A Day in the Life of a Failing Marriage

Photo attribution here.

I was only eight weeks pregnant. It was almost as soon as I knew that I also knew there were complications with the pregnancy. Spotting. Slow heart beat. Bed rest. I can't blame the baby for not sticking around. I wouldn't have. No one deserves that kind of home life. I was lying to myself about as hard as I could, but all that the stress I carried in my body was absolutely unbearable, even for me, a 27 year old woman. That's no place to keep a baby.

Before it all ended there was a night where I started bleeding. I called the emergency medical line phone number they had given me when it was confirmed that I was with child. The friendly male nurse on the other end recommended I head to the emergency room, so I did.

The Mr. came too... at least his body was there. He was playing a game where he was acting as happy as he could about the whole pregnancy thing, despite the fact that he had told me moments before I showed him the plus signs (three, just to make absolutely sure) that he was essentially on his way out of the marriage. Let it be a testament to the power of stress on a human brain that I somehow avoided allowing what he had told me before the big reveal to even compute. I couldn't believe that he would be leaving. I literally would not let myself. It's a defense mechanism used in the worst of times by the most desperate people.

When we got to the hospital, everything happened very slowly--not like a slow motion sequence of something significant-- I mean really, actually slowly. It was the middle of the night so it took hours to even get an ultrasound tech to show up. While we waited The Mr. fidget and played with the ER room equipment like a 12 year old boy despite my stress laced pleadings for him not to touch anything. When the ultrasound tech finally arrived it took an incredibly uncomfortable extended period of time with an instrument inserted in me for him to ascertain with extremely shaky hands, that the heart beat was slow and I should go home. Nothing we could do but wait.

That night I spent in the hospital I was racking every crevice of my brain to find some method of comforting myself. Ideally in this situation, of course, a woman would feel secure enough knowing her partner was there, but regardless of how hard I suppressed the knowledge that The Mr. was on his way out, my body still knew and would not allow me to relax. I suppose if a partner isn't available for emotional support then a girl might think back on her childhood--tender moments with caring parents, but either my childhood or my memory failed me that night. I could find nothing to grasp in an attempt to cling to hope and stability in the eye of the storm of the demise of my marriage--until, I remembered.

I was in my third transfer of my mission. I was with my follow-up trainer that I always called my fairy godmother. She had taken my by the hand and lead me into the mystical world of the terrifying and soul expanding life of an LDS missionary. After two transfers of her holding my hand and walking me through, I was getting transferred--to Kansas. Away from the Visitor's Center where I knew and loved 15 other sisters. Away from the house we all lived in together-- sharing stories, giant vats of lasagna and clothes. Away from the spiritual powerhouses I had come to know and love and the streets I recognized, I was being sent to an area far away with a Sister I didn't know to ride a bike in a skirt in a college town and talk to everyone about Jesus.

I cried.

I didn't just cry, I cried my eyeballs right out of their sockets. The newly formed friendships I had made there in those short months were and are life-alteringly important to me and in that moment I felt like I was leaving them behind forever. Crying like this is not uncommon for me, but crying like this in the presence of another person, for me, is almost unheard of.

My fairy godmother companion-- born and raised in Utah, runner of marathons, setter of goals, maker of plans, product of a stable home--knew what to do. You do what any good mother does when her baby cries. You sing to her.

So as I laid there and sobbed my little shortsighted eyes out in my twin sized missionary bed, this Sister, with no concern of her image or the awkwardness I felt playing the role of a child so aptly, sang me the song Que Sera Sera.

Que sera sera 
Whatever will be, will be
The future's not ours to see
Que sera sera
What will be will be

I think it was the most motherly thing that ever happened to me. It must have been, because in that dismal moment where my marriage, my life and the life of my unborn, unplanned, unprotectable child hung in the balance, that is the memory I finally found to cling to. My most salient memory of that night in the hospital is lying on a sterile bed with an IV in my arm, conscientiously monitoring my breathing in an absolutely futile attempt to abate my stress, The Mr. in my peripheral, and I'm singing myself that song.

Que sera sera
Whatever will be will be
The future's not ours to see
Que sera sera

Two nights ago I had the experience once again of sharing my marital history with a friend who had not previously been aware of it. This is a lot more common for me these days. I find sharing the story lightens the burden of carrying it for me, and so I do--much more often. The question came, of course, as it always does, "What happened?" And I had that moment again where I felt a need to justify myself. I wished again for a way to encapsulate the bitter essence of that era into an easily distributable sentence, so that everyone could have a small taste of what that time was like and no one could hold my decisions and actions against me.

But there is no easy explanation. It just was.

It was horrible.
It was traumatic.
It was emotionally scarring.
It was more painful than anything I had previously fathomed possible.

But he didn't hit me.
He didn't cheat on me.
He didn't turn to pot or porn or develop a sudden affection for Neil Patrick Harris.
He just wasn't kind, and the story above is a 6 hour glimpse into the two years that caused me to draw such a conclusion.

I'm sharing this story for two reasons.
1. I feel a need to reiterate that it is acceptable, justifiable and important to place a premium on personal wellbeing. If you have a story like the one I just told, you are entitled to seek and find higher, safer ground.
2. If you know someone who has been through it, consider the possibilities of the vast realm of experience he or she may have endured before "calling it quits". There is more than one way to hurt a person. There is more than one way to die.

Another Friend to Talk to

I suppose there are a few reasons for the lull in my writing, but the most interesting one is this: I no longer strongly identify as, "a divorced person". A quick read through these posts would help you understand how significant this is. There have most certainly been times where that was the only thing I could think of to talk about with any person who entered my life. Now... now I just feel like...

I don't know.

A woman. A student, an artist, a friend, a human. I feel funny and happy and dynamic and compelled to do important things. I feel more healthy. I feel more normal. I feel more whole, and for this, I am extremely grateful.

I am 100% certain this is becoming broken record irritating, but I want to reiterate once more how very much time helps with healing. It does get better, with time.

