Day 259

 final part from previous posts...

I know the grammar is heinous and the dangling participles are something from another world, but I'm pretty much just putting this out here to see if i can flesh things out better-bear with me...

I began to feel as if I had been pressured into this whole marriage thing, but I felt like I had no choices.  I would never go back to my parents and I felt if I got divorced I would be failing.  I already felt like I wasn’t good at the whole being a member thing.  I didn’t go visiting teaching and the temple stressed me out.  Sometimes when I was first going to the temple I would come home and cry so no one could see me because I felt so stupid for not “getting” it and not enjoying it.  I bet that’s a revelation, isn’t it?  Considering how its my air now.  Yes, I didn’t take to it immediately or even for awhile.

And then we had C.  And we were on Medicaid at the time.  And T didn’t have a job and I had post partum even though I didn’t recognize it and didn’t get help.  The job losses chipped at T until he was a bloody mess and I chipped away just as hard.  There were two camps of thought at that time:  We were cursed and sinful because this happened or else we were translated and like Job.  Both camps of thought made sure we understood this and we lost friends over it.  The bishop came to our house and told us he felt prompted that we should sell our house and belongings and move into my parents’ basement.  The rug was pulled out from under us, but it had been moving for a long time anyway and we numbly moved forward.  This was the same time C felt off of the counter and was miraculously healed and I fell down the flight of stairs and was hurt by the man who hurt me.  As I’ve already gone into that whole story on my other blog and talked about my TOS ad nausium, I will refrain from sharing that again.

What does it do to a marriage?  Where were those two kids who had life by the tail or at least one half of them did.  What does this do to love especially if one half is still struggling with wondering if she does love or if she’s just used to or just consigned to this fate?  There are so many little details here it would take several pages to share and we all know the details are what are hard.  There’s what happened to our cat, our “baby” before C was born that pushed a further riff between us, there’s the fact that T thought I was crazy for saying I was in so much pain when the docs could find NOTHING and when you are in horrific pain, the line between pleasure and pain is exactly the same and that’s a can of worms that’s best left undisturbed.  The people in my ward were understanding, but they didn’t want to be our friends because we weren’t legitimately there and did I mention the money that ward oozes with?  We were the black holes in a glittering milky way. 

T got hired as Christmas help at DB.  Lest you think I am using this platform as an exercise in humiliating or calling out T, it couldn’t be further from the truth.  This man had to swallow any and all pride he ever possessed, something I have yet to see more than a mere handful of individuals ever achieve.  He was the Christmas help along with teenagers.  He also threw boxes at Macey’s with all the pre RMs.  He also dug ditches and taught the other workers English along the way.  He did whatever it took to keep us afloat and everyone around us (this was before the recession) was the same as always.  Friend’s husbands were getting promotions and making more and more money and T with the lofty goals and high desires was eating slops in the pigs’ trough and his wife was in a chair because it hurt to exist. 

It wasn’t that we fought at this time because I didn’t have the strength to get angry anymore.  It hurt too much to have that strong of an emotion.  After working T would go to school at night to get his Masters and I would still be up because I didn’t sleep during that year and he would eat the dinner my mother made and we would watch Trading Spaces until he couldn’t keep his eyes open anymore and would go in and go to bed…alone.

I don’t know what he thought of me during this time.  He needed me to get better, obviously.  Life at this time is blurry.  I think I’ve established my conversion during the process I experienced.  T got hired full time at DB’s corporate office and worked with all the Mormon “superstars” we all experience every General Conference.  It gave us insurance which we needed to send me to Denver and the paycheck we needed to get us out of my parents.  With all of these spiritual perks the job afforded him, the pay wasn’t great and he would move on.  He tried to be supportive of me with my issues and I tried to be supportive of his.  My issues drained our bank account and devastated any nest egg we could hope to have.  Want to know what living 3 months in Denver will cost you, two major surgeries and over 10 years of rehabilitation?  That’s why T and I aren’t wealthy.  I cost too damn much. 

And with him trying to be supportive of me and me supportive of him, we were pretty sloppy at it.  Why didn’t I get better faster?  Why didn’t he have a better job?  It’s a dance we did and people would say to us, wow you guys have had it pretty rough.  A friend of T’s even mentioned to me he thought we might be cursed.  He didn’t laugh when he said it.  I think T believed it himself.  We almost broke up several, many times.  But now there was C to consider and we would have never done that to him.  I was worried about what other people thought, so I always nixed the idea, but T would have never left me.  If there was discussion about it, it always started with me.

And then we had little C.  And here were these two little miracles and they were from us.  Our fire, our flaws, our futures.  I started feeling some improvement.  The anxiety from the drugs and scalpels that left scars on my eyes and nervous system after the surgeries and the anxiety we both felt that at anytime we could lose everything again were a constant we were always trying to overcome.  Things were severely tested the day I called T and told him I felt like I needed to go to a new PT and do Pilates because the honest truth was how would we ever pay for it?

T got depressed.  How could he not?  Imagine what he had been holding for so long.  Now if we ever talked about splitting up he didn’t fight it.  Sometimes I knew he imagined what it would be like not to be saddled together with only the two miracles as a blessed buffer between us.  I remember one fight where words were hurled like vomit and I had a clear impression of “be careful.”  I knew we were supposed to be together because in moments of spiritual clarity it was the answer to all of life’s questions.  That this passionate, loving man was supposed to be mine and for whatever reason, I was supposed to be his.  He always knew this, but I the late bloomer had to come to see it for myself.

And the truth is, there’s no one else.  No one else who could have put up with the crap he endured in his early life, the hardships he’s experienced now as he looks forty in the face and could anyone guess what he’s overcome by looking at him?  He has a naturally sunny disposition and would drop anything to help anyone out.  He just keeps trying even at those times when no one has believed in him, and to my eternal regret, that has included me.  He just gets up and dusts himself off and keeps dreaming and striving. 

I’m still learning about love.  T knew how to love early on.  I don’t know the mind or will of the Lord, but somehow we were right there in each other’s paths.  I guess what I missed out on in quantity, I’ve found in quality.  And this road I’ve traveled, I wouldn’t change it with anyone else.  The sum of my choices and even lack of them have led me right here to this spot, with this testimony, with this truth, with this spouse, with this set of skills, with this weakness, strength and everything in between.  T and I are infinitely flawed, but we’ve overcome some tough tough things and still flirt with each other.  We fight and make up and keep chugging along.  Do I love him?  Do I trust guys now?  Do I feel beautiful and desirable and get why it all went down the way it did? 

Why yes, yes I do.