I'd had a long day yesterday and was pretty exhausted by the time we went out with a group of friends to dinner and a movie. The movie was an action comedy, and I really loved it. But sitting beside Husband watching the awkward teen sex scenes that were supposed to be funny made be a little uncomfortable. The crazy part of my brain couldn't help but wonder if he was finding those scenes hot or arousing. While they may be funny, I don't find sex scenes between people who could be my children sexually arousing. It feels inappropriate, not sexy. But I think Husband's animal brain still responds to this kind of visual stimulation and switches his other faculties to their low-function setting. And of course seared in my memory is his description of one of the prostitutes he had sex with (written for the prostitute review site he frequented) as having the ass of an 18 year old soccer player. Creepy factor aside, not the easiest thing for a 40-something year old woman who's always had body image issues to come to terms with.
As we were walking back to the car after the movie, I glanced across the street and noticed a tall, Jessica Simpson-type blond in a short skirt crossing the street. And I noticed Husband noticing her, too. I see attractive men out in the world every day, but I don't have the automatic response that I think husband has to attractive women. I'm sure there are plenty of biological explanations for this. But when it comes down to it, what I perceive (true or not) pushes my self-doubt buttons.
Now, Husband is a mid-40s, overweight, bespectacled, unemployed guy with thinning hair. Under a certain amount of bravado, he's shy and self-conscious. It's not like he's got hot young women trailing after him waiting to pounce the instant I look the other way. So why does husband's response to other women fill me with dread? Because it confirms my fears that I'm not sufficient. The nagging, absolutist rule I have in my head is that if Husband was satisfied with me, if I was good enough, pretty enough, thin enough, smart enough, funny enough, talented enough - if I was enough, no other woman could turn his head, no matter how much cleavage she was baring, or how young and hot she looked.
Why do I care if Husband thinks I'm good enough? I don't think it's him that I'm worried about. I think I'm afraid I'll confirm definitively that, as I've suspected all along, I'm not good enough. Not just not-good-enough for Husband, but Not Good Enough, period. Like a fact, a truth, an indisputable law of nature.
I don't measure up and when the real opportunity for something better comes along I'll be discarded.
As a matter of fact, when I was raking through this muck this morning, I was actually wondering (again) if Husband had settled for me because he got me. If he so lacked the confidence to go out and get what he really wanted (a hot blond) that he settled for me because I fell in love with and idolized him. Husband's college girlfriend, who he described the other day to a friend as "really beautiful" was blond. So were a lot of the prostitutes (though not all) that he picked, Chinese menu style, from that prostitute review and booking site.
It's a yukky place to go to, this corner of my mind. But sometimes I find myself here anyway.
This morning I went onto Husband's computer to Google something and, shovel in hand, still digging in this ditch, ended up looking at his web history. I found that he'd looked at about 10 pictures from the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue this month.
What the fuck?! What business does he have looking at these basically naked, very young women splayed out and pouting, offering the promise of their bodies to all the drooling Sports Illustrated slobs? What other purpose could there be aside from satisfying that insatiable, uncontrollable part of himself that can't help but feel entitled to gorge himself on this kind of pathetic shit?
My own animal brain kicked in: I have to confront him. Demand to know why he's done this. Find out if he discussed the incident with his sponsor. But most important of all, I have to be prepared. Prepared to surgically cut him out and move on.
I could feel my insides going into lockdown, things slamming shut and hardening. It felt good, because it felt empowering. I want to protect myself. I want to be invincible. I want to kill before I get killed.
But for some reason, when I go into this mode now, the cost never escapes me. I could feel myself going places I know I don't want to go.
It was a good time to take a few deep breaths, and try to look evenly at the facts.
It was an isolated incident. He looked at only a small selection of the 45 photos that were available. He didn't go from there to any other gawking at women. He hadn't spent the day, or even any significant amount of time looking at these pictures. And he hadn't looked at any other pictures of women online (at least on this computer) this month or last. This incident was clearly a different pattern from what he'd done in the past when he was deeply involved in his addiction.
I want Husband to be perfect, and and he's not. But he's far from what he used to be regarding his compulsive sexual behavior: Completely lacking self-awareness, deluded, full of himself, resentful, angry, sarcastic and in denial.
I still feel my anger churning now. But I can see it's because of the things that are here for me to be with, to learn, to absorb: Most things that can kill me (literally and figuratively) are beyond my control. My self-worth is still so defined by how much I think others value me. I have a long way to go in learning how to value myself. I am full of self-loathing and doubt that are easily triggered. And I'm afraid, afraid, afraid - afraid that because I'm not good enough I'll cease to matter to people I trust and love. (I can see how crazy and inaccurate this is with my logical mind, but I think that's as close as I can come to identifying the feeling I have right now.) Feeling like a consolation prize is very frightening for me. I think because I feel so vulnerable, so out of control, because my own internalization of my value is so weak. Being tied to the capricious valuations of others is pretty terrifying. I don't think about this consciously, ever, but upon examination it feels like the undercurrent of what's going on when I get mired in this kind of thinking.