All that is to say... I don't actually find myself ruminating on thoughts integral to divorce recovery of late, and I think that's ok. I do want to stop in and say hello and that I hope everything is going well, and I also want to provide a link to the blog of a friend of mine. He discovered my blog one day while in the worst moments of this road we walk and reached out to me. I am very glad he did. He too has started a blog chronicling his navigation of divorced LDS waters. The bonus is that his perspective covers so many things I don't and can't. He's more mature than I am, was married a lot longer than me, he has children and therefor still has to maintain a working relationship with his ex. Also, like the majority of my readers, he doesn't have the luxury of the option to pick up and move to Hawaii in order to nurse his broken heart back to health. I highly recommend his blog, and you can access it here.

In the mean time, I'll be checking in periodically and have a few posts forming in my mind. Keep walking, my friends. I get emails regularly and know there are so many more out there who do not write. Even on this lonely path, you are not alone. We are all in this together.

Take my hand, we'll make it, I swear...

I'm in Oregon, as I occasionally am; eating ice cream, as is often the case; in a giant floral muumuu, which is a special treat bringing me inordinate amounts of joy.

I just drove from San Diego to Portland and stopped at nearly every thrift store for the entirety of that stretch. The muumuu was purchased in the last thrift store on my last day of this endeavor to collect clothing for a vintage one-layer-modest clothing line, and it will always be a treasured memento.

As for the trip, north of San Fransisco I drove almost exclusively on the 101--which is gorgeous and quirky and I highly recommend it for road tripping fodder. South of San Fran it was the 1 (or PCH) for as much as I could manage. What that means is that I basically just spent the last two weeks careening my way along rocky cliff sides overlooking a vast ocean, then popping into the redwood forrest, then hopping back out to the Oregon coast in time for sunset lit lighthouses and blustery evenings of cold noses. Oh, Oregon. You're so silly. Don't you know beaches are supposed to be warm? : )

Anyway, I just wanted to check in to say:
1. I'm alive, and quite well, thank you.
2. I haven't forgotten you, or my divorce, but...
3. 18 months divorced (oh my gosh, almost 19 months! I didn't even realize that till I looked at my calendar just now) feels pretty dang amazing.

I am pretty sure it was the 18 month mark for me where I really broke free from the captivity of my post-divorce pain processing/wallowing. I hesitate to even call it wallowing because that word has such a negative connotation and processing is highly personal in its nature and time frame--but a girl knows when she has transitioned from sincere grieving and processing and into purely unproductive wallowing. Wherever I was at 17 months, I am not there now. In all honesty I feel like a completely different person. I don't miss him. I don't hate him. I don't think about him much. I don't wonder where we went wrong or wish we had only… I don't think we could have made it work and I don't wish I had never met him. I just see what happened, and I accept it for the absolutely soul killing adventure it was.

And I see it as over.

That chapter is complete. I've tried to close the book before, force the chapter to end, but there is a difference between slamming a book shut because you are sick of reading and naturally completing the chapter. I've finished up that section of my life by living one day after another. Some might congratulate me for getting to this better place, but the truth is, all I did was keep living one day at a time. Breathe in, breathe out, repeat. Some of those breaths were laborious. Some were filled with spite and regret. Others were zoned out and disconnected, but I have accumulated enough of them now that I have arrived at nearly 19 months divorced. I did it! I existed through that time, and now, here I am in my floral muumuu eating ice cream and not thinking about how sad it is to be a divorced lady. I'm excited for what the next chapter will hold. All the foreshadowing in divorce recovery chapter seems pretty promising. I can't wait to see what is about to happen. There are so many ways the story could unfold from here.

I know this process is highly personal, but I do want to offer every reassurance I possibly can that things do get better. I remember people who had come through it telling me that and how I didn't feel like I could believe them because they seemed so healthy and lighthearted. How could they ever have experienced what I had and come out the other end like that? There was just no way in my mind that could happen. No heart could ever recover that destruction...and yet, here I am--a surprisingly lighthearted Ghost of Christmas Future, to tell you this:

Don't you give up. Don't quit! Don't you turn your back on God. We need you and the faith and fortitude you are cultivating even now in the world and the church far too desperately. My brother, Jesus, is real and He is there--for and with you. He has been the whole time, even and especially the times you couldn't and can't feel it--He is, because He loves you and He always will. He will help it get better. He won't let it stay like this forever. He loves you too damn much.

Keep your chin up. One foot in front of the other. If it's a lay in bed kind of day or week, then let it be. It won't last forever. The sun shines down eventually. Breathe in, breathe out. Repeat.

It's hard not to have sex, said the Mormon girl.

Photo attribution here. 

And that Mormon girl would be me.

*Note: as you may have guessed, this post is about sex. It's not explicit, but it is direct. If that makes you uncomfortable, you probably shouldn't read it. 

Recently I got my first ever request for a post on a particular topic: post marital sexual deactivation. This is a post I've been wanting to write for quite some time because, frankly, I love sex, and it's really hard to go from having semi-regular access to it to zilch. Second, this is something every divorcee faces but no one talks about, and by now you know how committed I am to talking about the important things that make your average Molly Mormon/Peter Priesthood squirm. On that note...

First of all, I want to kick this off my saying that I know it's, like, a thing to run around saying we feel sorry for men and their ginormous sexual appetites and how it's not their fault and it's all evolution and they have a biological need to spread their seed and all, but I just want to throw it out there that there are many, many women--LDS and otherwise-- with healthy libido, and plenty of men I've met that can either take sex or leave it. So men, you are not alone in the struggle to fly solo after your companion has jumped ship. And women, you are not weird for liking, loving, missing and/or needing sex. So when we all got this letter tucked in with out divorce decrees...

Dear no-longer-married-person, 

Don't have sex anymore. Not with your former spouse, not with your (not yet married to) "future spouse",  not by yourself, not with an elf... Do not have sex here or there. Do not have sex anywhere. 

Good luck with that. 

Love, God


...it's safe to say that men and women alike had issues.

We all have different attitudes, experiences and opinions about sex, but no matter where you fall on the spectrum, if you are recently divorced you will have to reconcile your sex life (or lack of sex life) in some way or another. We as LDS people have an interesting, complicated relationship with sexuality to begin with. We are taught to fear it, but look forward to it. We love it, but fiercely try to control it. We have rules dictating our sexual behavior a mile long and we are accountable for our actions. In fact, it is not only considered appropriate, but it's expected that our leaders will ask us probing questions about our sexual conduct at any moment. Our eternal salvation is perpetually at stake.

