. I realize I'm not alone in this but it is an area I pray about on a regular basis and strive to control.

So, I alluded to two other areas of life which commonly cause strife in a marriage...finances and sex.

Let's start with sex. (Um, discussing it, that is.) From the day we married, there has never really been a fiery passion. Things were just sort of there. Sex was painful for me and I think that played a huge part in why I was not all revved up like a newlywed should be. For five years, I went from OB/GYN, to PCP, to Psychiatrist, to Chiropractor, to seems like there were more people in there that I went to in order to find out what was causing the pain. Hyde took my lack of interest in sex as a rejection of him. No matter how many times I tried to explain that while I realized it affected him, it was not about him. He never did, and still doesn't believe me. As mentioned in an earlier post, he is still under the mindset that I would reject him today. I was desperate for an answer as to what was causing the pain. I dredged up an instance of abuse from my childhood, an instance of date rape from college and tried to work through those things with a psychiatrist. While it helped with some things in my mind, it didn't make the pain go away. Then, my PCP referred me to an allergist. (Not because of the painful sex thing but because I was always in there with sinus/allergy type issues.) I go through the testing and lo and behold I'm allergic to beef. Now, keep in mind, at this time I ate some form of beef at least 5 times a week and often more. I stopped eating beef and within just a week or two the pain vanished. However, the damage to our sexual relationship was done from his point of view. Any negative thing I ever said when I was going crazy with pain and frustration, I still hear about it. Since the physical issues were resolved, I've been the only one to initiate any type of intimacy. (Oh, this is probably way too much information, but even when I couldn't have sex sex, I was more than willing and offered repeatedly to, um, well, you know, do other things. I've never heard of a man who turned down, well, other stuff.) So, how do we go forward if one of us is living in the past? This question comes up in every area of our life.

Money issues. Ugggghhh. The night Hyde asked me to marry him, I told him he did not want to marry me. I listed all the reasons. I had a yucky past, I had had problems with sex being painful (yes, I know, I shouldn't have been having sex before marriage and I've repented of that as well), and I had a mountain of debt. As I said, I had already gone through law school and passed the bar when I met Hyde. I outlined all of the debt I had, credit card and student loans. He of course said he wanted to marry me anyway. I also brought up the issue that I had a higher education and would likely make more money than him. This had been an issue with my ex-fiancee. I was assured it would never be an issue.

Sidenote: I married Hyde 3 months and 4 days after I met him. I sometimes wonder if this marriage is my punishment for rushing into a life long commitment. I truly thought Hyde was the answer to my prayers. I had actually prayed that I would meet a man who was a gospel preacher so that I could make college students and other singles feel welcome in any congregation we ended up at.

So, here we are 11 years later and money is still a huge trigger for fights. Our views are vastly different. I think God is going to provide for us, we should help others as much as we can, and we should enjoy (within reason) the fruits of our labor. Yes, we have debt but we are not amassing more (transmission emergencies and tires aside). I've stopped shopping like crazy and charging stuff like I did early on in our marriage. I actually do without now. That was a hard lesson to learn. We've made huge dents in everything except our student loans. I feel we are so blessed. Financially, we never go without our needs being met and rarely have to do with out our wants. We are able to help out some friends of ours, both locally and overseas. How great is that? I am so thankful for the blessings we've been given. (Even if I do complain about my job and my student loans, I know that they are both blessings in their own way. Well, maybe not the loans, but the resulting education.)

Hyde's view is that we should have filed bankruptcy early on in our marriage. I had a major moral issue with this. I told him I just couldn't do it in good conscience. This is held over my head even today. We ended up going to a credit counseling agency. They actually caused us more harm than good. I'm told, still today, that we waited too long because I didn't trust him. I'm still not sure he has the best financial mind but I'm trying to trust him more. I even went along with his idea to cash all of our savings out and buy gold. I knew it was not going to work. Been there, seen that with my granddad. However, I told him to do what he thought best. We lost tons. He had no clue when to buy and when to sell back. Eventually my parents offered to put up collateral for us. Something my Grandpa (mom's dad) had done for my parents when they were early in their marriage and didn't own anything. My parents never made a single payment and we paid off a huge (seriously...HUGE, like over $40K Huge) debt in a relatively short time. Hyde holds this against me and my parents as well. So, where are we today (financially). We have one credit card with a very low balance and a personal loan from Discover. This loan covered paying off Hyde's car, the treadmill, the balance on a Discover card, and some other big item that has slipped my mind.

However, Hyde wants those debts gone. He just doesn't want to acknowledge they exist anymore. He says he can't handle it and that it is what put him in the hospital with chest pains. (If you read previous posts, you'll know that he blames TattooGate 2008 for that as well...and I remember now one other thing we paid off....Hyde's bill for his hospital visit.) What kind of world does one live in where they decide they don't want any more bills and somehow I'm supposed to just make that happen? Especially when that person will not get a full time job?

So, there is my litany of sins. I think I've covered all of them. I've repented so many times that I worry that it reveals a lack of faith on my part. It is not that I think God didn't forgive me the first time because I know I was sincere. It is just that my sin (any sin) is so ugly and there are consequences that don't go away and so I'm reminded and plead for forgiveness still. I've asked for forgiveness from God for every one of those sins and I know I'm forgiven by Him. I've asked my husband for forgiveness but he refuses. I know this puts his soul in danger. I've begged and tearfully pleaded that he think about this. I've mentioned that it would do him more good than me just in this life if he'd let go of the bitterness and hatred and forgive. He says that all I mean is that I want him to forget and act like all is fine. I mention 1 Cor. 13 and I'm called a hypocrite. I never thought marrying this man (and this family) would result in a refusal to discuss the Bible. (That is one of the things I told him about why I married him. I wanted a spiritual leader more than someone to provide for me financially. One that would lead me to Heaven. He of course has fixated on his interpretation that I don't need him.)

What now? How do I live like this? What is it teaching ShortStuff? How do I make sure I'm living righteously? I worry that my prayers must not be heard because I see no relief whatsoever. So, if my prayers are not being heard, there must be some sin preventing God from hearing them. So, I pray for my eyes to be opened to that sin and I'm not seeing anything. I have a lot of friends and family praying for me/us. I can't believe that all of their prayers are being hindered as well. I know that our time and His time are very different. I realize that part of this has to be Satan at work because I feel my faith weakening. It is not that I don't believe that God can and does answer prayers because I do believe that with all my heart. I just think I must be an unrepentant sinner whose prayer is not heard and I can't for the life of me figure out what I'm doing and that is what is weakening me. I have so many fears. I try to turn it all over to God and it works great and then BAM Hyde comes home. So, for any Christians who happen to read this, help me please. Pray that I will be shown my sins so that I can repent. Pray that Hyde will open his eyes and his heart. Pray that ShortStuff will come through this without scars. Pray for the older men and women who have failed to do their duty. Pray for the elders who do not know their flock well enough to even know our marriage is a disaster. Pray for our marriage and our souls.