When the Scorpion Stings

When the Scorpion Stings

When the Scorpion Stings

Laurinda McLean

© 2020, Laurinda McLean

ISBN: 978-1-7360489-0-0 Library of Congress Control Number: 2020949572

The views expressed are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organization, employer, or company. Assumptions made in the analysis are not a reflection of any entity other than the author.

“Anguish too excruciating to murmur through parched lips…

Searing ache ripping at your tender heart.

Would that I could…

Meet you in it….”

L. McLean

My humble attempt to meet you in it…

Contents

Preface

1

3

Dear Trespasser...and You know who you are

The Sting

5

Aftershocks

41

Lessons

49

Final Note

59

Preface

There are untold reasons for writing down what has transpired in the past. Sometimes the specifics are retold in a factual manner or the details may be metamorphosed into a story. The telling can be to soothe the writer as they finally grasp that it is at last in the past (isn’t that where we want to leave our dragons?) or to communicate what we can’t find the words for by ourselves, to offer us another chapter of perhaps a familiar story, to comfort us when we feel alone and when we question if we are alone in feeling whatever it is that is hitting us, to strengthen us for each day and to empty our hearts of what has happened, at least, for the moment. Stories allow us to get away from loneliness by hiding between the pages, entertain us with intrigue, introduce perspective into our own ugly situations, express anger that we are too afraid to breathe and, maybe, even offer a freedom to the person reading to get outside of their world for a moment, to step 1

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into someone else’s footprints and the shadows of their path.

Stories are what brings the past to light, possibly makes it easier to face the future, and what often validates us where we are at the moment. Stories may be sign-posts, guides back to freedom, illumination in an empty place and may provide closure. Learn from them, emulate the good, and pray for a “happy ever-after”.

You have, in front of you, a gilded invitation to listen in on a story of sadness and heartbreak expressed here in the form of a letter. Not a gentle story. It is actually a one-sided conversation where the writer is often angry. If you find a fragment you can relate to, or an emotion you have sensed burning in you but at last find articulated on these pages, then I’ll be glad. Above all, I anticipate you will find bravery, strength and the joy of unearthing answers for yourself. I can, however, promise you that it is ugly.

Yet telling it is very crucial, as critical as it is to scrape away the lifeless surface from a wound in order to allow sun and wind and healing to enter. I must tell it. Unsealing my lips will be my healing!

The memories locked in my mind sometimes threaten my own sanity. Once they are voiced, I’ll be finished with them, I hope. I’ve already been held back in my personal growth of who I was meant to be, it has handicapped me in various areas of emotional maturity, occupied my dreams with the agony of betrayal and strangled the vision in me. Like a drowning person gasping for breath, I am straining towards the surface of this ocean of hurt, straining towards a haven of life. I am covered with scars, some fragile wounds remain, bitterness rages in my mind at times and I have had counseling and prayer. I know that I know that I am being re-fashioned into much, much more, moment by moment, as I wait in this place. The years of abuse, mentally and emotionally, can be miraculously mended at once but the Lord knows that I won’t believe in the healing unless time goes by as I daily learn to walk it out.

But, for this moment…as the memories empty out, listen. 

Dear Trespasser . . . and You know who you are,

Believe me when I say that I don’t miss you. I don’t miss anything about you! I don’t even miss the moments that I thought were good. I don’t miss the supposed exhilaration of your life that swept me along. I don’t miss the way you only thought of yourself 100% of the time—your endless exaggeration, or should we just be honest—the lies and stories you constantly told. Then there was how you bought the most expensive things for yourself ($250.00 sweaters and $1,000.00 fishing poles!) and doled out bits of money for me to grocery shop with or to buy for the kids. I don’t miss your irrational, red-hot, anger and unbelievable self-centeredness or the embarrassment of your uncaring and callousness.

I don’t miss your eyes trailing after other women that crossed your line of sight or your verbal abuse over my weight and the close scrutinizing of every bite I took, nor the criticism of the way I dressed and styled my hair. It was all outward appearance 3

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with you. I don’t miss being hungry. So hungry on many levels to the point of starvation, physically and emotionally.

I don’t miss the cover-up game we all had to play to keep your sin hidden over and over again and to make us appear normal as a family and an ever-loving couple, smiling and smiling. As a matter of fact, one that many looked up to wishing they could be like us in their marriage! The inspiring sermons you bestowed in the pulpit on all who would listen in rapt silence or the enthralling Bible studies yet the opposite side of you that would come out when the crowds went home. The mooning over mindless love songs and withdrawal from me when you were having your allconsuming affairs.

Your deceit, cunning tears, and cowardice are now behind a bolted door but the bruises echo in my memories and surface when I least want or expect them. I long for closure, I want a Finale score to play, a culmination, I want the curtain to fall and the words “THE END” to play across the multi-faceted screen of my mind. I want a beginning to that ending for me. Cue the orchestra! 

The Sting

I was born to love and love passionately, to value others above myself and I believed that when I was fortunate enough to fall in-love that I would be loved in return with a matching devotion. I waited my whole life to find the One and I was so sure that, conversely, I would be the answer to Someone’s dreams and hopes for a Love that would last till eternity.

When I met you, I believed I heard the voice of God saying that I should marry you. It “seemed” like a very clear message.

Now, I am not sure, however. I recognize that the Lord often takes our blunders and redeems them, if we ask Him. My life is a witness to that truth being born out over and over. A constant redemption of blindness.

I was a simple young woman who had fallen for a young man and believed that you would be my knight in shining armor.

After 21 years of marriage, I had come to find out that you truly 5

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were a “night” of a very different kind and meaning, a very long and often a shadowy, tempestuous night.

As early as I can remember, my thoughts were only of being a wife and mother; that is all I ever yearned for! It was my focus which grew stronger as I matured. My dreams and hopes were centered around a home with little ones playing and a marriage that would stay true into old age. Quite ideal but I had plenty of examples of my dream lived out in reality and knew it was possible.

By graduation time from my boarding school, I was not one of the ones playing with decks of college applications, agonizing over which one to shoot for, no, I was the one who was wondering who I would marry one day and with whom I would have a family.

I never did well in school and maybe it is because my mind was not on it but my heart’s cry was for something else. I didn’t see the point in pursuing a degree or a broader education. I knew I had all I needed for devotion to a family. I did take a year after high school for Bible school in England which is a separate story.

Following my time at Bible school and still not sure which direction my life would take, I made the decision to go back home for a year with the intent and anticipation of helping in the work to which my parents had dedicated their lives. Truthfully, I would have been content to stay in my childhood home for the remainder of my life but that was not going to be. Perhaps I hoped it would turn out that way and that is part of the reason I returned.

Going home, I was startled by your presence there! A young, fervent, single man on his first mission. You were so devoted to the Lord’s work and you were burning bright.

Our romance progressed rapidly and we were married six months later. On our wedding day, it was pouring rain and a few things went wrong but that didn’t matter to two love-birds. We stood in front of a Pastor, my father, encircled by loved ones we had known all our lives, in a church with vibrant stained glass windows and vowed to each other, our commitment and fidelity.

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Fast forward to twenty-one years later, in comparison to the day of our wedding, this, for me, was a true beginning and a final ending. You and I had just stood in front of a judge to divide what was not meant to be divided unless death took one of us. You observed the process as you smiled and chit-chatted with your lawyer and I sat frozen while it all unfolded. The cold eyes of the judge and your lawyer smiling pierced into my soul along with the half-smirk on your face. You later tried to tell me that you “just didn’t know how to act”! No, you never did, not properly!

Our wedding day it had rained, wet with rice…this day, groups of clouds danced across a crystal clear sky of blue, a blinding brightness enveloped me and a weight was gently lifted from my shoulders as I stepped out of the court house doors into the sunshine. I could finally breathe freely and I gulped the air in through my tears. It was all almost too much for me to handle.

Looking back over the years, I find I am amazed—although I don’t know why I should be—at all the astounding ways you came up with to deceive. Even when you were in a situation that didn’t require deception! I was not entirely innocent of the world but innocent enough to not question or doubt, innocent enough to take you at your word, to hope that I was as precious to you as you were to me. Furthermore, I trusted you!

I grew up outside the borders of the United States and, having grown up in a place where the roles of men and women were very clearly defined, had defined me as well on many levels.

A man planted the corn, patched the thatched roof on the house, hunted and gathered. The wife bore the numerous children and bore the death of some of those babies, arose very early to stir the coals and bring to life a fire to boil the black beans, then make the corn tortillas, prepare food for the man to take with him when he went to the fields, sweep the dirt floor of the hut, fitting in time to carry water from the river in a clay jug on her back or firewood

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from scouring the forest, bundled neatly on her back. Some jobs were shared but most were very gender specific with the wife’s place firmly under the thumb of the man, eyes averted, ten paces behind, and not an equal partner but subject to the man and, above all, obedient.

When we met, I know that was one side of me that truly intrigued you. Would I stay that servant-like? What did that mean for you in the coming years? Oh, I know, my thin legs, long hair and shyness attracted you and the fact that I did not fawn all over you, as other women had and still did, peaked your curiosity. I was something to be dominated and taken, to be possessed and used, this far outweighed anything else in your mind. You didn’t have to work too hard at it because of your magnetism. I was quite content with my role until reality hit me!

I fell in love with you because I believed you were what I had hoped for and that you felt the same for me. I assumed that the way I would be treated would prove your love for me as a well-chosen help-mate. In reality, what you felt was a reinforced appreciation for yourself mirrored in my eyes as I, figuratively, walked my ten paces behind.

Our courtship was too short, six months from first date to walking down the aisle—something I would never encourage any­ one to do. How can you know a person in that amount of time?

There are vital things one should learn about a perspective mate before getting involved in extensively planning a life together.

I neglected to be concerned about how you acted in varying situations and surroundings. I had not seen you interact with your family or others outside of our small mission group, had not seen what you were like for any length of time to see what kind of respect you demonstrated to others, whether in action or verbally. Could you be civil, self-controlled no matter your emotions, were you aware of when you did wrong and did you realize it and apologize, could you be vulnerable and open or did

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you hide behind a mask? You could keep the real you hidden for quite a while, I learned.

Your mother and uncle visited for a short time during which you spent much of the time showing them the tourist sites. She was pleasant enough to me, but we weren’t as certain of where our relationship was headed at that point, so there was no reason for her to feel threatened by me. Threatened by someone who might take her son away as she would, six months later, scream angrily.