With that magnitude of significance and consequence lacing our biological, God given desire to procreate it's no wonder that we get spazzy about sex. As for those of us who have experienced sexual intimacy, we find ourselves in an even more complex position where we did our best to transition from forbidden to sacred and bonding (or at least just plain fun) and now, not only are our souls torn up from the dramatic shifts in our lives, stress levels high, moral compasses whacky and ideals all in question, we have the task of un-familiarizing ourselves with a notoriously relaxing, pleasurable, relieving, happy making activity we once enjoyed. Oh yeah, and we're so lonely we can't watch an insurance ad without bawling.

All that is to say, I hear you! I know. It totally sucks. I hate it, and I'm sorry. Unfortunately, this, like many other things in our lives right now, doesn't have an easy answer. God loves us, is aware of us, grieves with us and ultimately, so far as I can tell (because there really is no literature on this that I've been able to find) doesn't make any moral exceptions for us. We are commanded to be abstinent once more. That's the long and short of it.

That being said, I do have a few thoughts and tips for those of you who feel similarly to the way I do about this issue. Having made it nearly 18 months now without a gentleman caller knocking at heaven's door, this is my advice:


1. Embrace and accept it. It is what it is. No amount of suppressing, avoiding, fixating, indulging, blaming, guilting or denying will make this go away. Craving sexual intimacy is not weird, it's not wrong and while it will likely vary in intensity from time to time, it's not going to go away, and that's okay. This is a moment in time. Sometimes the best thing we can do is to step out of its way and let it happen.

2. Remember that acting on impulses will likely bring momentary relief or enjoyment, but ultimately, when that fleeting experience is complete, we are where we left off, but with less of God's Spirit. I think we can all agree, we could use as much of God's Spirit as we can get these days. Premarital sex is still (now to me, having seen first hand what the bonding power of sex can do) terrifyingly dangerous, especially in the state we're in, and pornography is a cheap counterfeit that sincerely has the capacity to dramatically distort our view of this sacred thing we crave. (Click here for a great website with more on this.) Ultimately, no matter how much emotional pain and turmoil we're in, it's just not worth it. It's just not. 

3. Closely related to #1, try not to beat yourself up about it, because things do happen. Guilt serves one purpose and one purpose only: to motivate us to change. If it's not motivational, it's just another tool in Satan's kit. Accept and love yourself, no matter what you're going through and how close you currently are to following Christ's gospel perfectly. The love of God is endless and cannot be withheld from you if you will look up.

4. Do your best not to dwell. We all have memories of the past and hopes for the future, but letting them run rampant in our minds can only bring us down. Acknowledge that there will one day again be a time and place for that, and allow your mind to be freed by any one of the following:

-Climb a tree and see what you can see.
-Dance with a child, or have her tell you a story from her imagination.
-Take up a sport or some sort of physical fitness hobby. There's more than one way to release endorphins ; )
-Look outside yourself to see the needs of those around you. Help someone in some small way.
-Read a (wholesome) book that takes you somewhere new. The library is full of cheap vacations.
-Make a bucket list and start crossing off adventures.
-Write out how you feel. Sometimes just writing it out, then chucking it will get unhelpful things out of my system.
-Make new (platonic) friends.
-Join a club - hunting, knitting, cycling, dancing, you name it. The more foreign to your regular routine the more brain capacity it takes to learn, the less brain power you have to spare for unhelpful pining.

You get the idea.

I'm not saying it's easy. Heaven knows the struggle I've had and still have with engaging fully in the present life I live. So much time missing and wishing. I am saying, however, there is a high road. In all of the deluge of confusion, pain, grief, frustration and heartache that comes with the end of a marriage, I have found that the most long lasting satisfaction comes when I do my best to take the high road. It's hard, but we can do hard things.

Keep your chin up. Like everything else it gets better with time... sort of : )

30 Things to do Before I Turn 30

The first 28 years of my life have been eventful. I've lived in 30 houses in 7 different states, attended 4 universities and a trade school, seen Paris, Mexico, Canada, visited 20 states in the US and served a mission. I've fallen madly in love a few times and had my heart brutally broken once. I've met and made better friends than any person has a right to. I've given up and tried again, discovered talents I didn't know I had, and weaknesses I didn't want to know I had.  I've worked as a teacher, pizza maker, shelf stocker, deli slave, personal assistant to a boutique owner, campus bouncer, a special needs nanny, an RA, a waitress in a tapas bar, and now a cotton candy spinner extraordinaire. I've skinny dipped, road tripped, yelled at the ocean, stared at the moon, laughed so hard I've cried and cried so hard I've had nothing left to do but laugh. I've seen vibrant rainbows, more beaches than I can count, new babies and old ladies, big cities, small towns, gorgeous countryside and trees that tower so tall and majestic that I would dare anyone to not be overcome with a sense of awe at the sight of them.

And now, I'm almost 30. I'm 29 in fact--today.

To give you just a small glimpse of what it's like to be "almost 30" and a student at an LDS university that only offers undergraduate programs I will relate the following: A couple days ago I was sitting, sketching and a guy I'd talked to a few times around campus came and sat to make chit chat. We exchanged stories  and laughs for about half an hour. By that point I'd calculated that he was probably 21 years old and I could see he was getting curious. I always ask people to guess my age when they ask and he came up with the usual guess of 23. When I, half grinning, knowingly revealed that I was just about 29 the guy hilariously half choked, then caught himself and tried to recover with, "Oh, congratulations" and a handshake. 

When a woman gets this far past the ominous, "menace to society" label she has two options. She can either bury her head in shame and spend her days pining for a man to make her an acceptable member of Mormon culture-- a wife, a mother, an adult--or-- she can fully embrace the exceptional thing it is to be so free, to know herself so well and to have so many doors open to her and enough sense to go explore them. When put that way it's hard to understand why so many of us settle for option A. 

I've decided the best way to celebrate the year twenty-nine is to cram thirty more "to do"s into my eventful twenties. They've been good to me, and when they haven't been good to me, they've taught me oceans of lessons I benefit from daily. I want to give them the fine farewell they deserve.

