Two Years From Now….

“As we go on our pilgrimage and the song of sorrows plays in our lives, we must be reminded not to serenade our days with regrets—-and refuse to make it the melody of our lives” – Dodinsky

In August of 2013, Daniel* said to me “Two years from now your life is going to be different.  You’re going to find a man who loves you, you will have a new life, and things aren’t going to be as bad as they are right now.”  He was right.  Daniel * was my imaginary escape from my marriage and was trying to love me by giving me hope.  I didn’t believe him, but he was right.  He is still a friend and continues to give me hope by proving to me love does exist.  He is now married with a baby and couldn’t be happier, and by watching his happiness unfold, I have hope that my own truly does exist.

But where am I now?  The two year anniversary of the assault is September 29.  There isn’t a day I don’t think about it.  There isn’t a day it doesn’t enter into my mind at the most inconvenient times.  The pain isn’t as fresh.  The flashbacks aren’t as intense.  The anxiety doesn’t throw me to the ground like an apple from a tree.  But I can’t let go.  It is a monster in my head that never leaves my side.  The event isn’t exactly what hurts me still.  It’s the remembrance of the feelings of isolation.  The feelings of being imprisoned in my own head.  It is the fear that Daniel* wasn’t right.

But overall, I am happy.  I am in a year long relationship with someone I adore and who treats me in a way I have never been treated.  I have a new life.  I have the highest paying job I have ever had, my own health benefits, friends who I can truly believe are real, and confidence I never in my life had.  Yet my monster still lingers.

Mike* still tells the world of my trespasses and convinces people that I spread lies that he raped me.  I feel paralyzed in these words.  I feel without a voice much like when he attacked me.  My voice choked up inside and I wasn’t strong enough to stop him or to cry out for help.  And at times I still feel just as weak.  So I go to the gym to lift heavier.  Work harder.  Be better.  But I am still so weak.  At times I feel the pain of entrapment piercing through my skin into my heart.  So I drink alcohol to numb my skin.  Numb my mind.  Help me to not feel the anxiety.  I am still so hurt.  At times I still feel so silenced.  So I write a song to hear my own words externalized.  To hear my truth come out.  To break free the chains of PTSD.  But I am still so muted.  At times I feel the self-hatred consume me like a fire.  It is hot and it burns.  So I choose to empathize with the world.  I give more of myself to those around me and work harder at being a better me.  But I still sometimes hate myself.

It’s been two years and I am better.  Even with the loss and the pain and the monster that lives in my head, I am better.  Even with the feelings while remembering the isolation and feeling like I am eternally trapped, I am better.  I am free.  And perhaps freedom always comes with a price.  I cautiously walk forward in my life, my relationships, and in my head, looking at every corner preparing to be trapped again.  But I am free.  At times freedom brings me to my knees in sorrow and gratitude.  Knowing life wasn’t done with me yet and I can make a new life escalates my soul.  Yet remembering the years I felt trapped and abandoned, isolated from my friends, and codependent on another person brings a deep sorrow.  As the anniversary approaches, my emotions are fragmented.  I feel everything and nothing all at once and the dichotomy of my inner life begins to play out in my externalized emotions.  I am trying to keep it together, and I am trying to not to let anyone see these ups and downs.   This isn’t me, yet it is.  It’s who at times I have become because of what he did to me two years ago.  Perhaps two years from now, my life will be different.

Preserving The Sanctity of Marriage

Gay marriage started to become legal when I was still deep within the walls of religion.  Though I knew the belief held by those in my group, I secretly cheered on each state that passed it into law.  I never saw how it affected the sanctity of marriage, as it had no bearing on my own.  But over and over I heard the rhetoric of what it does to America.  In my heart, but not with my words, I called bullshit.

During the final stages of my divorce is when I began to truly become outraged and heartbroken that the LGBT community were being treated so unfairly with being denied the right.  My heart broke knowing that marriage for gay and lesbian couples was still an unattainable goal.  It broke my heart because I knew my “sin” was worse than theirs.  Jesus spoke so many times against divorce.  Not so much for homosexuality.  Yet here I was, with the freedom to leave my spouse.  Here I was with the freedom to marry again (to a man) if I chose.  And here I was, able to do that a hundred times over and yet it was not even possible for gays to do it once.  It was not fair!  It was not just!  So as SCOTUS made its ruling this past week, I rejoiced as an open ally to a community I have for years hid my support of.

Though I cannot know fully the struggle of that community, I experience it in part by being divorced.  The same group that denounces them, denounces me – but oh so passive aggressively in comparison.  I can’t count the amount of times I have seen a “clever” meme float down on my FaceBook feed about how people don’t fall out of love because love is a choice.  Or how love never gives up.  Or how though marriage is hard, you always fight for it.  It is a very passive way to tell those that ended a marriage that they weren’t strong enough.  That they didn’t fight enough.  That they gave up.  I can tell you that the people that would say that have only experienced bad times in a good marriage.  They have never experienced bad times in a bad marriage.  Those two things are a world of difference.  Bad times in a bad marriage are like being in a prison underground.  You find hiding places in your own mind to escape because the mantra of “love never gives up” invades every hole in your soul.  Even good times in a bad marriage cannot even compare to bad times in a good marriage.  The good times are like a festering wound that is always on the verge of healing yet continues to ooze the puss of infection.  The memes about gay marriage, however, are much more overt and hatefilled.  Though they don’t directly relate to me, they make my heart sick.  I can only imagine what it feels like for those it is directed at.

But the good news is, the sanctity of marriage was not destroyed when gay marriage was legalized.  Nor was it destroyed when I divorced.  The sanctity of marriage was held as more sacred.  Both of those things give an open door to more love in this world.  Because I was able to divorce, I am legally free to marry again.  One day I want to do just that.  It is because I hold marriage to be so sacred, I will sanctify it when I remarry.  The marriage I was in was toxic at its core.  Even at its best, it was a cancer to everyone involved.  Because I hold marriage and love so highly, I cannot accept what I had as marriage.  For the sake of its sanctity, it had to end.  Gay marriage, on the other hand, is just another celebration that love exists.  Sure there will be many bad relationships that end in divorce involving homosexuals, BUT there will be that many more good ones.

Since being divorced, I have introspectively looked at what I believe marriage truly is beyond the legal benefits.  The only ways I can define it is this….  It is the strong love between two people who choose to commit their lives to one another.  It is giving and taking and sometimes not at the same time.  It is communication in its own language that creates understanding and peace.  It is forgiving and asking for forgiveness.  It is caring for one another in the darkest times.  It is an attraction that goes beyond youth and beauty but deep into the soul.  It is knowing even the worst days together are better than the best apart.  It is honesty.  It is commitment.  It is a shared goal of life.  It’s unity in difference.  It’s compromise.  It’s inspiring one another to be a better version of themselves.  It knows no gender, no race, no past mistakes.  It only knows love.

From the Other Side of the Cage,

Jae