Your father also visited, on his own, as your parents had been divorced. He made my skin crawl. Overly attentive to the opposite sex and overly eager to welcome me as your new girlfriend but not averse to talking about your “old” girlfriends. Bringing up sub­ jects that I was uncomfortable with were just some of the traits that made me guarded and insecure around him. You tolerated the one parent and idolized this one and you walked in the footsteps of the one you idolized.

Your best-friend and my mother felt we were rushing into things. They did all they could to dissuade us. Typical of two young people who feel they have a “deeper” understanding of their relationship, we pooed-pooed them, asserting that they didn’t comprehend the depth of the love we shared. I know now that they understood very well and with much more wisdom than either of us thought or imagined.

Would I have not married you had I been given time to see you in your element? Perhaps. I would like to think I would have been more perceptive but obviously I wasn’t. If I had only correlated the way your father acted towards me and his attitudes towards women in general with the deep admiration you held for him, I would have run in the other direction. Had I had eyes to perceive your veiled contempt for your mother, I might have wondered what your attitude was towards all women. Or had I had eyes to see the blind admiration mirrored in every woman’s eyes that had known you or even met you for the first time, old

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and young, I might have questioned the reason. I might have decided it was not anything of which I wanted to be a part. And had I given weight to your speech, I would have listened closer to the voice in my own head.

Leading up to the wedding, we stayed some of the time with your dad and some with your mom. What an education that was and I failed it miserably! No one tells you that it is okay to leave a relationship that is stripping your soul and consuming you with fear.

I remember, like it was yesterday, your dad’s colorful de­ scrip­ tion of how “stacked” one of your old girlfriends was, “Remember…?”, during a conversation the two of you were having one evening. So unfamiliar with slang like that, I had to ask you what he meant. I was shocked that this was commonplace to talk in this way!

You never stopped him or reminded him that you were now engaged and would rather show respect for me by NOT discussing past relationships in that crude way. No, you entered in with gusto and made me feel like I was in a shadow-boxing match with old loves. But, my choice was, even then, to stay. I was sure that I could change anything in you that could be a concern.

No one should ever think they can change another person! Never rest on that idea!

There were many flags and signs along the way—some bla­ tant and others more insidious. The other side of loyalty is that you can have a hard time realizing when it is time to let go. Loyalty is a two-sided coin. I’ve been learning along the way that the most precious thing in my life is me because, without knowing who I am in Christ and valuing myself, I can’t love or prize anyone else.

I kept pushing away those things that should have made me stop in my tracks. Things that were horrific but how stubborn I can be in the name of loyalty.

Your mother’s deep aversion for me and your reaction to her should have been a signal. Instead you kept insisting that

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she throw a bridal shower for me, of all things! The shower she very grudgingly threw for me had all her embittered single friends attending. No one I knew was there though one aunt on your mother’s side kept reaching over to pat my hand. She had an idea of what I was feeling apparently. The others surreptitiously mocked me and boldly ridiculed the institution of marriage, while I meekly opened up gifts that were things they “just found around the house to wrap,” their whispered words exactly. Odd gifts of a bright orange and yellow plastic key chain such as the type children make at camp, knee high socks with a screen print of a romantic scene on them, a single Tupperware bowl and lid, plastic salt and pepper shakers, and a strange mish mash of items designed not to celebrate but to spring clean their homes.

It is ridiculous now but, at the time, to a young lady who should have been excited at upcoming nuptials, all I felt was humiliation. The final gift I opened was a white lacy negligee and I know I turned crimson while all of them were starring hungrily at me. The symbolism of it was almost more than they could handle in their barren lives. That charade of a shower being over, your mother went back to ignoring, belittling me in a veiled manner and keeping silent when I would speak to her.

I can see now that the relationship you had with each of your parents was so tainted by co-dependency, selfishness, ego, and sin that it was impossible to have anyone else attempt to relate on healthy terms—that should have been another turning point but I stubbornly excused it all and just knew it would get better…that we would have the restored life that they had lost and their issues would not touch us. However, one should always remember that you not only marry the person but their families, in many ways, with all the present, future, and past expectations that come with that.

Then the ever-growing jealousy I began to sense as I noted the looks of yearning you aimed at other women. Your eyes were

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always roving for someone to look at. The seeds of jealousy that were imbedded only grew over time with roots so gnarled and deep that it took me years to even hope to be able to overcome them and left me with feelings I am still haunted by today. Such feelings of inadequacy and worthlessness!

I was bullied into acquiescing to the truth that I was some sort of evil individual if I could have such suspicions of you.

Yet, every time we were out in public, you shot veiled glances at other women and girls. At your home church, I encountered old girlfriends, heard supposedly uproarious stories of your antics shared by women of all ages and how charming my soon-to-be husband was. Even one girl tearfully told me how she had wanted to marry you for so long and “I guess I won’t get to now!” I always felt tangled up with emotions during these times as you joined in remembering things with the women and laughing uproariously.

Wish I had seen that even then I was only a prop in your theatrical life-play.

From these intervals of jealousy, the fighting began and became more and more volatile, one that concluded with a bad purple-bluish bruise on my upper arm which we explained away to friends as a result of falling clumsily into the dresser in the bedroom—classic! I was so embarrassed and felt disgraced! That was the one and only time you struck me though and I wonder sometimes if you scared yourself that you could be that out of control. Not because you felt badly for me but it was a chink in your otherwise self-righteous, flawless armor.

These arguments ended in the same way every single time with me pleading for forgiveness for being so “bad” and, you, your repetitive, haughty statements that you would never do anything like cheat on me. It is very prudent to be wary of someone who is self-righteously emphatic about something that they would “never” do and, especially, if they get angry when they are telling you so. If you had said those words and been loving

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and demonstrated that you had no intentions of crossing those lines, I could have believed you—possibly.

Over time things degraded and you began to say that if I persisted in suspecting you of doing anything or “kept up” with the “accusations” then you just might go ahead and do what I was fearing! After all, if that is what I was accusing you of doing, why shouldn’t you just go ahead and do whatever it was I thought you were doing—emotional rape! Shifting the blame on to me as though I was pressuring you to engage in adultery and betrayal only added more dread and insecurity to my heart and mind. As hard as I tried I couldn’t do anything to control my suspicions!

And how could I have. I know now that those suspicions were rooted in a reality and the seeds were disseminated by you. The reality of which I watched daily unfold as you were constantly lusting and wanting and fantasizing and, before long, you did begin to live it out.

I wonder, why did you not ever consider fighting for our relationship? Fighting for ME?! Why? Because, I believe, you never had fought for anything but for yourself and your wants.

You were willing to do anything to get what you wanted but to step outside of yourself? No, it was not worth it for you, the payoff would not be what you were ruthlessly pursuing.

You were cruel and, over time, the primary reason you gave me for your perpetual need for attention from other women was that I was overweight. Mind you, I was having babies, in between losing and gaining from that and the emotions we played ping-pong with and the food I drowned those emotions with. Secondly, I didn’t express my love for you enough, I should dress like other women if I loved you, my hair should be different, if I cared I would try to look like so-and-so. You would actually name other women! So that every time I was around these other women whom you had mentioned, I knew where your mind was and had to work at measuring up. It was constantly a game of

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comparisons that always left me out of breath and blown about, a tag-along that did not measure up—quite honestly, let’s face it, I would never measure up…at least not in your eyes.

The endless equating filled me with disgust and fury for other women whether I knew that person or not. I constantly was in a rivalry with every other female, and my expectations were met. Well, they were met if the other woman or women fit your fantasies and the bulk of them did in one way or another. I used to pray we would be surrounded by overweight, dumpy women, as they were the ones you reminded me turned you off, then I could pretend to feel better than them for the moment.

The bigger issue is that lust is birthed in the mind and I could not compete with your mind games. I was preoccupied by trying to be who you wanted me to be say nothing of getting into your head and preempting your acting out of fantasies or attempting to do so.

Patterns of desperation began to play themselves out in our marriage. Pulling and pushing against your dictatorial ways, my low self-esteem and doormat-spirit growing, the jealousy mushrooming and taking over my life, the emotional and verbal abuse. It all slowly began to unravel behind the scenes though always sporting a beaming smile. Such a sham!

I became used to the cover-up, the excuses I had to manu­ facture to family and friends for why you were acting a certain way—“He’s been working so hard lately with that project”—when in reality you were spending hours with your mistress. Or—“He hasn’t been feeling very good or getting enough sleep”—because you hadn’t gotten home till very late the night before, and it became a part of me to desperately lie to keep some semblance of family and loving couple. I splintered into pieces!

My days were devoted to making sure you didn’t have to lift a finger for anything and your “give me” attitude consumed all and everyone. You were that way when we married and I did my

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best to satisfy and make sure nothing shook your world. What a mistake! I was very familiar with the ripping anger and words that would assault me if there was any change in your world.

Always cowering in the face of your anger! Every wish granted; every whim met.

I maintained to myself that you were the love of my life and that all your wickedness was just the way you were (shoulder shrug), that it would be okay someday, that you would eventually truly love me, that you would soften, so I thought. Surely!

As my heart shattered, I kept telling myself that it would turn out okay if I just could work a little harder to make you happy, lose a few more pounds, fulfill any wish or desire that you might have and never, EVER let my guard down. I had developed a list of no-noes, you see, subjects that should not be brought up to you, attitudes that I better not display and actions that should not be manifested. The times I forgot The List, I had to deal with yelling and being ignored by you so I tried very hard not to cross the line. My servitude knew no bounds and I was unwavering in that it didn’t matter if I vanished as a person as long as you were contented. That was the only way I could exist. I fooled myself into believing that when I had sacrificed enough and done what you asked on every level then you would be willing to finally love me back. If I would only perfect being a wife then things would get better. I wonder what I envisioned would be the tipping point for you? My days and nights were consumed with giving you your way and desperately hoping one day it would finally be enough. It never, ever was! Like a spoiled child, you only got more demanding, more strategic in your ambivalence towards me and life went on merrily for you. The cycle was set in place.

You maintained that you loved me “enough” and I was the woman you chose to marry but that it was the suc­cessive disap­ pointments in me that drove you to search for love in others which resulted in a long line of women trailing through our marriage.

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Your words were blows upon blows on my heart! Can a heart truly break, physically? I believe it can because mine did.

One example of my overwhelming attentiveness to your whims is when you would take countless fishing trips. I would get up as early as 3:00 am to cook a full breakfast of eggs, bacon, toast, making sure you left for the day with homemade coffee cake, a thermos full of coffee, drinks, and sandwiches or fried chicken to hold you over for the day. Everything had to be flawless for you down to the last tiny detail! When that was the way things were going, you would act pleased and I interpreted your pleasure as love.