I have one friend I reach out to in my blackest of the black moments. She is infinitely patient, kind, positive, and gently nudges me in the best direction-- even when I don't want to hear it. She intuitively contacted me moments after The Mr. walked out of my life for good and never seems to tire of my sometimes spastic pleas for help in moments of desperation. In recent conversation about the demise of my marriage she said, "I don't feel like it was the end of something. I don't even feel like it's now a new beginning. I feel like it's the beginning. The start of your beautiful life." I feel like I am in a place in my healing where I am ready to more fully look forward. I can feel a shift in me where the healthiest thing to do for me now is to look ahead and build, and the best way I can see to do that this year is to work my way through the list I've compiled of thirty things to do before I turn thirty.

Life Goes On

Photo attribution here.

So, whoa.

Imagine a whirlwind, a tropical whirlwind that smells like plumeria and glows with never ending sunshine that heals everything that it touches. This magical whirlwind came to the San Diego airport, picked me up and lovingly set me down in the most heavenly, beautiful, perfect, healing place imaginable for me. It quickly rearranged everything in my life and then laid me down in a bed, in a dorm, on a campus in Hawaii. I now live half a mile from the ocean in a land where there is one main road that circumnavigates the entire island in a meandering, swooping motion along the beach, with a speed limit of 35mph. There is a breeze that constantly rustles the leaves of palm trees and I am serenaded by tropical birds everywhere I go. The student body is the most culturally diverse in the whole of the United States. My days are filled with art classes. My afternoons are spent working and studying--during which time, I am still in a tropical paradise. I make new friends and learn new things every day, and there's a gentleman we'll call Captain Amazing that I met the day before classes started. The first time he kissed me, there was a rainbow around the moon. Rainbow. Around. The moon. 

Life, my friends, is beautiful. 

Also, The Mr. is engaged. 

I suppose it's serendipitous (or perhaps a little more divinely orchestrated) that I should be in such a lovely place in my life when I found out this news. In fact, I was on a date with Captain Amazing who happens to be a Bio Psychology major and an advocate for the power of training the mind not to focus on things that will only hurt you. "That's so crazy! It's okay though. You'll be fine." Was all I got from him. 

When I balked at that and said, "Don't you think this is a big deal? I mean, it's totally nuts!"

He said, " I don't want you to be hurt. Thinking about it will only hurt you. Let's talk about tonight." 

And that was that. 

So, a brief recap of lessons learned from my six week hiatus from this blog:

1. Don't ever give up the search for your happy place. There is balance and beauty in the world that is yours for the cultivating. 

2. Sometimes when you think it's really, really, really important to wait one full year after your divorce to date anyone a handsome philanthropist comes along and changes your mind, and that's okay. 

3. There is no telling what your ex will do, and some of it will likely piss you off or make you crazy, there's nothing we can do about that. We most certainly can, however, choose how we respond. Choosing to cultivate healthy thought patterns and avoid rumination is a good choice. 

Upcoming posts will undoubtedly cover the blissful, terrifying madness that is trying to find the balance between protecting oneself and allowing oneself to be loved post traumatizing divorce, and more details about dealing with an ex getting remarried in all its glory. 

For today, happy sabbath, and aloha. 

To share, or not to share?

Photo attribution here.

So, the other day this thing happened. I started attending Institute here, which I've really been enjoying. The first time I walked through the doors (thank goodness I was early and the class was pretty empty) this senior couple who had served in my singles ward here three years ago was setting up the class and they totally remembered me. They walked up with slightly puzzled looks on their faces and said, "Wait, didn't you get married?"

When I was in phase one I was very, very open about my matrimonial history. One, I'm an almost absurdly open person to begin with and two, the beast that is divorce had overtaken my body, mind and soul to such an extent that it really felt like I didn't have a choice. It was the only thing in my head to talk about. No matter how uncomfortable it got I just kept opening my mouth and out would topple comments like, "Oh yeah, my husband did that too," or "Yeah, well the first time I got married I wore a vintage dress, but I don't know what I'll do for wedding number two," or, "Oh my gosh, I know. Making out is my favorite. I love it, even more than sex!" As you might imagine, this lead to many uncomfortable moments in my small, young singles ward.

During my epic road trip down here which transitioned me from phase one to two in my Get On With Life plan, I pondered extensively the pros and cons of going public with the fact that I was once married. When an LDS person finds out another LDS person has been married and divorced, it changes the way the once married person is viewed; there is no way around this. Eternal marriage is such a deeply integral aspect of our faith that, especially while one is single, everything seems to be viewed through this three part lens of married, single or divorced. Once divorce is admitted everything in the life of that person assumes a new hue.

We divorcees can feel this shift, which is why so very many of us remain silent. The righteously indignatious part of me wants to buck this system, which is another reason I was so loud mouthed about my divorce in my last ward. It's kind of a shock when people first hear it, the "D" word, but my theory was that the more people I could expose to a real live divorced Mormon, especially a devout one, the more stigma would dissipate.

However, in  order to achieve this noble aspiration, one would need to take upon herself every awkward moment she could in order to break the ice, again and again and again. In truth, I'm just not strong enough for that. Also, through my deliberation on the drive I decided such an "in your face" approach is probably not the most effective anyway to change perspectives or break the stereotype of the bitter divorced lady. Better to let a person discover the elements of me as they come and allow my divorce to be just one more layer of my fairly complex life story. In the early moments it was impossible to believe, but the truth is, I'm a lot more than my two year relationship to a man with whom I no longer speak.

Having settled on a "need to know"policy for when to speak about myself,  I have also settled on the decision to anonymize the blog. You may have noticed. Many of you know who I am and mostly I advertise this blog through facebook, but we're at about 5,500 hits now and coming up as #3 in Google search for "divorced mormon blog". I'd love to see us continue to grow. I'd also love it if we could just go with my nom de plum Imogen Frowfrow (there's a funny story here, as you can imagine) as my name. Sometimes it's hard to have strangers know your story.