I'm going to stay on my side of the street with this. I'm going to assume Husband dealt with his actions appropriately. And I'm going to focus on myself. On who I am and who want to be in the world. I want to look at myself with God's eyes, and see all that God would see, the way that I look at my son and see all his magnificence.
It's easy to lose this thread of relationship to self in the dense fabric that is daily life. The temptation to get pulled into the urgency of the unimportant is strong and consistent.
So perhaps this is why Higher Power gives me teen sex scenes, hot blonds on the street, and those unwelcome invasive thoughts. They are all opportunities. Opportunities for me to lean into the dissonance and chaos of life and know again that I can be fully alive and present to both the ecstasy and rawest pain of a human life, and not be overcome.
The Beginning of Something Else
On June 1, 2007 I found out my husband and partner of almost two decades had been unfaithful to me since before our marriage, and had been having intercourse with prostitutes for 3 1/2 years. This is what happened next.
Showing posts with label afgo. Show all posts
Showing posts with label afgo. Show all posts
Sunday, April 25, 2010
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
More opportunity to practice (AFGO)
On the CD that comes with the book Spiritual Liberation by Michael Bernard Beckwith, he says "In the mind of God there aren't any problems, there are just impetuses for us to evolve." He goes on to say that the real question to ask as we face challenges is "where must I grow, where must I evolve?" What is it within me that I must set free to empower myself in the face of this issue?
I've also been thinking about the difference between self-delusion and serenity. If I just choose to be happy, as I'm often invited to do, isn't it possible that I'm just looking on the sunny side and not dealing with the muck and darkness like I've always done?
After more thinking I've concluded that delusion is when I choose to be happy by ignoring or otherwise distracting myself from problems; and that serenity and empowerment come when I can choose to be happy in the presence of challenges and obstacles. This involves acceptance regarding what I can't control, and faith that I have everything I need within myself to meet all challenges that come my way. I can grow, I can evolve. It may not be easy, it may not be pleasant, but it's definitely something I can do. I can find the opportunity in any situation if I really want to.
So I have another opportunity, and my grand conclusion is easier contemplated than practiced.
Husband found out last night that he's being laid off in January. With my consulting work a trickle the past month, my mind immediately flings off in the direction of foreclosure.
This is part of my sickness. I fall into a downward spiral and hem and haw about disasters that haven't happened and things I can't control.
I have A LOT OF FEAR about financial insecurity, and about Husband being able to handle the stress of job loss, job hunting, stress in his current job, his continuing health issues, his upcoming operation, staying on his new medically supervised liquid diet, and sometimes not being able to get enough good sleep. I worry that the addict is going to pay us a visit.
So...I'm going to meditate more, exercise more, ask myself how I can evolve (I've already got a hunch this involves restructuring my relationship to abundance and surrendering to what I can and can't control,) talk to my higher power and turn things over...and we'll see. I'm getting better at seeing what is mine to deal with and what is Husband's to deal with, so that's useful progress.
Maybe over the past 18 months I've gained some facility in dealing with groundlessness and the impermanence of life.
I've also been thinking about the difference between self-delusion and serenity. If I just choose to be happy, as I'm often invited to do, isn't it possible that I'm just looking on the sunny side and not dealing with the muck and darkness like I've always done?
After more thinking I've concluded that delusion is when I choose to be happy by ignoring or otherwise distracting myself from problems; and that serenity and empowerment come when I can choose to be happy in the presence of challenges and obstacles. This involves acceptance regarding what I can't control, and faith that I have everything I need within myself to meet all challenges that come my way. I can grow, I can evolve. It may not be easy, it may not be pleasant, but it's definitely something I can do. I can find the opportunity in any situation if I really want to.
So I have another opportunity, and my grand conclusion is easier contemplated than practiced.
Husband found out last night that he's being laid off in January. With my consulting work a trickle the past month, my mind immediately flings off in the direction of foreclosure.
This is part of my sickness. I fall into a downward spiral and hem and haw about disasters that haven't happened and things I can't control.
I have A LOT OF FEAR about financial insecurity, and about Husband being able to handle the stress of job loss, job hunting, stress in his current job, his continuing health issues, his upcoming operation, staying on his new medically supervised liquid diet, and sometimes not being able to get enough good sleep. I worry that the addict is going to pay us a visit.
So...I'm going to meditate more, exercise more, ask myself how I can evolve (I've already got a hunch this involves restructuring my relationship to abundance and surrendering to what I can and can't control,) talk to my higher power and turn things over...and we'll see. I'm getting better at seeing what is mine to deal with and what is Husband's to deal with, so that's useful progress.
Maybe over the past 18 months I've gained some facility in dealing with groundlessness and the impermanence of life.
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
AFGO
It's a year of change.
I got laid off this afternoon. Perhaps now would be a good time to figure out what color my parachute is.
More lessons, more opportunities for growth, more chances to be with what is so.
Ahhhhhhh.....
Off to the treadmill to work up a sweat and focus on staying wonderfully present to life!
I got laid off this afternoon. Perhaps now would be a good time to figure out what color my parachute is.
More lessons, more opportunities for growth, more chances to be with what is so.
Ahhhhhhh.....
Off to the treadmill to work up a sweat and focus on staying wonderfully present to life!
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