When I learned that I was pregnant for the first time, you gave the impression that you were ecstatic and I do think you were genuinely happy; I would never take that away from any one of our children. You loved each of them more than you had loved anyone before. That is as much as you were capable of loving anyone else. They still had to ‘fit’ into your do’s and don’ts and not bother you. It’s funny though how, in your love, there was always a lack as wide and as deep as the Grand Canyon. Love is not genuine when it is given to satisfy yourself, when it is poured out as a show. Make a note of that for the future, please!

My joy knew no bounds as this completed the other dream I had had for my life—outside of being married—to have children.

It was a soul-deep longing I had lived with since I was a child when I was inseparable from my dollies. To have it fulfilled was an answer to my deepest prayers. Then a second and a third baby and I was equally elated each time. There was life brought back into mine by their births.

But your indiscretions didn’t miss a beat. A look, a comment here or there under your breath meant for only a certain person’s ears, a lingering to talk, and your lust kept playing out in very real heartbreaking ways, growing more and more flagrant. The examples began to multiply.

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Then, we moved to an exquisite land of never-ending springtime and flowers, mountain lakes and beauty. It was a land of promise and we spent nine wonderful years there.

But, when a certain person was around, explosions of suspicion would overtake my mind and heart. I found that she began to be around more and more. I walked into your office one day and there she was. She turned up everywhere, especially, wherever you were. She was a man’s dream, flawless body shape with seductive curves, heart-shaped face and beautiful form, long dark brown, almost black, hair, very stylish with mini-skirts, large eyes, everything you always argued with me that I should be. I firmly believe she embodied your fantasies.

She was tutoring you in the language, you said, but, oddly enough, the “class time” seemed to take long hours behind closed doors making you late to meals and to coming home. Sometimes missing meals altogether with the “urgent need” to complete a task at work and/or study on Saturdays, and odd hours. Your ability in the language was not bad anyway but the studying began to take up large chunks of time.

With great persistence, you insisted I should get to know her and be the best of friends because “She is so sweet!” I believe your objective was that by accepting her as my friend, I would be relieving some of your guilt in a strangely warped way as though I was giving you permission, as though I was complicit in your sin.

Buried under an extremely low sense of my own self-worth, specifically where my outward beauty was concerned, I was very reluctant to be friends but you forced it. Complicating my inner image-pain was that I was now carrying our third child, swelling with baby and pregnancy weight, feeling the tug of weakness and exhaustion that accompanies one, along with two other little ones vying for attention and care. I did not want to be seen around this woman much less be friends!! Since you laughed when I said anything along these lines, you may have enjoyed seeing my anxiety at the thought of it!

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One day, you came home from work in the middle of the day saying that she was sick and how nice it would be of me to do something thoughtful for her. I dutifully bagged up one of my prized possessions—magazines. I thoroughly enjoyed magazines and I did not give them up easily but you were going to go see her and would give her the bag along with the get-well card I had written—also forced. No, I didn’t need to go with you since it would be a quick visit. What a joke, and another lie! Your visit was a lengthy one—longer than it should take to drop off a few magazines and a card to a supposedly sick person.

Shortly after that, you insisted on inviting her and her husband over for dinner one night. Yup, she was married with a beautiful, curly haired, “just like her mommy”, two-year old child.

The pretense being that we should not only have couple-friends in the English-speaking community but also in the local one.

Naturally, under other circumstances, that would have been a viable argument. Her husband and I were incidental guests while the two of you were the stars of the show. Dinner was cooked on the grill and I completed the tasty meal to be washed down by your lust.

I have a crystal-clear memory of the very moment that in between a bite of one thing and another a thought flashed into my brain, “They are having an affair!” It screamed through my soul and broke me apart. I don’t know what cues I picked up on, or even what happened the rest of the evening, but I felt cold as ice in that instant and my breath being measured within me, with metronome precision, and sticking in my throat with each inhale.

I moved mechanically through the rest of the evening acting as the outwardly attentive wife and hostess while inside of me a hurricane raged.

After they left, I burst out with a question which I don’t even remember forming. Neither do I know what I said when it ended up coming out of my mouth. It was met with your violent

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anger and there we were, nothing solved and once again having to swallow the bitterness and frustration. Thereafter followed many, many nights of quarreling, you swearing nothing was going on, me, hiding in the back yard under the vine branches, weeping.

I would whisper into my tear-stained hands how much I hated you and then immediately feel such a fear as not to be imagined wondering what I would do without you if I ever lost you. I was on the bank account but knew very little about it as you handled everything, not on the credit cards. All financial decisions were made by you. It was as though I would not survive without you being there to take care of me. If I had only been tougher inside, I would have packed up the kids and left you. I wish I whad been, but I wasn’t and my weakness would amass a high price for many years to follow.

I was very near my delivery date with our youngest when you, oh, so sweetly, asked if you could bring her to lunch and “we could have a nice little meal together.” By “asking” I mean you basically told me and asked me to agree with it. By now, you had transitioned our old maid out of the house (maids were cultural) and had her mom moved in so, naturally, any cooking would be done by her and shouldn’t create any extra strain on me, you said, faking concern for my state of pregnancy. You were always a king of manipulation and, by the end of the conversation had me convinced, almost, that this was going to be a furthering of my supposed friendship with the woman and be a delightful break to my day!

After all, I reasoned in disillusionment, that if you wanted me a part of this, it must mean that I meant more to you than she did, and for some reason, that thought made me feel like it was enough. I am wondering now why I swallowed your lies so easily?

Or, so seemingly easily. The reason was that I so badly wanted you to discover you loved me, finally.

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But picture this, the three of us cozily sat around our dining room table, sun streaming through the upper windows of the living/dining room area in our house. We ate amid ridiculous, fri­ volous conversation and forced laughter. To this day, I still don’t know how I got through it! Fortunately, it was a quick lunch and then you both got up and left.

Besides the ludicrous lunch and my heart break, there was also the mortification of her mother watching the three of us eating a lunch she’d prepared and pretending the whole time that everything was as it should be—a sweet couple having a lady over for lunch and nothing else. How is it that the participants in a situation can all know the truth but all play the game? Her mother knew, I knew, and you both very much knew, and it was a meal dined at the feet of greedy lust and twistedness. How full of yourself do you have to be to bring your mistress to your home for lunch? With your wife?! Your swagger and self-centeredness pursued the prey and I and our family were just the roadkill.

I remember standing on my tiptoes at the high window in the kitchen straining to watch from behind the curtain as you both walked out to the car. In that moment, you did something you had never, ever done for me, you opened the car door for her.

You did it for her then you both drove off and you returned home late—again. It was beginning to be fodder for a country western song, if it could have been taken so lightly.

My baby was born and you were not giving up on your affair. All the joy that comes with a newborn life was eclipsed by your obsession over this woman. Two weeks after the birth, it happened to be our anniversary. I was recovering from a C-section along with taking care of a precious newborn and two very active preschoolers. You were gone all that day to work and you weren’t home yet even though it was well past the time work usually ended. Concerned, I had called your office to see if you were there and whoever answered the phone stated that you had gone home

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earlier that afternoon. Huh, oddly enough—YOU WEREN’T AT HOME! It was a rainy, stormy, thunder and lightning, sort of evening and I was not very much concerned for your safety anymore but more for your whereabouts. How I thought that having a newborn in the home would make you act any differently is beyond me!

If this had been at a time when you carried a cell phone, that would have been my next choice but, in the midst of my state of healing, all I could do was to wait while my imagination ran and my certainty grew.

I knew deep down where you were but still ached for an alter­native reasons for your absence. Remembering how “happy” we used to be, I had written a card to you for our anniversary that very day and left it there on your pillow. I mechanically, and in pain from my incision, went through the process of getting the kids ready for bed following dinner.

As I am writing this I am wondering, what if something had happened and one of us needed something that required a vehicle? Or, my stitches had come loose and I needed to get to the emergency room? Or, something much simpler than that had come up? Let’s say—just for instance—your family SIMPLY wanted you around?! You had the only car we owned and, with no way of getting hold of you, we were basically stranded. What an extremely, intolerably selfish man! You left your family in such circumstances and went to satisfy yourself in the arms of another man’s wife. You sick, sick person!!

Do I sound angry? I am and it is a shame that we aren’t, as humans, covered with see-through skin so that each of us could see the other’s inner thoughts and bents and intentions. Such a thin layer of opaqueness separates us and behind that is a world of blood pumping, tissue, organs, heart, emotions, and life so that the true honesty is really only between yourself and you. You were a master at playacting!

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It was late when you finally got home that night, well past 10:00 pm. I remember I was sitting in the rocking chair quietly crying, children tucked in bed, and sleeping by then. You saw me and theatrically crumpled to your knees and sobbed in my lap. I saw this pattern repeat itself whenever your indiscretions got the best of you which translated means that you had just left another woman’s bed—always with tears, on your knees. At first, I suppose, you hoped it would make everything all right and, after a while I think you just began, in your pride, to believe that I couldn’t see past your tears. They didn’t fool me. I knew where you were and you knew that I knew but I let it go, once again. I think that affair lasted a year and a half, maybe?

You finally had a trace of repentance and talked with a college friend, then our Pastor and we had some counseling and things seemed to become a bit better. A key thing, however, should have been for you to admit that you had the affair to me, but you never did till many years later. Just a “flirtation”, the suspicion on my part and the insecurity, again, on my part, had brought us to this place. I think her husband also found out and may have threatened you because you seemed a bit edgy for a few months while staying close to home.

Your promises of changing, of seeing the value of our marriage and me, in particular, as your wife, etc., etc., melted into your usual belligerence, fussiness and critical attitude, though you gave the impression of trying to be more of what a husband should be and, in turn, more of what a father should be. It was always a surface demonstration of change and not inward or lasting.

I wasted so much time in a sleep-walk from the games you played! And, yes, I can taste the bitterness that these memories bring up in me because I had to battle with every ounce of my being to even be able to put one foot in front of another—say nothing of playing with the kids and keeping their world on an even keel.

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Jealousy was, by now, my constant companion, and I was tormented by distrust and uncertainties all the time and, all the while, in a schizophrenic state of acting like a loving wife. By now, I was burnt badly and I knew that there was not ever going to come a time when I would trust you fully. Besides, you “just couldn’t believe” that you had gotten so caught up in a mere flirtation!

“Oh, dearie-dear!” was your attitude. Why did I trust anything you said? But I tried to or fooled myself into thinking that I did.