As for your decisions, because you will have many to make about how much to say about what and when, here's my advice (since you so clearly asked for it). When the moment is right, do not be ashamed to admit your experience. Shame and guilt are tools of the devil if they are not motivating us to change. We cannot change what has happened, and we should not allow ourselves to be shamed because of it. Hold your head high when you speak about your divorce. It (hopefully) has changed you, ultimately for the better and brought you closer to Christ. It's an experience many of us share in silence. Sometimes breaking that silence can be a powerful and right thing to do. Also, you have every right to protect yourself, to establish boundaries, to decide how much of yourself to share and how much to keep. There is nothing wrong with giving yourself a clean slate, and in moments it will be right to stay quiet, omit, or even mislead. Your experience as a married person does not have to define you. There is more to you than this. God will let you know which moment is which.

Love

Photo attribution here

I have long been prone to bouts of melancholy. When you deal with depression people like to give you to do lists and things to try, or maybe you make the lists yourself. Being depressed is miserable, so I understand the inclination, but this pattern inevitably leads me to a place where I personify a defeated lump of guilt. I am left void of inertia and worse off knowing what I should be doing and still somehow am not. More often than not I spend my days swimming through a sea of tentative anxiety while making efforts to appear as though I am just another one of the kids with nothing more to stress about than my phone bill. This has been life so long for me I cannot discern when it first began. However, despite this component of my existence and the challenges it presents, I do pass through times of great happiness. Today I'd like to briefly describe one for you. Once upon a time I was fresh out of high school... 

Eighteen is a beautiful age. I was off on my first adventure as a newly christened adult at Southern Oregon University. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life or really much of anything about what I liked or needed or wanted or didn't want, but I didn't care. I spent my hours meandering along the streets of the charming town of Ashland, Oregon relishing in the uniqueness of the cranberry hazelnut bread I'd discovered at the local bakery, or the sun soaked beauty of Lithia Park, complete with monologuing thespians and dread locked nomads who only ate organic. I had no money, I had no car, I had no idea what life would bring, but I had a profound appreciation for the freckles God put on the skins of apples just for me. Despite the troubled waters running deep within, there remained in me a relentless wellspring of hope. 

There are times in my world of slow moving blues and greens like that year in Ashland that afford me a brand of solace and joy I believe to be uniquely mine. I cannot say I leave the sea of overwhelming emotions completely, but I have intense moments of illumination and peace, melancholy notwithstanding. In my marriage, however, that light nearly died in me. So desperate for the healing affection that I was sure The Mr. possessed in some hidden corner of his ever increasingly distant soul, I offered him piece after piece after piece of me as a sacrifice. Without him asking I would hand him this peace offering, praying that there could be some way that we could be compatible, that he could love the me I was killing off in the effort to save us.

There's a day that stands in my memory as the day of last date we attempted. Dates were always hard for us. Turns out it takes more than chemistry to enjoy an afternoon together... or evening... or dinner at home... or a birthday. He was doing some work on my car before we headed out and I'd slipped away  to the local sandwich shop. I was enjoying a lemonade and the sunlight as it shimmered through some orangey red leaves canopying my table. Somewhere in that stolen hour the realization shimmered down upon me that for the first time in quite a long time I felt just the slightest bit like myself. For long stretches of our marriage I could not see the light in the trees. Beautiful blossoming Oregon unfolding herself just for me that spring was masked in kind of a hazy smog of confusion and panic. It wasn't that I didn't want to see it. You have to believe me that it wasn't for lack of trying. More than anything I wanted things--every day things, work things, marriage things, family things--to be normal. Healthy. Just to be okay... but they weren't. That day late in September I caught a glimpse of the happiness I once could conjure up within myself, even in times of distress. It giggled up from some unknown spot in my soul, fluttered about my face, close enough to see but just out of reach, and then disappeared into the leaves. The sun began setting and the Mr. and I headed off into what would be one of the more heartbreaking days of my life. It was ending. I could no longer deny that it was ending. 

That little glimmer of happiness went to some mysterious land to hibernate, not to be disturbed through the darkest months of winter. As it did I was swallowed up in the black abyss of my existence for the next several months. There's a reason this blog didn't start in November 2012. In those early months I retreated into the darkest, most terrifyingly lonely places I hope to never see in me again. In a stupor of heartache I spent my days dragging my body from one obligation to another hoping time was passing, but too discouraged, disoriented and afraid to count days or weeks. I was half drowning in my own personal rivers of sorrow, neither able to succumb nor escape.

This is depression. This was my reality. 

The writing I do is primarily what I call "vomit up your toenails" writing. I sit down and spew out whatever thoughts have been chasing each other around my brain all day in an attempt to get some peace. As I write this post I've been asking myself what the value in it is. Doesn't the world have enough stories of soul slaughtering blackness? You will only bring people down, telling them about those days, I think to myself. But I am choosing to record this despite those thoughts. I record this for you and for me. 

While I never want to relive those days, I also don't want to forget them because the contrast they strike is so stark to the way I feel today. In those dark moments the voice inside us says, "It will always be this way. No one understands you. There is no hope." But the voice inside us is a liar sometimes. I record the pain in its blackness so that no one has to feel alone in it like I did. Some posts I write here scrape the bottom of the barrel of my capacity for levity, but today it feels right to make plain that my marriage and my divorce have sent me unwillingly through a refining process where I felt turned utterly to ash; a shadow of myself floating away and disappearing into the wind. Just as involuntary as that experience was, a new wave is crashing. It's washing away the charred remainders of my miserable failure, satiating the parched and barren wasteland of my uninhabited soul, and reviving all that's best in me, teaching me something surprisingly beautiful and comforting. 

In those incomprehensible, disorienting moments where life went for the knockout, I lost hold of what I  thought was making me good. For a season I couldn't achieve the way I used to. I spent inordinate amounts of time sleeping, crying, lying around, begrudging, loathing, sobbing, swearing, wallowing and letting go of hope. I lost the ability to prove my worth through works, only to discover when the disillusioning fog dispersed that the goodness remains. Faith without works is dead, we are told, but like a submerged buoy this goodness, with a force outside my active will, burst through the surface of my rivers of sorrow. I didn't pray it that way, I didn't exercise it into existence, I didn't bake someone a pie or ask anyone their forgiveness. Having exhausted every other option I could think of, I got so sick of myself that I made a search of the house for all the shards of my broken heart. I packed them up and I took them to my bishop. I showed him the mess I'd made and I cried and cried, not knowing what I wanted him to do about it. That beautifully imperfect man of God smiled at me and put into words the things God had been trying to tell me during all the gnashing of teeth. Though these aren't the words he used, that day my bishop taught me this truth.

