Never say never

In true 'An American Tail' fashion, I've had the song "Never say never" running through my head for the last day. Yet another lesson I'm learning from all of this, and surprisingly not a bad lesson.

I can remember the day almost 5 years ago when I made my decision to turn away from my beliefs and my God. My husband had just moved out without a warning, I'd found out he'd been cheating on me, and I'd just gone through a pretty emotionally heavy miscarriage of our child. I sat on the tile floor in our bathroom, looking around at all his things gone. I could see into our walk in closet and his clothes were no longer occupying his side of it. The tile floor was cold, and yet I didn't mind it. It was there that I lost it and wept and screamed and ached in a way I never had until that day.

I remember yelling out my questions, "Why God? What did I do to deserve this? WHY do you keep taking the men I love away from me before I am ready??" Over and over, it went through my head and a few times on my lips. My kids were at daycare, I had called in sick for the day. And after an hour of sobbing and being on my knees, I wiped my tears away. I looked up at the ceiling as if to see through the sheet rock and roof, to find that God that I had so diligently spent my life yearning to find. And I called out and let Him know that if He forced me to make a choice, I'd choose love. Not His love, but the love of the man I so desperately craved and needed. Just recalling this moment, still brings back tears. I can feel it as if it were yesterday. And I stood up and I vowed that I would never call Him my God ever again and that I would never step foot in that church building where I had been abandoned.

You see, my family and I were members at a wonderful congregation. A loving and open one, vastly different from the one I grew up in, but with the same teachings and ground beliefs. We'd been members for about three years and settled in. But upon finding out about my husband's affairs, I had grown distant, less faithfully attending worship and doubting everything. When my spouse left and served me with divorce proceedings, I had expected the support of these people I'd shared the last three years with and instead the eldership in explicit terms let me know that my husband's emotional affairs were not enough for grounds for divorce and that it was my job to fix my marriage. Cast out, left with no where to turn is how I felt. And humiliated. They knew what my spouse had been doing to me, and I felt they were judging me for not being a good enough wife and not understanding the brevity of the situation because I knew in my heart there had been a physical affair, I'd just not been able to get my spouse to own up to it. And so faced with being disfellowshipped, I withdrew my membership and walked away from the faith of my youth and never looked back. I was not going to be held to a belief and blame that I knew was not one I was meant to burden.

About 10 months later the spouse and I worked things out and moved back in together, we would attend other churches from time to time, but it was too raw for my heart and soul. I could barely make it through a song service without the wounds being ripped open and the tears streaming down my face. I found excuses not to go, I found new beliefs that filled the gaping hole in my heart . . .the beliefs of not knowing what I believed in anymore. I was content and ok, but never truly happy. And then I realized why I'd walked away so quickly from my church. I had grown tired of pretending to be someone I wasn't. I knew all along that my spouse did not love me in a Godly way or even in a healthy way, and being around people who shared that love was too hard for me. I couldn't go back, when I knew we still weren't loving in a healthy and true manner.

And then this happened. When my STBX announced to me that the first affair had happened months into our marriage and was a month long physical affair, I was immediately tinged with relief. I had been right, my gut and heart had known it despite my pleadings with the elders of the congregation . . . I hadn't been heard, but I'd known this man I had joined my life with. And then I was sad, sad because I had made the wrong decision. I had chosen the love of a man who would never ever be able to give it to me in a way that I deserved and that was healthy and whole. I had chosen the wrong love.

And so for the last month my father has been gently pushing and asking me to come to church. My initial response was, "Not a chance in hell dad, I will never step foot back into that building, it is too painful". And yet he kept asking, never being forceful or calling me to the mat, just gently inviting me as I allowed him and my mother to take my two girls to worship and classes. And finally, this weekend I made the choice to walk away from the love of this man who has harmed me in so many ways. I realized that as scary as it is to realize I may never be loved, it is a lot better than staying in a love that is unhealthy and bad for me. I chose to love myself over the need to be loved, and with that my heart was ripped wide open in a new way. Not a painful way, but one where I once again find myself open to the person I use to be. The good and gentle and open soul that I was when I first found God to be a belief I chose. And so last night, I did something I said I never would. I went back to that church.

As I was driving there, I kept saying over and over in my head how stupid this was. "J, you're walking RIGHT into the lion's den. Are you glutton for punishment?" I knew that they could call me to the mat for walking away, for choosing to live a life outside of religion. I feared the elders would corner me and take me for a talk, like a child who has broken the rules. I thought for sure I was going to bolt, puke or pass out when I walked over the threshold of the building and instead pasted a smile on my face, though I know my head was not as high as I usually carry it.

And instead, God taught me yet another lesson. A lesson of forgiveness and protection. We all know the story of Daniel in the lion's den, how he goes in with these meat eating beasts as punishment for praying to his God. He prayed and found solice and protection in his God. And during the singing and lesson, I prayed. I prayed that the couples around me, lovingly holding hands wouldn't hurt my heart. That the elders wouldn't use me as a lesson to others. That God would see how traumatized and in pieces my heart was and to please go gently on me. And He did. Every single person that came up to me gave me a hug, told me how glad they were to see me and greeted me with an open heart. Many commented on my beautiful son and how he looked just like the girls' had at this age. And a few of the elders specifically sought me out (I could tell my dad had told them I'd be coming) and shook my hand, looked me in the eyes and said how happy they were that I was there. One in particular said to me as he held my hand, "I'm so glad to see you here J, though I'm very sorry for the circumstances you're going through". And that simple statement has led me to tears off and on through the day. Good tears. Tears of grace and relief. They know, they are going gently and they aren't demanding anything of me that I cannot give yet. They are giving me time and I need it. And it is a wake up call that I am going through this in a self chosen path of being alone, whereas I need support and true friendship and love during this time in my life.

A few of my old friends came up and hugged me and said hello. Asked how I was, to which I gave the typical, "I'm good" response. One who didn't know what was going on unknowingly shook me to the core as she asked how STBX was and if he was off to war yet. I explained he wouldn't be deploying for another 2 years, but was away on travel. I didn't have it in me to blurt out the initial response that was on my lips of "He and I are separated, you won't be seeing him here or with me and we are getting a divorce because he cheated on me repeatedly for 9 years". I know it will come out, I know it will be painful . . .more so the looks of pity I'll receive which is typical when people find out what happened. But in the meantime, I'm taking it slow and just thankful for the sense of peace that I left with last night.

Peace, it's what I seek most in my life right now even more so then love. And the peace that surrounds my heart, soul and mind today has been something I've not had for a few months and desperately needed. And it is guiding me through the day. This peace has me realizing that I will go on, I will make it through this. I will still hurt but I will heal, no wound is unfixable except that of death. And I'm not dying. So for now, I'm just holding to this peace and accepting that this is my new life. No point to wishing for another life or being bitter that life has dealt this hand to me, because in it i'm getting lessons that clearly I've never learned before. I'm learning how to choose a healthy love, a love from a God that I had let go when I thought my spouse's love was more important. This is the part of life where I grow up and I model to my children that our own hearts' are much more important than the heart of another when they hurt you with it. And I'm learning to never, say never.