It was a long time before I really found out the truth of what happened between the two of you even though I knew all along. I needed to hear it from your lips. I have my own idea on affairs and lusting and that is this: when the prize is claimed, absorbed and consumed, it quickly sickens the ones involved, in the very way too much candy makes one reel with headache and stomach ache. It may have been a combination of that and a slight opening of your eyes to what you were at risk to lose. I don’t know, but it ended, it ended with me still wondering if it had been consummated or was it just a flirtation? I was like a weeble, wobbling between did he or didn’t he, until years later when I found out the truth.

At that point in my life, I was naïve and believed that the actual sexual act would be the ultimate betrayal. But, I now know that the heart is where the evil is birthed and, after that, it doesn’t matter whether you are wearing a wedding ring, sleeping with someone, or believe you have fallen in-love with someone other than your spouse because the ultimate turning point happens in the heart when you decide to take a second look and when making the decision to pursue your lusts. You didn’t hold yourself back from your cravings and you were wearing your wedding band the whole time.

Life continued on and my physical state kept “being” fat. I bring that up repetitively because it was your biggest conflict with me, seemingly. Or, at least, that is to what our confrontations always went back. Why wouldn’t I watch what I was eating? Why

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didn’t I care about you? You couldn’t fault me where cooking was concerned, I made everything to your liking. That included re-making things like the tuna fish sandwich once. The bread happened to be toasted just a smidge past your liking and you demanded that I remake it. Outwardly, I loved you without fault, putting up with unending situations of embarrassment and being mortified, making apologies along the way. I played my part very well.

Now, looking at pictures of me back then I was often very thin and sometimes deathly thin. That didn’t make a difference in how you saw me. Your constant criticism of what I was eating, how much, suggestions to put the fork down, unending remarks under your breath, curtailing what I ordered when we went out to eat, most embarrassing were the times when we would go out to eat and you and the rest of our friends would order delicious desserts. Under your breath, you would hiss that I couldn’t get anything. Such humiliation, then lying that I just couldn’t hold another bite! What was it your father used to say in the great pursuit of thinness? “Just stop bending your elbow!” A very key thing for him in his women and, huh, funny thing for you also!

I consequently became very sneaky and often ate like a crazy person when you weren’t around. I snuck food all the time but then would starve myself at other times so it wouldn’t show. For an example, one week when you took a trip, I ate beef and cabbage soup the whole week and had lost quite a bit of weight by the time you returned home. I was hoping to surprise and please you.

Then when I finally got a car to drive myself around , rather than waiting for you to take me places, you have no idea how many trips to the quaint little restaurant, the Switzerland, I made. Chocolate crepes, mocha malts, hot fudge sundaes and so much more. It was a wonderful little corner where a person could get anything from soup to ice cream and, primarily, chocolate in any form.

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Always the underlying hope that you would notice. You sometimes did for a passing moment but it didn’t change you towards me. My poor body was fluctuating all the time and aching for nourishment but you never saw me! I certainly did not fully realize that then.

A huge part of the tragedy of this story was that I never saw what I was doing to myself for your sake, how I was breaking down my body, how I was killing any creativity or growth in my mind, body, and emotions. I was pitifully happy when I was allowed to do something or given a little room on my rope.

The happiness bubble burst at every turn when I would see you longingly watching yet another woman or eyes glittering over a singer on the TV or females of all kinds. The looks you would exchange with another woman while I stood right next to you. It was endless. How I struggled with hate and love for you. I wonder how much of it was just that I was afraid to leave, if I had left would things have worked out for me? It’s a question that has haunted me.

Life moved on and I won’t deny good things happened in our world and in ministry but many more horrific things were to come. Through a series of events, we moved as a family to another part of the world that was far removed from the one we’d been in—new language, new culture, new climate, new everything. Your dreams and the result of them, took us to the strange place. It was up to myself and the kids to rally around your desires and to make the best of it. We did, we always did, even though I was petrified of this new move. I tried.

Going into the second year of our time there, I finally broke down the barrier I had put up around myself and began to love the country and the people as much as I had loved any place before and the kids fell in love with it all, too. In fact, I found myself growing very attached to this life-change. I made friends and we hosted the Bible studies and, for the first time in a long

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time, I began to believe that we might have reached a great place in our marriage and in ministry. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if our marriage could heal completely and we could minister to other couples? I hoped.

There had been a lull in your affairs and I foolishly thought that you had gotten some things sorted out, that you had settled down, and we could finally begin to live in peace together. Wrong, so wrong. The true test of how a person has changed and to what extent the change has taken effect is when they are put in a similar situation as the one previously and they react in a new way. Not you! When given the chance or when pushed to a certain point, you always reverted back to your basest nature. A very primitive, instinctual nature.

It made sense for you to take a break now, as we were in a place that held you up almost as a god and clung to you for the answers. That became the new fixation and new role to play. This was a perfect scenario for your inflated ego when you should have instead found peace in God and pointed everyone to Him. You were only a conduit, not the source. But this took the place of your lust for a little while.

In our new assignment, due to the nature of the work and the language spoken there, we had to have interpreters everywhere we went. You seemed to find mostly females to translate as though there were no men who were bilingual or capable. I suppose there were not as many men but, knowing yourself by then, for who you were, and in light of the counseling we had gotten, it would have seemed prudent to guard yourself against temptation. However, fighting your desires and urges was never a strength or choice taken. Instead you did the very opposite, giving yourself every opportunity to be tempted.

I think because you knew that you weren’t going to say “no” any longer to the temptations therefore as long as you were open to it, you could be choosy and pick just the right opportunities.

Judicious adultery!

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Oddly enough, and I say that with dripping sarcasm, you began to be very partial to one particular interpreter. Oh, the two of you had to go everywhere and do everything together. Long hours and a noticeable dependency began to grow between you.

She giggled at everything you said as though she was a teenager and hung on every word that came out of your mouth. You doted on her; making sure she was alright at every turn even though she was married with children and responsibilities of her own along with her husband. You purchased things because she “couldn’t afford” them as though you didn’t have a family who depended on you for winter boots and such. And here we went again, only this time the spirals spun deeper!

Speaking of winter boots, to mention a twinge of pain that still hits me when this memory comes back, there was a beautiful brown leather pair of boots that only laced up and came almost to the knee, that I had been wanting to buy for the coming winter.

They were exactly the style I had dreamed of for a long time but never been where the necessity outweighed my desire. Your response? No, they would be too expensive, we didn’t have that kind of money, what was I thinking?! I would have to do with what I had already. Period!

The following day, or maybe two days later, we had a meeting at our flat and, you could have knocked me over with a feather as the saying goes, when she walked in wearing THE boots I had wanted! She just “happened” to buy them was her comment but several of us watching the two of you entering together knew differently. You had taken her shopping and I was dumbfounded!

She was making more money as one of our interpreters than many were making on the street and you still did things like that for her. You became involved in her life in ways that were inappropriate and wrong. A lump in her breast she was afraid might be cancer and no women called to pray, but you and she, over in a corner, praying for healing. I asked you what that was

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about and you said she was too shy to have anyone else know about it. REALLY? Time for her period. You had her laying on our daughter’s bed and then took her gently home.

Pretty soon, you were back to your wicked habits, but there was a new twist to it. Had you gone so far down the road that you weren’t holding back anymore? Lying about everything, needing to talk with her constantly, to the point that you would sneak out of the flat to find a public phone in order to place a call to her.

Our son played ice hockey at the playground and he got lots of extra practice in the evenings while you were on the pay phones.

I despised the fact that I had to think like you to stay one step ahead or maybe it was just knowing how you worked that kept me one step ahead.

One weekend, we took the Church on an outing to a camp outside of the city. Once our chartered bus arrived at the camp, you walked with her and carried her backpack to her cabin but left us to haul our own things to our’s. Apparently it did not cross your mind that it just may look a little odd! That whole weekend was playing cat and mouse with you! One of my friends told me that they saw her come out of the woods in one area and then shortly afterwards you emerged in another not too far from there. That was very early one morning. I asked you and you said you had gone into the woods for a quiet time with the Lord. You had some nerve! I knew better and I knew what had happened.

There are things a wife knows instinctively by the way the other woman acts and, naturally, the way her husband acts. Yes, you did some weeping in my lap that weekend but not too much. Sin was getting more and more comfortable and cozy for you! The stories are endless. I did not even question anymore as I was at the end of my rope!

One time, I remember, she called you at 10:30 at night saying that there had been a fire in the elevator, she was frightened, could you come over. You jumped in the car and left for hours to

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make sure she was alright, of course! Another time she called you because her son had a fever. Again, you left and didn’t return for a long while. Oddly enough, these situations came up at night and always when her husband was gone on a business trip.

But you! YOU! It NEVER crossed your mind that with a family of your own, we might need you when you were unavailable or to return in a responsible length of time. That maybe we should have been your priority in spite of what anyone else was going through? No, whenever she called, you bolted.

Here’s another thought, YOU never thought about what you were doing to your ministry, our ministry! Did you think the Lord was sweeping your actions and attitudes under a proverbial heavenly rug? Or, sitting idly by? I’ve never been able to come up with how you were able to do what you were doing being in the position you were in.

It was worse this time with your affair because our kids were older and watched it develop and saw your partiality towards this woman, saw how you preferred her kids to the point that if they wanted a toy or something that our kids had, you would take it away and give it to them to take home. There were three pairs of little eyes watching you. You clearly would rather have been with her and her family and made us all feel second best or worse. For my part, I was sick of the affairs and flirting and I had now become much more of my own person with a growing awareness of who I was as a woman, a wife, and mother and what my contribution could be if it had room to be. And, I was becoming very, very angry.

Things kept surfacing of your actions. I found out years later that you brought her over to our home once when I was out shopping, told the kids that the two of you had a lot of work on the computer which just happened to be in our bedroom, told them not to bother you, went together into the bedroom, closed and locked the door! Did you honestly think they just didn’t have brains to figure out what you were doing? Did you think I would just never find out?

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We had a Bible study once a week at our flat and we had a dog. That afternoon, I was busy taking care of things in another part of our tiny flat, actually in our bedroom, while the two of you were teaching down the hall in the living room. With all my suspicions throughout the years, I developed habits of which I am not proud. Checking your wallet in the middle of the night, looking in pockets for anything suspicious, etc. I thought doing this somehow saved my sanity at the time, but now I know that it only lowered my integrity!

This afternoon, in particular, her coat was hanging on our closet doors and I put my shaking hand in to each of her pockets dreading what I might find. Reader, take note, generally when you look for something with a suspicious mind, you will often find something— specially if circumstances surrounding a specific person or situation have often been questionable!

From the last pocket I pulled out a neatly folded letter, recognized the handwriting, and felt a cold wash over me. It turned out it was a love letter—from you to her. Horrified and shaking very hard by now, I began to read the most childish, immature, and embarrassing love letter I have ever read. A Pastor?