That goodness, the light, the hope and the very best essence of ourselves isn't something we can make appear or force into existence. The goodness burns brighter in and after the fire. It is driven relentlessly upward to float on in the river of life past the season of sorrow to show us that life does go on, even when we can't contribute. There is no mistake we can make, no covenant we can break, no sorrow or sadness or circumstance of life that could ever make us less to our God. Through the smog, the fear, the dwindling faith and the knockouts He sees our best selves and stands anxiously awaiting the moment we are ready to embrace the glimmer of hope once more. Sometimes that wait is a long one, but He doesn't tire of it. He stands close saying, "Take all the time you need. I'm here. I'm not going anywhere and neither is my love." They say if you're not paddling forward, your floating backward, but from this moment in time all I can see is that no matter where I am in this ever changing, exquisitely beautiful river of life my God is there with me, and today that matters more. 

Somebody Looks Fabulous

Yesterday was my friend's birthday. Over the course of my early healing I have had the occasional invitation to some sort of activity that the general public considers fun, but when a chronically depressed person is also in the throws of mega grieving, social interactions can become somewhat ridiculous. The brilliant blog Hyperbole and a Half describes the experience of trying to hang out with people unaffected by such tragedy perfectly with this cartoon.

I could no longer rely on genuine emotion to generate facial expressions, and when you 

have to spend every social interaction consciously manipulating your face into 

shapes that are only approximately the right ones, alienating people is inevitable.

Because of exactly too many of the experience described above I generally find a way to eschew social interactions that require any form of genuine positive emotion displayed on my behalf. It's really best for everyone. But it was Mr. Postman's  birthday, and I love Mr. Postman. He's the husband of the girl I spent my first magic summer with, swimming endless hours in The Padre's pool, cruising around my small home town in her mama's Astro, listening to mix tapes of Weezer and The Weakerthans, sewing, painting and thrifting with the occasional round of laser tag. Her baby and I share a middle name, and this is not happenstance. Furthermore, for a reason inexplicable to me, people are always bailing on them. I couldn't flake on Mr. and Mrs. Postman. I just couldn't. 

And still, the morning of the party I woke up already inventing ways I could excuse myself from this terribly intimidating thing of going out to enjoy myself with people I love. "Maybe I could offer to watch her kids for her. That would still be nice and I wouldn't necessarily have to do any smiling... or I could just tell her I'm having a panic attack, which really isn't far from the truth. Alright. I'll simply explain that the idea of meeting a few friends for dinner and drinks is the most fear inducing concept known to my brain right now. She'll understand that. No problem. Where's my phone. I'll send her a text..."

But a text had already come. "Lady Lame Pants just canceled on us. Looks like it'll just be us 5." It's just like Lady Lame Pants to take my out off the table. Okay. I'll do it, I thought. I'll do it for Mr. Postman. 

I spent my getting ready time practicing my faces that I thought might be expected of me and doing the usual cavity search of my brain for anything I might say about myself other than, "I'm a divorced cat lady, nice to meet you." I finished tying my bandana, Rosie the Riveter style, and buttoned up the new blue polkadot shirt. Red lipstick. Last bobby pins. Deep breath. Practice smile. Well, the eyes are still stuck in sad land, but I've made a valiant effort. And out the door I went. 

The night progressed pleasantly. The practiced smiles seemed to be enough to squeak through the dinner conversation, and I lasted a full six minutes before letting some comment about my divorce slip out; possibly a new personal best. I wouldn't call it fun... what I was doing... but it was admittedly much less terrifying than I'd imagined going out into the world of the living would be. 

With dinner done we headed over to a trendy Barcade down the street. Now, a word about bars. Admittedly I am currently in the worst place to defend myself from titles like "stick in the mud", but the truth is,  I haven't really been interested in hitting a bar since I was about 21 and one day old. The thrill of surrounding myself with inebriated individuals was short lived, but tonight was Mr. Postman's birthday, so with that same sticky smile I diligently took my Shirley Temple to a Pac Man machine. The first few rounds I spent the minutes pondering the existential crisis of a society deriving joy from a deranged yellow dot chomping at other less deranged looking, smaller dots, then ultimately (in my case rather quickly) being overtaken by cartoon ghosts and dying a pseudo death, all in an attempt to get your money. Other people seemed happy though, so I mirrored that whenever it seemed like someone in our group was watching. But then something started to happen. Mr. and Mrs. Postman were playing a round of Dance Dance revolution and there was something so endearing about the way they were jumping and spinning in unison with such focus. It made me smile. A real live, from the inside smile. 

Photo attribution here.

When the barcade had served its purpose we hit the street once more to take our chances with another bar. Russian roulette lead us to a magical land where the people were smiling, the bar top was an aquarium, and the entertainment was several gentlemen in heels higher than Bob Marley and enough glitter to outfit an entire cheer squad. Yes, we'd stumbled (some of the group more literally than others) into my very first gay bar with a drag show. 

Now, a small confession here. The first boy I ever fell in love with is queerer than a two dollar bill (and still my favorite), and both he and The Mr. grow a beard in three days that could punch your dad's best beard in the face. The Mr. also rides a Harley almost exclusively. I guess you could describe my ideal man as kind of a metrosexual lumberjack, and lately I've been severely lacking in the metrosexual (or just plain homosexual) companionship department. Imagine my delight, then, as the following conversation unfolded. 

Sitting at the bar, inconspicuously sipping at my water, a tall, slender man approached me, and in a tone not unlike Jack from Will and Grace said, "So, my friend over there (who was bearded, for the record) and I are gay, and we just wanted to tell you, you are FABULOUS. We love you. We love your hair, we love your outfit, we love your lipstick. We think you are beautiful! Your whole look! You are like something off the silver screen, a 40s Starlette! We just can't get enough of you, and we thought you should know."