Writing this type of juvenile love letter to his Interpreter? Why, naturally!

That week’s sermon was going to be on a portion of Song of Solomon and this letter was an explanation of some of the terminology and pictures painted in the beautiful Song, except that you turned it into a letter to her. Even in my anger, I was filled with embarrassment at some of what you wrote realizing that if someone wrote this to me, I would be blushing at the unabashed desire in the words and the imagery that came to mind as you painted with words.

At that moment, you burst in to tell me that the dog needed to be walked because he was getting in the middle of things and bothering everyone. I was angrier than I had been in a long time

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and told you that you could take him out if he needed to be walked! You were shocked at my response, realized with horror what I was holding, turned white with anger, and told everyone to go home because an “emergency” had come up. Yes, it had!

What followed was a heated dispute between the three of us with, of all things, you angry at me because I had gone through her pockets, angry that I had read a letter that was meant for her and “not for you!” and then you demanded that I give her letter back to her and said you would be back to “settle the matter” after you took her home.

Then I began to feel fear of what you might have meant by coming back to settle the matter. Settling the matter to me meant more time berating me about my misdeeds and having crossed the line of respect and decency. I’d heard this sermon before but your tongue had gotten sharper over the years. However, hours later, you came home and refused to talk about it. Refusing to address issues and pretending nothing happened were some of your latest weapons! Sometimes they scared me more than your screaming.

Refusing to discuss something tells the other person that it didn’t really matter to you and that you have the controls.

Pretending nothing happened leaves the victim feeling like they may have imagined it, or even worse, that they don’t have a right to be offended. That you have the freedom to do whatever you choose and that the recipient should just endure whatever you wanted to say or do—in this case, me being the one to bear the impact over and over again!

From there on till the time we left there, our world became a tangle of blistering anger and Pharisaical holiness, each in turn when the situation demanded it. You became palpably evil when at home or alone with me and nothing changed where it came to her. Naturally, everything stayed the same where the two of you were concerned. You were holy when you were in the pulpit or

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performing a marriage ceremony—even though an hour later, you would be leaving with her. She became insolent towards me and her kids were hurtful to our’s which spoke volumes because they recognized that you preferred them. You allowed it, and why not, that is where your heart was.

I truly believe that at some point you decided that you could do whatever you wanted and that you would not be questioned or rather should not be questioned, that it was not any one’s business. Somehow you got the idea that you were a god in your little kingdom, an untouchable island, above any judgement or critique and that whatever was right in your own eyes, was right, period! Whenever I would try to question or express jealousy and asked to speak with you about a situation, your anger would flare to a fearsome, frightening level.

I found out that you had taken her with you to the next largest city for a Pastor’s conference. When I broached the subject, you were driving me (a real change from always taking the bus everywhere) and we narrowly missed getting in a car accident— you were so angry. You thought you had gotten away with it! I dropped the subject, not in hopes of preserving our relationship, that was long gone, but I sure didn’t want to die mangled in an accident. The relationship had died years ago.

You made a fool out of yourself and dragged us all down with you. You set in motion a chain of events that none of us will ever fully recover from and all because of your narcissism, your self-indulgence, your egotism, and your self-absorption over the years. Life had become tedious for you with us and you wanted to move on. You screamed to the kids and I one night, “I want a new wife and new kids!”

Hoping desperately against hope that your sudden burning desire to return to the U.S. was so that we could work on our marriage and preserve what we could of what was left. I fooled myself, and went along with the mad dash of packing in spite of my back going out and your perpetual absence.

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Leaving broke my heart along with the kids’ hearts and, the morning we left, you didn’t even drive us to the airport! You packed up our car with suitcases and such and explained in an enlightened tone that it would be better if we took the bus—the BUS—to the airport! We had learned by now to not argue with anything you had made up your mind would be the ‘best’ for us. Actually, by now, we were broken. It was far easier to just do whatever we were instructed to do.

Do you know how silent the city streets were at that hour while we struggled along with our carry-ons and our beloved cat in her carrier trying to find a bus headed to the outskirts of town where the airport was? It was early and few buses were running yet.

It was a city turning her back on us, a city in mourning. After all, what had we accomplished there? A broken marriage, wounded kids and ourselves, a split Church, many hurt individuals who had looked to us for answers, verbally fighting like we were in the ring day after day and night after night, mountains of shame, humiliation, painful questions, a loss of inestimable quantity on all sides emotionally and spiritually. I can’t even begin to add to this what we did to God because the damage that was caused went beyond human understanding.

Quite a number of our friends were at the airport waiting when the kids and I arrived there. Then we waited and waited and waited for you. You, in the car, who didn’t have to walk to the busstop, then make stops along the way like a bus does, who didn’t have to be jostled and shoved around as you made your way to what felt like your funeral. No, you were in the car tootling along.

We weren’t fools and we knew you had taken your time, going by her home, saying your farewells and till-we-meet-agains. That is what it turned out to be with the plans the two of you had schemed-up together.

Once we were back Stateside, I expected that my breath would begin to come more steadily, and I wished that you might

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let all this go, but I knew deep down that it was not over. And it wasn’t. When our son found you in the study, madly typing away on the computer to your mistress with the door closed, and when you had to get a cell phone like your very life depended on it, and when you continued acting as though you weren’t a part of us. I knew.

I think by now, four years after you had begun the affair, the end result of countless verbal and emotional attacks, feeling bereft, alone and heartbroken, I was numb and maybe a little bit insane. One thing is for sure, I blocked many things out and tried to be normal but, sadly, I don’t think I knew anymore what “normal” looked or felt like. I was splintered.

You began saying that you had to get to Colorado to find work and that you would go by yourself as there was not a reason at this time that we should all go. We had always talked about settling in Colorado someday, had camped there as a family for many summers and we were in summer so why not take us?

Maybe, just maybe, this would be a turning point if you went alone? Maybe time away from us, from me would be beneficial?

How I lied to myself!!

It seemed there was an unwritten list in your brain of things to check off in the short time before you would be leaving.

Number 1 - Getting me a driver’s license was one of the main ones as mine had expired a long time ago having been out of the country for so many years.

Number 2 - Getting my name on the bank account and on the credit cards – two things you had refused to do for all those years were all of a sudden a must.

Number 3 - Then, you HAD to have a van and your uncle, who owned a car lot, set you up very nicely with one while thinking it was for our whole family.

You began to plan your date of departure and, as you did, you went through our storage and took everything that was “yours” packing it all very neatly in the van. You packed all your

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clothes and everything you would need—not for a two-week trip, as you kept repeating, but evidently for good.

A sense of steadily sliding down a precipice overtook me. I had been sliding for a long time but a drop off was approaching.

The morning you left was surreal, painful, numbing and frightening in an icy sort of way. I waited in bed, laying on my back, staring at the ceiling listening while you got your cereal and coffee wondering what the next step would be. I was bone tired, every part of me hurt. As you poked your head back in the bedroom door to say you were taking off, I blurted out that if you weren’t back after two weeks, I would begin taking steps. “What?”

I repeated it. You starred at me for a few moments, shrugged your shoulders and just…walked…out!

The cold reality is you had been gone for a very long time already. You had left years earlier. All this time had been the dress rehearsal for a new life you had been building for yourself.

Even so, something ground to a halt in my heart when you left that morning, the feeling of scraping a knee against asphalt, a numbing sting that I knew would really hurt later.

Before leaving, you kissed each of the kids and told them goodbye. Later, they told me that they knew in those moments you would not be coming back. How, how could you do that and ever be able to live with yourself? Me, I could understand, because remember, the problems started long before the kids were born and I knew at gut-level that you had been through with me for so long now. But in spite of everything, the kids hoped it would not be the end. They wished that Daddy wouldn’t leave. But you did. The very second your foot cleared the threshold of the house on your way out the door, you were never going to be back and nothing would ever be the same. That step was final.

I found out much later, by way of my lawyer, that you went directly to a lawyer yourself and filed for divorce that morning.

Then, per your mother, who I knew you were in communication with, you drove to Chicago and picked up your interpreter/

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mistress who had flown in. I wonder how she afforded the very expensive flight over? Hmmmmm….

There followed three or so months of you doing whatever you wanted to do but with us not knowing where you were, never hearing from you though we did follow the paper trail of charge card bills that ended up coming to me. I could see all the places you had gone with her, to all the places I loved going once upon a time.

Oddly enough, remember your mother who hated me? We had ended up staying with her when we got back initially and, after you left, I had nowhere to go with the kids, so we continued staying there. None of my family were close by, I didn’t have a car to go anywhere anyway…that’s right! You left us carless!

Practically moneyless and blowing in the wind! You would be back in two weeks, right? Lie! Your mother had just had surgery and we became her caretakers while she angrily peppered me with questions about why you had left “like that”, when you would be coming back, why you weren’t phoning ever, and I finally told her that the marriage was ended. She tried to figure out loopholes to prove me wrong but those loopholes were non-existent. All her questions, and her bitterness, poured out on us.

I also had to visit our supporting Churches, one by agonizing one, and stand in front of the congregation and give a synopsis of what went wrong. Precious people who had given money faithfully for the Lord’s work so you could have affairs.

A wash of humiliation and embarrassment covered me. It was heartbreaking and devastating to them and I had to be the one to break it to them as you were too cowardly to own your tragedy.

To the reader: The ones who gave and prayed were who the Lord honored by “working all of these things together for good to His glory” and He preserved the kids and I though we came out a little scorched by the flames. He alone knows the ever widening circles and who was blessed there and here.

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I managed, with financial help from our Churches, to find a home for the four of us and a vehicle was contributed by another friend, and then I found a retail job at the Mall. It made me pathetically happy when they hired me. Then came time to get the kids enrolled in school and navigate all of that. Still, no word from you except for one call the kids made to you to ask something, can’t remember now what, but may have had to do with their enrollment. Other than that, there had been no contact with you in several months.

As I write this, I am once again, knocked off my feet at your complete disregard for us! You never called to see if we were okay or needing anything or even, sarcastically, breathing still, but we could follow the paper-trail and map out where you were per the credit card statements. Then, one day, the credit card statement showed that you were back in town, in fact, staying at a campground very nearby! Even then you didn’t come by to check on us, even then! I know you and your mother had countless phone conversations because she would tell me things. Then one day she began to be cruel to each of us in many little ways that aren’t worth mentioning here because why would you care to hear about that?

I could tell that the more you communicated with her the more she believed that you were not at fault and were innocent in the marriage failing. You had explained to her that the real fault was with the kids and I, specifically me—at least that is what she told me at one point when she asked us to leave.

Thank God, we had a home by now, again with help from the Churches guiding me along and financing the purchase. I was so happy that it did not hold any memories of you, none that could be seen at least, only the ones in my heart and mind. We unpacked and settled in to our home and some things began to fall into place.

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I was working at my job on one particular day, and the only staff in the store at that moment. I had a customer in front of me but, when they moved aside a little, who should be standing at the entrance to the store but you! It creeped me out while you just stood there starring until the customer left. I asked you what you were doing there and you said you wanted to come back to me.

How, how did you think as a sentient being that you could waltz back after all that had been done? You actually thought that you could come back and pick up where we left off? Where was that anyway? After all these years, you would have to pick-up at never!

Where we had never gotten together, never lived the lives we had, never experienced your sin and my inability to cope.

I don’t remember word for word of our conversation but I recall telling you that it was impossible for you to return to the family, much less me, until you went to our Pastor and figured out what your issues were. You were shocked at my response and, realized quickly, that I was not going to budge as you kept wheedling and acting like you were victimized! You heard nothing I said except that I would not let you back. Then you left and headed to meet with our Pastor, but ended the conversation the two of you had by telling him that if I wouldn’t take you back that you would find someone else. Your mistress was out of the picture by now anyway. You didn’t find the answers you hoped for with her apparently and, as her visa had expired, she left the country.

With me not taking you back, you did find someone else and your life has moved on.

The examples are never ending but I imagine you get the idea by now, or, maybe you don’t since you always have been obtuse about the role you played in your own ruin and how that affected each of us. I can’t be gracious and say anything about the consequences you have confronted because, in my opinion, you brought it all crashing down on your head all by yourself. Per the

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Bible, you reap what you sow, and you had been sowing wickedly for a very, very long time.

The four of us only flinch when someone or a situation brushes up against the old scars that still hold ghost feelings.

Or, when a memory tugs at the corner of our minds and we have to either push away the ache or make the decision to take it out and examine it closely—we might pull it to pieces, peel back some layers and check to see if the pain still has the capability to slice like a knife and maybe to see if it, at last, won’t anymore.

I don’t think you thought anything about the varied outcomes or what the results of your actions would be. At the start, you were aware of the way it made us feel, but only to the extent that you would then have to work harder at hiding and tried very hard to pretend nothing was happening. Such a thin veneer over the tangle of sin.

Several times in the marriage and throughout the life we lived together, there were chances to come back home and room to repent. I was able and ready to forgive even up to the last affair, when we had to rush back to the U.S., I was prepared to work to make our relationship and marriage function as it should. But, not you, you kept digging deeper and it made you more and more detached and the cover-up was turning you into a stranger.

A stranger that finally had to say goodbye….

For those of you who stayed for the whole letter, in order for you to not have done this in vain, here are some lessons I did learn along the way. But before I write out the lessons, the following are some scars I was left with and the often-crippling effect this kind of a life left me with. 

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Aftershocks

Trust, reliance on the truth, and the ability to have confidence in what I am told or not told is still a significant hurdle for me.

Some days are easier than others, but when I feel tired or weak emotionally, then I struggle to take what I hear and see as truth.

When I was much younger, and definitely before this expe­ rience, I trusted completely, almost too completely. It was perhaps naïve of me, but I felt that whatever someone told me, was probably because they were telling the truth or as much truth as I needed to know, as in the case of a surprise or if it wasn’t anything I needed to know. I trusted if that was the case that it was for my good and not as a result of someone’s deceitfulness or dishonesty. Of course, over time, I learned that there were times when others were not truthful and my trust wore down but I was not devastated in any way, not yet.

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At the start of this fated relationship I relied on him fully, with the thought that he only had the best in mind for me. Isn’t that how it is when you are in love and have asked someone to share the rest of their life with you? Perhaps, relying fully, is not the issue if you are not in a relationship that is based on betrayal.

I no longer could trust; I had lost it, bit by bit, over time. At first, thinking that the affairs and mistreatment I was receiving were from misunderstandings or something that I had to learn not to do because it upset me. It was then easier to let it go and ignore it, push down the hurt feelings and go on. But, as the hurts intensified, I lost all ability to trust.

Trust became, for me, impossible, unless I could know everything about everything which is impossible, by the way.

When he would tell me anything, I just knew that there was more to it and there usually was. Eventually, finding out confirmed to me that there was always a hidden side to whatever was being said or done. The sad thing is that it was not limited to him, but I began to feel that way about everyone. Trust was broken!

I also began to hide things and found ways to communicate in such a way that didn’t tell the complete truth, because the truth, sometimes, or very often, left me open to more haranguing!

I hid things like what I ate when I knew he would “disapprove” or purchases I made when I was able to squirrel away some money without him being aware. During the last and worst affair—if affairs can be graded from mediocre to crushing—I hid a lot of money, as much as I could, because I had no security and could not trust anything that was said to me. This insecurity created such fear that we would be left without a way to get back to the U.S. or without a way to buy food. There were plenty of examples of times that he would spend money on himself or on his mistress.

It created a lot of fear in me on many levels concerning the kids and me. What would I do if I had to get the four of us out of the country and didn’t have him to direct and organize everything?

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Remember, I didn’t move two inches without permission, and that was for the entirety of the marriage. The daunting prospect of taking my kids and financing a trip was terrifying!

Another negative from this relationship has been that I didn’t like other women very much and I judged them on their physical appearance immediately. If a woman was beautiful, or thin, or any physical form that I decided was attractive to him, I realized I was not any of that and I would have nothing to do with them. I still feel that I have to compete. and this has made me very focused on the outward beauty and, sad to say, not so much on the inward beauty. This is changing, but I will be fighting it the rest of my life.

My check list for other women is very short, making anyone and everyone who is not thin, primarily, with a certain variety of beauty that I spent years attempting to emulate, because it is what I thought was what I needed to be, not worth me getting to know.

I failed at it and saw myself as falling short of being worthy every time. Worthy for WHAT? Bottom line, worthy to be loved and, since he never found those qualifications in me that he found in others, I basically believed the lie that I just wasn’t ever going to be enough—a vicious cycle of striving, failing and climbing up on the wall again!

I find myself second guessing what I think or plan to say or do. For so long, I was asked, “What is wrong with you?”, “Why did you do that?”, “How stupid are you?” and many other demeaning questions. Those questions formed into voices in my head which kept repeating the same thing for years afterwards. There never was an answer because they are questions that aren’t meant to be answered, that is not the purpose for asking them! All I do is question and doubt. Nothing I do is anything I can trust myself to be confident enough to stand on. I always look for someone to affirm how I dress—my hair style, my beliefs, anything about me.

What a weight to put on others!

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A side note: I always saw myself as worthless and unbe­ coming when I was much younger though I had begun to make a change and learn to love who I was created to be. Then I got into the marriage; my struggles did not give him an excuse or the right to have treated me like that! This is why I encourage women to have confidence in themselves and to know their value. Never let anyone besides God tell you your worth! I was a perfect match for him and for his actions and attitudes towards me; however, I did become, through it all, to be the person I am today.

As the years went by, I grew stronger emotionally, and the fog of hatred for myself began lifting, there was real growth in who I knew myself to be and in how I related to others and let them relate to me. A perfect example is that at the end when he was leaving, as you read, I gave him a deadline. One of the things I have had to live with is the regret of staying and praying for an answer to the marriage issues. Regret for not laying down boundaries sooner. There must be limits set in any relationship depending on how close that relationship is but, with a mar­riage, it is crucial.

From my earliest memories, I was taught to pray and sang a children’s song at bedtime with my mother about not worrying when you can pray. I couldn’t say my ‘r’s so the worry became “wuwee” and the pray turned into ‘pway’. I have never wavered from believing that prayer is the strongest weapon a person can wield but, when you pray and nothing happens that you can see with your physical eyes or no results are evident, you begin to question. There is always more going on than you know. I prayed and prayed that the affairs would end, that his heart would be “turned towards me,” that I could just be who he needed me to be so that the marriage would be strengthened and maybe then he wouldn’t need to hurt me in this way. I prayed and begged God for this. Do you see the issue? It was not me!!!

I could have done all that I thought I should to end the complications that kept showing up but I could not change him

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and even God couldn’t. Does that sound blasphemous? I have always believed that God is the ultimate Gentleman. He invites, He opens our eyes, He holds the door open, He speaks, sometimes loudly and sometimes not, He waits and watches, but He never forces! If He did, what kind of a heavenly Father would He be?

There would be no real relationship because the foundation of a relationship is choice. Each of us chooses to enter into a relationship with Jesus and the Father, WE make the decision and daily we keep making the decision. It is not forced upon us and we are not bent to His will by force. That would be a slavery rather than a bond of love.

In addition to all of that, I also am very prone to throw relationships away. What I mean is that if relationships with individuals I have known for many years begin to sour and hold traces of manipulation, every time I am around that person I don’t like who I am. I don’t have the patience anymore, though I dealt with it, was the appeaser and ‘sucked it up’ for a while, now I don’t want to. I don’t have patience nor do I give allowances for another’s shortcomings so to speak. I am not as callous as that sounds but I no longer put up with treatment that reduces me to floor-mat status where I am no longer of value to that person or to myself!

For example, there is a person who has been in my life for a long, long time, she has always had her moods and moments, but I’ve always let them go. There have been stretches of time when she has not spoken to me in literally years and then she’ll start talking again for a time before the cycle begins again. Each of these occurrences are following a disagreement or a time when I had a different opinion. Most recently, I must have said the wrong thing and now I find myself locked out of her life again.

And, I have decided that I am not going to play this game again.

What do I actively do? I don’t reach out, don’t try to include her, have stopped calling, in essence—finished! She knows where

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I am if she wants to reach out, however, and she knows from the past that I am always here. The main difference is that I used to take on the cloak of peacemaker and always worked on being at peace with her.

There comes a time in a person’s life when they need to grow up, having had a few years and experiences in which to do that!

The issue becomes when they include you in their varying stages of maturing and you become their whipping post per se. Enough is enough! There is freedom in saying that. You demonstrate respect for yourself when you do this ,and respect for them as well though they may not see it.

You are respecting that they need to take these steps to live a full life and that it is their decision how they approach them, not anyone else’s. You can’t create an atmosphere that allows them to grow, that would not do them a favor and it will only wear yourself down.