Now, spending time with such beautiful people as Mr. and Mrs. Postman and company, watching a fully grown black man shake his money maker in a hot pink mini and enjoying the magical experience of tropical fish swimming beneath my fingertips were all elements pushing me closer and closer to an authentic experience of happiness, but this sassy, happy, lisping doll of a man loving me up like he'd just rediscovered his favorite teddy bear was what finally put me over the edge. An authentic smile bubbled up from the belly of my sorrow and unforgivingly slapped itself across my face, bringing with it several traces of the girl I once was. The girl that laughs and smiles, sometimes for no reason, and gets out of bed in the morning without having to slay the demons of panic and despair on her way to the shower. The girl that gets pleasure out of the way sunlight looks as it filters through leaves in the afternoon, and repeating the word "elongated" in her mind over and over when she's otherwise unoccupied. The girl who can be happy.

Photo attribution here.

I made a kind of involuntary squeal noise of joy and hugged this man I'd never met. He gave me the biggest, fattest kiss, right in my ear, and disappeared into the night, leaving me glowing with a full heart, good company and the slightest recollection of what it's like to be me. 

I'm happy to say, this magical moment seems to have cracked open my crusty exterior just enough to let in some sunshine and boost me up to a place where I feel fairly prepared to get my "six months divorced" gold star and enter a new phase of healing where things are a fair bit lighter, freer, less tormented and (dare I say it?) hopeful. Now, I'm not recommending you find yourself a gay bar and wait for someone not attracted to you to hit on you, but in this documenting of my journey through the unknowable path of Mormon divorce recovery I will venture to suggest that moments of healing may come in unexpected packages, at moments you don't feel ready for them, while you're doing what you do out of love. 

See? Even this cat is sad for me.

Photo attribution here. 

Part of the reason I started this blog is because there are few things in existence scarier to the freshly traumatized mind than the unknown. In the first few weeks of my breakup (and sometimes still) all I could ask those who had boldly gone before me was, "How long does this part last?" This blog is many things. An attempt to sooth your involuntarily frantic four year old soul by providing a basic trajectory for how things may or may not play out for you, is one of them. In that light, I invite you to please look the other way while I tell you how I really feel this day, about 4 2/3 months into divorce recovery. You may want to grab a little cheese to go with this whine.

I present to you, Ten Reasons I Have a Right to Feel Sorry for Myself:

1. My bike has been sitting on my deck in a state of slight disrepair for the last 6 months. The Mr. has the tools and know how for fixing my bike. I clearly cannot purchase tools or learn to repair it myself, and therefore cannot ride my bike.  (Appropriate responses to this may include, "Poor baby", "That scoundrel!" or, "I'd be happy to come do that for you!")

2. Everywhere I go in this town that I never wanted to move to in the first place is plagued with memories of my miserable life with The Mr. 98% are awkward and/or sad. 2% are happy. Either way I'm screwed.

3. I have watched every episode of Bones, transferring any inkling of hope I had for the male species onto the character Booth. (Don't judge! It was January in the dreary Northwest!) Not only am I up to date on the series and have to wait an entire week for an episode now, but I watched an interview and David Boreanaz is inexcusably and irredeemably idiotic .  *Bonus: I just googled his name to make sure I got the spelling right and the first autofill was, "David Boreanaz affair" followed by "David Boreanaz affair texts". Really? Texts? In the words of Meg Ryan in the film French Kiss, "All men are bastards."

4. I have absolutely no hope of getting laid in the foreseeable future.

5. Not only will I not be getting laid, but my shrink has advised that I should not date for the full year following my divorce because...

6. ...divorce rates apparently actually increase from the astounding failure rate of 50% for first marriages to something like 60% of second marriages and 70% of third. (He attributes this tragedy to rebound marriages, hence the year off.)

7. While #6 is really bad enough on its own, renowned psychologist, Dr. John Gottman who's got over 25 years worth of longitudinal studies on marriage under his belt relates in his latest book that people who remain alone after ending a relationship are a bazillion times more likely to have health problems related to loneliness... and die.

8. While I was typing just now, my cat dove face first into my pineapple salsa.

9. I won't be having sex tomorrow. I also won't be having sex on Monday. Did I mention sex is my favorite?

and

10. According to my shrink I have every legitimate reason to be sad, angry and upset. This will only dissipate with time.

So here's to me passing another evening with chips, a fresh bowl of salsa and some Netflix, sans Boreanaz, I can assure you. I'll let you know when my state improves. In the mean time you just feel free to think lots of thoughts like, "That poor Frowfrow girl, she deserves to win the lottery," only I don't play the lottery, another downer. You really shouldn't waste your positive intentions like that.

Maybe month five will be better?

If you love me at all, don't call.

When we first broke up the thought that The Mr. and I would somehow stop being involved all together was so mind boggling I just refused to accept it. I told him I thought it would be helpful for us both if we could kind of check in with each other from time to time, support each other.

This was my grand idea for how to get healthy after two years of a toxic marriage, and this is why God invented therapists.

I have this friend who is, in many ways, 100 times more interesting than me, but in many other ways we're like two peas in a pod. She expressed one of my favorite similarities perfectly at a friend's wedding a while back. She had just been spilling her guts to who I think was someone's parents that she'd met ten minutes before...? I don't really know that she was sure herself. She turned to me at a break in the conversation and said, "Whatever it is that makes people afraid to open up and talk about themselves, I think I have the opposite of that."

Which is why it should come as no surprise to you that one day in therapy I asked, in a slew of angsty, concerned, frantic questions, "But, I mean, should I keep talking to him? Like, maybe we could support each other through this! Maybe it would help us both to..." I'm sure I would have continued, but Professor Rationality (Let's call my shrink that. He's so very logical.) could have knocked me over with his cocked eyebrow.

"Why would you do that?" he said, his voice kind but dry. "It's over."

And you know what? He's right.

One of the best things I've ever done is decide to cut off contact with The Mr. as much as I can manage. There's the occasional text about a lease agreement or some detail about his Harley, but it has been at least a good solid month, maybe two, since I've taken his call. I can say unequivocally that it has been a profound step in my healing.

I mention this because I know this can be a big thing for some people. To be divorced is to have a relationship with someone that is likely the most intimate relationship you've ever experienced, while simultaneously being irrefutably toxic. The dichotomy is enough to disorient you and cause you to wonder if your should trust your own judgement several times over. At this moment in time, take it from me, four months (today!) in and going strong... or not so strong... or terribly weak at times, but going nonetheless!