As far as respecting yourself, you are giving yourself freedom from being controlled by the moods of those loved ones or staying with that person in their abstract changes. I am not a harsh, calloused person but I am at a point in my life, finally, when I have the right to say “no more” to the ones who have used me to pour out their anger and bitterness because I have been a great listening ear and I empathize. I am very compassionate so it has not been easy to “wash my hands” of others. When I stick with my decision, I am finding strength and growth from that. It does not negate, however, that the relationship can be made right again but relationships take two who are mutually invested—only one is not enough.

The failed relationship has left me with a fear of the dark.

Anything I don’t understand or don’t feel secure about is what I mean by that. My earliest memory is being in complete darkness and, even though in this memory I knew I was in my crib, I could not see anything. That icy cold fear of the dark stuck with me for

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many years and I still have to have some form of light on at night.

In the dark, you can’t tell how deep anything is or how wide, if there is an end approaching or not, where the obstructions are or whether the way is clear, is there a tangle of roots that will trip you or is the path ahead clear? You freeze where you are because taking a step could mean your life, and I lived for a long, long time in a frozen state. Possibly the worst part is that you feel like you can’t do anything to get out of it.

I relate my experience to the sting from a scorpion. Have you ever looked at these creatures? They are both frightening and intriguing. Instinctually, you know you should not touch them, but it is hard to resist. If you ever did reach out your hand, you would find a painful reminder of the “no touch” rule!

At one point in this saga, our family lived in the high desert where it was warm but not humid, the cactus grew and we had to watch the children in case of snakes, black widows and scorpions.

I was horrified at the thought that any of the three of them would be bit or stung! There were tragic stories that circulated of victims who lived for sometimes only 20 minutes following a scorpion sting. You can be as careful as you desire but things happen that are not in your control.

One night, I rolled over in bed and a red-hot sting landed on the side of my right eye. I jumped up and turned on the bedside lamp only to find a scorpion trying to crawl up the wall where I had thrown him. He did not live and I wasn’t sure I would either!

But I ended up with only a blister similar to a burn where I had gotten stung. It later scabbed over and slowly went away leaving a very slight mark. The pain lasted and felt numb for a few days then it was gone.

I’ve never forgotten that night. It seemed darker than it was outside, the sting hurt, I felt fear not knowing if I would die (which was very possible) but now it has faded to a misty dream.

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That experience is like this one. A hideous creature came into my life that was at one time both frightening and intriguing, that is who the open letter you have now read is about. The pain lasted once the numbness went away and the mark is there to this day. It isn’t evident to anyone who looks at me but if you care to get to know me, you will see the scars. 

Lessons

Lesson #1 The decision that I came to at a later date was that a relationship which is very isolated geographically, relationally, and emotionally, may be unhealthy. We were the only two “white” young people and, though there were many others of our age around, none were possible for life partners or for dating as the culture prohibited that. But, for the two of us, it was not an issue and we quickly became obsessed with each other which we would have denied. No one “knows it all” or is an expert and I wish I had listened. I didn’t, because, typical of many of us, I was sure that I knew better. It didn’t matter that individuals who had loved me all my life, awho had dvised me and wiped my tears away, were now warning me. I paid no attention and made my own decision, to my downfall.

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I wish someone had told me that sometimes marriages just don’t work out. Being raised to believe firmly that marriage is a representation of Christ and the Church, the mere idea of breaking that by walking away from the sacred union terrified me! I felt that that might be unforgiveable and to be found guilty of not doing everything in your power to keep together, no matter what might happen along the way or what it might look like behind closed doors, could be deserving of separation from God forever. I wish someone had told me that I would find grace and acceptance and not the eternal damnation I expected.

Sometimes, you have to walk away and, perhaps, to break a vow is not the end of the world, you can be forgiven by God and His grace just might cover even the end of such a sacred bond.

When you are in the midst of a situation that does not improve, perhaps even worsens, it might just be okay to leave. When there is no repentance on the part of the offender and the violation keeps being repeated with a growing disrespect and emotional and verbal abuse towards the victim, then it may be heaven’s answer to walk away. You may just not have been supposed to marry that person or, as in my case, one of you has ceased to honor the marriage vows. We don’t see clearly and are not always willing to hear the truth and we make mistakes along the way. Once again, Amazing Grace.

Lesson #2 Several things happen when a spouse cheats that dominos the emotions and actions. The other half wonders if it was some­ thing they did—did they inadvertently push the offending spouse to do that? Was there something that could have been done that was willfully ignored that could have preserved the marriage? We forget that no one makes anyone else do anything. The ultimate decision is with the one making it. Maybe, we think, could something have been done to prevent such a deep betrayal? Could

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I have done something to stop it? For years, I was convinced that the affairs were my fault and I was responsible in some way or maybe it was all my fault. I should have been more submissive, thinner, more dedicated, worn my hair differently, perhaps, but what more?

I had come into the marriage without a healthy self-esteem and thought that I could find it by pouring myself into my husband’s life and into his world. You can’t accomplish that by doing that! One does not necessarily result in the other. You will always perceive yourself as deficient because you can’t and aren’t supposed to be the answer to another person’s issues, nor are they to yours. They have deep faults that they are trying to pretend are not there. In fact, you may be the one to keep reminding them of their shortcomings and mistakes. The larger the disparity between what you are trying to accomplish and the reality of the situation, the worse it is. Depending on how long this has been going on, that disparity grows. You see, the offender gets hardened to what they are doing and with each turn, they get further away from truth.

Lesson #3 Thinking that I was much of the reason the affairs and lust kept happening brought tremendous feelings of shame and embarrassment on me. It is a fact, for the most part, that you don’t marry without loving a person, right? And, for the duration of the marriage, you stand by that person which I think is a crucial facet of the vows. When something is happening that you have no control over, and tears do not always work, you become ashamed of what you may have done that appears to be complicit with the wrong doing. And the longer you keep your lips sealed, the greater the shame.

It was freeing when I realized that I had absolutely nothing to do with the decisions that had been made. I didn’t dream up

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the fantasies, encourage the lust, I didn’t orchestrate all of this and I was cleared of it all.

Lesson #4 You feel like a fool for a lot of the time. You teeter back and forth between believing the lies of “this will be the last time! I promise!” and consider leaving. Once you have been in the mar­ riage for a while, it can sometimes be easier or perhaps simpler, less complicated to adopt the wait-and-see attitude, hoping with all your might that they will realize before it is too late or before you have become such an emotional wreck that there may not be a You to salvage. You hope that by standing by them, they will turn to you someday with gratitude and your relationship will be restored. Instead, their anger only gets more intense because they are trying, underneath it all and subconsciously, to drive you away so that they won’t be the ones leaving the marriage but the more you hold on and remain faithful, the more they have to deal with their culpability in the failure.

Lesson #5 I learned that you cannot change another person, however you may try. That is an easy thing to say but much harder to live by and put into practice! To learn that truth, I had to make some mistakes of doing everything in my power to attempt to conform to the image for which he was looking. It made me schizo­phre­nic as I was constantly changing things about myself, burying my­self as I flipped from one type of personality to another, pretending to not care that I was not gaining ground and finally learning the truth of it.

But, when all of that is over, you must forgive yourself for those decisions you made that kept you in that relationship for the length of time it did. Forgive yourself for not being able to see what may have been evident to others. Sometimes a part of

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the relationship is not wanting to walk away until the truth has slapped you in the face several times in a row or bludgeoned you until you no longer see straight. That is okay. You never see what you don’t want to see! Forgive yourself!

I believe we all want to see the best in the spouse/partner we have chosen otherwise we’re afraid of what that says about us?

We cringe from added bruises to our already broken spirit, so to think that we chose this person that is now throwing us away is a blow to ourselves.

Lesson #6 One of the most painful, excruciating lessons for me sur­ rounds my children. They don’t feel I protected them and though they have dealt with varying degrees of anger towards me at multiple times through the years, it will be for the rest of my life, I’m afraid! So many questions about when do you take the crucial steps to take them out of a very damaging situation? If I had left when they were young, I would have dealt with their anger at why we weren’t living with Daddy but which anger is better? The one that brings up questions when they are little or the anger that I face at times now with not having pulled them out of the pain sooner, not having protected them more or kept them from more.

I don’t know if my children are fully aware of the damage that was done to them but I have to live with the knowledge I can’t escape that I could have put a stop to it. Protecting is one of the roles of a mother and I have to admit that I failed and failed horribly.

I am reminded of this as often as the memories flood back into my mind.

I know that those years were traumatic for me and I was often in a trance-like state but does that give me an excuse for what I knowingly allowed? Could I have been stronger? I wasn’t, and I did the best I could in light of those circumstances and with the heartache I was experiencing. As often as possible, I have been

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reminded that I am dramatic. Is that a natural result of what I went through and desperately needing any form of attention as I was being starved of it? Or am I just wicked and all these years have become my legacy of an undisciplined, internally wicked person?

As the divorce was finalized when they were older, the judge decided that they were old enough to decide for themselves whether they wanted to see their father or not. If the divorce had been when they were little, it would have been the whole messy weekend here and weekend there. And the painful knowledge that even though they were no longer around him 24-7, now they had to deal with weekends split. I am not sure that would have been optimal either.

Was there a value to them watching me go through that?

Maybe not just watching but listening and being a part of it could have instilled some strength in them of what they would not deal with or would not allow to ever happen to them. Unfortunately, I think that is just the outcome of going through it and does not put value on what happened as though it were a vital part of their childhood and maturing—instead, that may have been some of the result, but not the optimal way to achieve that end.

I do struggle constantly with what I unintentionally or unthinkingly put them through and for so long.

Lesson #7 Now, the sneaking around that I did in order to eat things I wasn’t given permission to eat, or squirreling money away every chance I got, backfired into false guilt that I still deal with whenever I do something enjoyable or eat what I choose. Something in me says I don’t “deserve” or have the right to enjoy it. To find pleasure in anything of Me was prohibited and the joys that I have now have been fought for. When I do “get away with it,” I push the boundaries to test how much I can indulge rather than freeing

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myself to love those individual occasions that happen to me. It’s a greedy scarcity!

Often the kids and I would keep things hidden ,or lie, or I would hide money because of lack of trust. All of that now gives us an easy out when we can’t face the truth or don’t want to deal with a stressful situation. We deflect. Each of us have had to learn to not do that and trust those around us to not annihilate us, emotionally, for any reason or no reason. We have to learn to draw lines and make boundaries and protect ourselves, and that being back in balance has been a huge part of growing out of this situation.

There is a tendency to become paranoid about our walls and who might want to break them down, and we become militant about not letting anyone near, but when we are brave enough, we will begin to embrace vulnerability and live outside of those ‘rules’.