Don't call him (or her).

Don't call him, and don't pick up when he calls you. Don't text him, especially when you're angry, and don't respond to his bitter or pitiful texts. Don't email her. Don't page her. Don't write him a letter. Don't send the Pony Express. Even a telegraph is out of the question. In every situation that it may seem remotely feasible just say no. 

I recognize some of you out there have children and joint custody and mortgages and such to work through. My heart goes out to you for all the challenges this must present. My advice is to find the system that works best for you with the least amount of direct contact possible and stick to it. (*Side note from 8 year old me: Dear divorced parents, Communicating through children is a terrible idea. One day they're going to grow up and realize what you did. Love, a child of divorced parents who communicated through her.) There is nothing more likely to mess you up in the head than poking around in a dead marriage.

Divorce means the end. Forever. Thank God for that! Even if you don't feel like it at first, build the habit. He'll show you ways to be grateful for it.

One of the things that my mom told me that was true could be paraphrased thusly: When you fill your life with the subpar and that which does not serve you, you have no room for the magnificent or for that which brings you joy.

You can do it. Let it go. Say goodbye. Open you your life to greater possibilities. You deserve better.

Maybe you should get some...help?

For those of you out there who have heard this statement reluctantly leave the lips of your loved ones, you are not alone. There is a depth of grief that comes with certain life events that your average momma or papa bear just doesn't know what to do with. I sincerely hope you have people in your life that love you immensely and want very much to help you, and for some people that may be enough to get you to a healthier place. For those of us who have spent one too many nights rehashing the breakup with our best friend, bishop, sister or the poor, unsuspecting guy who sat next to us on a bus, there is another place to turn. We have the option of seeing a professional.

I've encountered three basic camps on this issue. 1. Camp Shrink-tastic. 2. Camp Never Can Decide-y Pants. 3. Camp I Don't Need Your Voo Doo. To the skeptic I say, okay. Don't get therapy. Everyone has to work this out in her own way. I sincerely wish you luck. To the enthusiast I say, I hope things are going well for you. The rest of this post is for group two, the as of yet  undecided on the topic. I'll write this in the way I imagine a Q&A session might go. You'll be the Q, I'll be the A. My qualifications to be A are: I have seen a shrink or two in my day. One odd, a couple totally unhelpful, one pretty good, and Professor Rationality (we'll call him) who I see now I like quite a bit. Also, I am, as an acquaintance once described me, "very opinionated".


Q: How do I find a therapist?

A: Ask your Bishop for a recommendation. He likely refers people in your ward for therapy often. If you prefer a non LDS counselor or don't want to ask your bishop, ask around or talk to your buddies, Google and Yelp.


Q: What do I look for in a therapist?

A: Decide what issues you want to work on and look for a therapist who specializes in that. If he doesn't do the work you're looking for, ask him for a referral. Also, you may prefer a male or female, LDS or non-LDS, etc. Do your research, then email or call. Feel free to ask a reasonable amount of questions before scheduling an appointment.


Q: How do I know if I found a good one?

A: This is an important question that most people don't consider. The first session should be an interview with the therapist where you ask him or her anything you want to know: where she went to school, why she chose this field, what her methods are, how she structures a session, etc. You'll need to feel you could build trust with your therapist and feel confident in her abilities to lead you on a path to healthier living. Don't be afraid to shop around 'till you find the right fit. It's important. Once you're in therapy, know that the process brings up a lot of emotions. It's not uncommon, therefore, to feel deeply after a session or to be very tired. Ultimately, however, you should feel hopeful throughout the work.


Q: How long will I have to be in therapy?

A: This one is really must be taken case by case. It depends on what you want to work out, how often you attend, what the theories of your therapist are etc. The man I see is pretty firm in his belief that therapy is one of many tools to be used for the time that it's useful. He recommends an appointment just once or twice a month and has no qualms with the idea that our sessions will likely end when I go off to school in September. This is something you will want to discuss with your therapist as early as the first interview.


Q: So, what happens when I get in there? I mean, do I lay on a couch and close my eyes and talk about my childhood while some grey haired balding man listens and writes down cryptic notes while occasionally parroting my expressions?

A: Good glory, I hope not. I have never been laying down. That would be weird. And I hate when people just parrot what I say in a validating way. How the session is structured is largely up to you and your therapist. He'll help you identify where your thinking patterns have become distorted and are causing you grief. He may have exercises for you to try (ie:writing a letter to someone who has wronged you), books for you to read, or practices for you to incorporate in your daily life to help move you through what you've been struggling with.


Q: Couldn't you just talk to your friend? Isn't it the same thing?

A: In some cases, talking to my friends has been way more helpful than seeing a shrink for me, but I happen to have phenomenal and wise friends and family who are kind, down to earth, and helpful. That being said, with the therapist I have now, I do feel like going to a session to work with him is different for these reasons.

1. I don't feel guilty burdening him with anything I'm going through.
2. It's a set time for me to "work" on important challenges regularly.
3. He's been in practice for 27 years and is very scientific in his approach. He is excellent in explaining
to me what is a normal reaction/function of the brain and/or body and what I can expect to come next. He puts things in a helpful context for me, helps me see where my upbringing or relationships were off or unhealthy. Sometimes when you've grown up in chaos or been in an unhealthy relationship for so long it can be hard to distinguish what's healthy and what's not on your own.
4. There's something about paying for something that causes one to be a little more invested, action oriented and concerned with results. I find this helpful and motivational.


Q: Isn't therapy for crazy people and sissies?

A: No. Well, I mean, actually yes. Counseling sessions can be useful for some forms of psychosis, however, all candidates for counseling need not display symptoms of psychosis or even neurosis. As for being worried about people thinking you're a sissy, that makes you a sissy much more than attending therapy. (Nipped that one in the bud, didn't we? ; )


Okay, kiddos. That's all I've got for tonight. If you think of any more shoot me an email or post in the comments below. I'll add any good ones to the list. Sleep well, and whatever you are doing to help yourself through this, I sincerely hope it's working.