Sometimes you have to begin to trust a long time before you feel you are ready though—it can’t be “tested” otherwise. Just like an exam in class is to test what you have learned, trust has to be tested also. If you feel you can’t but you try anyway, the result can be surprising. But we are deeply afraid to do that and hence we close off, waiting for that moment that never comes.

Lesson #8 Perhaps this has been one of the hardest lessons and it has taken me absolutely years to finally come to it. Take ownership of your part in the failed relationship and what that set into motion!

It is not to say you are taking “blame,” that is not what I mean by ownership. I mean consciously realizing that I let this happen, that I could have made a decision at any time to take steps to get out of the situation, that I can’t go on blaming and excusing any of my actions, words, and attitudes. Doing this releases you to stop castigating yourself for what you could or should have done.

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No one, not your church, not the institution of marriage, not your grandma’s wish for you or your children, NOTHING should keep you in an abusive relationship, verbal or otherwise, and you should be free to walk away. It will take strength and when the weakness in you feels overwhelming don’t give in. Tell anyone that asks or wants to share unnecessary counsel that the decision is yours and you are taking steps to leave the marriage or relationship whether they agree or not.

I was, however, very guilty of not saying enough is enough.

When the signs are screaming in your face and you keep taking steps, that then becomes your responsibility. You allow people to treat you the way they ultimately do and I tolerated it. I wish I had not waited to learn this so late in life. It is much of the reason why he married me; my cheerleading for every little word that came out of his mouth and for every idea he hatched which gave a crystal clear picture that I couldn’t have cared less for myself.

Don’t do that!

Lesson #9 Now, let it go! Release it! Break the chains! This has been even tougher to do but writing down a number of my ugly memories has been cathartic like expelling sickening air from your lungs and taking in crystal clear breaths. It has been very good to put it down, realizing that I didn’t imagine it or embellish. Sometimes you do think that because, to you as a decent human, you can’t formulate in your mind how someone to whom you are deeply connected, can be viciously cruel.

Face the fact that it was hell on earth, for a little while. You should never diminish the effect it had on you. Anytime someone is allowed to cross a line, whatever that line might be for you, then it is an abuse. If you are uncomfortable, fearful, angry, then it is a line crossed. Don’t feel you have to oblige anyone out of coercion, insistence, deception, or love. I add love because I thought I was

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in-love and that everything I did was founded in love but it was actually founded in fear, insecurity, fear of rejection of any kind, feelings that screamed at me that it was the best I deserved.

Anything that doesn’t add to your life is detracting from it.

Maybe we were two immature young people living out our individual dreams or fantasies but the irresponsibility of bringing others into our world is heartbreaking. I don’t think there is a way to communicate to a young person to wait, to be sure, to weigh the ramifications, to look at things on all sides, to step back from the physical desires, to wait. If one is meant for the other, time is on their side, no need to rush, no need to hurry, just be sure.

There is a love that breaks, hurts, and leaves you shaken, and yet can be within the walls of true love and has a foundation of trust. Without trust, there is no love. So don’t hold on to any of it. Be free and know that you deserve the freedom. 

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Final Note

This concerns the Church at large who fall short of knowing how to handle situations like this or even the one of which I recently heard—a missionary and father who sexually molests the daughters for years. I was intensely horrified and shocked that these little girls had been in a nightmare situation like that at the hands of someone who was upheld in the community as a pillar.

HOW does this happen where truth is supposed to set you free, where we “confess one to another” our fears and short­ comings, a situation that leaves forever scars, others know what is going on but no one says anything. We scoff at the idea of not being truthful and we are quick—very quick—to point out things in others’ lives that we don’t see as measuring up to the Scrip­ tures. We are horrified at the Catholic church sweeping under the rug all the abuse that has become a headline recently but we are as guilty in our own back yard.

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What do we do when we are faced with this kind of evil and decide to not say anything? What do we do when there is a weakness affecting the family and, ultimately, the ministry, as in my situation—his predilection towards womanizing—and others see it but nothing is said to the Offender? Some saw it very early on in my situation and then later also.

I distinctly remember the first affair known to me. A person was joking with my “X” about the woman and how she would look in a wet t-shirt contest! How do we hold each other accountable if we partake in the degradation and encourage cheap talk and dirty jokes because we feel guilty for having lustful thoughts ourselves?

It is true that the offender has to accept what is being said to them yet they often aren’t going to. That is where the Church must come alongside the broken and be their strength to leave the situation. What if the signs of abuse are evident in the lack of respect and the overbearing attitude towards the victim. Do we really need to have so many sacrificed on the altar of Church/ missionary work? Is that glorifying to God? Aren’t we responsible to come alongside the victims and encourage them to leave and then support them in taking that step? If someone had sensed what was happening in my own life, they may have broached the subject with him and maybe it would have not turned out as it did. At the very least, I would not have felt alone and I would have found strength to leave. I would have had someone to confirm what my gut was telling me—“this isn’t right!” But instead we decide it isn’t any of our business.

I believe we are afraid of being vulnerable ourselves, and if we bring up someone else’s sin, well, what if they turn and point at us? Will that expose my weaknesses and lusts? Maybe, but if that is why we don’t say anything, then shame on us!

Working “on the front lines” makes you a target for the Enemy. I remember, when we first got to our final location, a missionary who had been sent there to begin the work that we

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would eventually take over, said to us, “Whatever you arrive with, whatever you bring with you, will only get worse here.” He spoke the truth and I know he was giving us a warning unbeknownst to him of what lay beneath the surface. But no one from our past who knew said anything, not even me.

Shame is a great motivator! It keeps our mouths shut when there should be freedom to speak. I felt like I was a huge reason for the affairs and ones who are molested sexually feel like they are also at fault if not even more so. Those that know are ashamed that they even have the knowledge and don’t do anything to stop it. But it goes on and no one says a thing.

Part of the problem is that the Church doesn’t know what to do with any of this because it is very wrapped up in keeping an image untarnished. It reminds one of Christ’s statement, something about whitewashed sepulchers! They have lost sight of the fact that even as followers of Christ we all have our failings and we all are responsible to walk with one another in truth.

We need to draw the lines—call sin, sin, and stop turning away.

Something is missing in the teachings that allow us to believe we are not responsible. Is it that grace has been taught in a twisted way? That no matter what awful, seemingly unforgiveable, act a person has committed, we let it go under the belief that God will always forgive us. I believe He does, but how that cheapens the grace we have been given.

What would have happened, let’s say, if someone had called my ex-husband out on his sin? It would have gotten really messy and that mess would have gotten all over everyone as it seemingly spun out of control. Everybody that supported us while we were on the “field” would have to face that they were supporting someone like that and work through the ramifications there. The ones who sent us out would have to face that they did so without holding him accountable perhaps.

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I don’t have an answer but I know that too many have given their emotional and spiritual lives for the sake of missions, the Church and ‘Onward, Christian Soldiers’! If I sound bitter, I am, righteously so. I am angry that so much happens and nothing is said! People suspect, see signs, but don’t want to rock the proverbial boat—their boats. It’s already rocking, people, and it is time to live out what we believe.

Guilt is not so only once it has been proven! There is far too much of “maybe it isn’t true” going around and it damages everyone on so many levels. The Wild West used to hang a horse thief based on the fact that he was riding the stolen stallion or mare. Maybe a few were hung without being guilty, but the chances of that were rare. Things were more straight forward then. Now, in a court of law, everything has to be proven beyond the shadow of a doubt; hence, we have criminals walking free because there is no way to get a picture of the gun in their hand. Who cares if they are covered in the victim’s blood or there is not sufficient DNA evidence?

Let’s break down my particular situation – “Are you having a sexual affair with that woman?” “NO! I am not!” What are the horse-thief-clear indications based on what I have written above?

Obsession over the other woman, total disregard for your family, run to her side when called, long hours spent away that don’t fit the scheduled meeting or training, stories that don’t fit, your spouse or family knowing the truth because of how you are acting, your exclusivity to that person, money missing, everyone seeing the looks between you and on and on. Guilty! And, I’m sorry, but the excuse of it just being an emotional affair should never wash or make it less impactful. The damage is equal to whatever it may be in reality! And it is rarely simply an emotional affair!

We are afraid to stand for what is true and we fall at the what-ifs!

Are we so afraid to lose our heroes that we are willing to look the other way? I think we are, and hence, the excusing of what

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should never be excused. A shattering of relationships and heart break and degradation should never be let go of because we don’t want to lose our illusions.

I do want to say that a witch hunt is not good, either where everyone is suspect or everything they do is questioned. I am writing of specific situations here.

If we began to notice and stood up against the abuses we saw or even suspected, it would get messy for a time, but then, maybe the numbers of individuals caught in these situations would go down. Anything that is done in the shadows, can only be healed by having the light of God’s grace and redemption shown on it and exposing what is there. Briefly, in my case, if someone had said enough is enough, it would have been the end of many things— the marriage, the ministry such as it was by then, the beloved home where we were at the time, and for those who gave their money to support the work, and, most of all, the victims being exposed and all that is entailed there.

I am not ignoring the fact that many abusers will deny to the last that they have done anything and won’t go along with the decision of leadership to leave the mission assignment very easily but, there are usually enough who have seen something and know there is something wrong whether they can verbalize what that might be or not, and with their testimonies, at least the victims can be released from the situation, never from the wounds and memories, but from the immediacy of what is happening.

I think before any of that happens we, the victims, must begin to tell the story. If hind sight is 20x20, then hopefully someone will begin to see truly.

And, maybe, just maybe, nothing can be done. I am not holding anyone responsible for the situation I found myself in.

If someone had come to me, I might have denied it all, and stuck up for my ex-husband. There may not have been anything anyone outside of our four walls could have done. So many are victims

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of abuse of some sort or other and will deny, protect, and firmly state that nothing is wrong. They make themselves even more of a victim by denying that anything is wrong. There must be a slow solution and tenderness from the ones aching to help.

Maybe we all need to pray for more discernment and sensi­ tivity for the situations in which so many in our world find themselves. It will take expending spiritual and sometimes phy­ sical energy and I know many already do this and, even in my situation, some came along and endeavored to but to seemingly no avail. I say seemingly, because it did matter and it did make a difference for us but the struggle can mask what is being done and said. This can make a difference though that may only be realized when looking back over the years.

The sting of a scorpion hurts and burns and lasts. The reason I titled this as I did is because scorpions are predators and killers. The experience I had with being stung happened once but I have never forgotten it. The memories are there.

What I have written about was like that—excruciating, dreadful, and mutilating. I won’t ever forget but it has begun to fade. The colors are less and less vibrant that overshadowed my world all those years…. 