Making it real

Journal Entry, October 6 2002 - 
Today my life is over.  
Today my husband confessed of being unfaithful to me.
Twenty-three years ago on this day my husband told me that he loved me for the very first time.
Today he told me that he never really loved me.
What is real in my life?
What is happening to me?
Patti Snodgrass - Surviving Your Worst Nightmare - A Guide for the Betrayed


     It happened for the first time months ago.  I thought I was making things up in my head again, but it was God talking to me, I am now sure of it.  In one of my intense prayer times, out of the blue, I heard, "A man is coming from another place to give you a message."  This part was clear.  I also heard that Dave would introduce us and the man is a pastor, but I was less sure of these two statements.  Dave was the only one I told, because how embarrassing if I was mistaken.  Then one day, several weeks later, on Dave's facebook page he announced a pastor from out of town would be speaking the next weekend.  I knew when I saw the man's picture, this was the guy.
     I made sure I was there to hear what this man had to say.  I have fought back tears in church before, but as I listened to this man's sermon, it was a constant.  He was telling my story, the male version, but it was my story.  The message: Don't ever stop talking about it.  Don't let anyone close your mouth when God tells you to open it.  Keep talking even if it seems nobody is listening.  Keep talking without fear.  Your words will be used by God.
     I left right after the service because there were too many people in line to talk to him.  But I came back the next morning and hung around until Dave introduced me to him.  We talked briefly and he continued in his message to me about telling my story.  His wife had written a book about her story.  He had cheated on her and she had forgiven him.  He told me how she battled to keep writing and all the messages she received from Satan as he tried to convince her not to write.  At the time I was writing my story and really wanted to stop.  He gave me what I needed to keep writing, to keep talking.  It doesn't matter what anyone thinks of me or my story.  I tell it for God and as long as He is satisfied with what I am saying that is all that matters.  I have an audience of One.  It's a blessing if anyone else benefits from it.
     I bought his wife's book the next day along with another he suggested.  I really didn't see a reason to read her book, because I had never been cheated on by my spouse.  Well, that I know of.  I just felt there was a reason and maybe it was to hand it to someone else.  It turned out to be a huge part of my healing.  See I was not cheated on, but I was "the other woman".  Years ago, the one person who had always believed in me when no one else did, became my biggest secret.  My dad had an affair and left all of us just before I turned twelve.  Now, I had become the person who had destroyed my life.  
     Once in awhile I would pick up the book and read parts of it.  I would get a little bit out of it, because we have all been betrayed at some point in our lives.  I could identify with her pain.  Then came the day when I read about how she made it real.  How it had to be real for her to heal.  She pictured him with the other woman until her heart hurt so bad she couldn't stand it.  She pictured them together over and over until it was real and she could feel it and then she began to heal it.  It had to be real for her to forgive and for the healing to begin.  Most people would say she was torturing herself, but I understood it.  Many times I have faced pain by making it real this same way.
     A friend of mine who had to face the murder of her grand baby handled it the same way.  She fought the system to be able to hold her grandchild.  She looked at all the reports she could get her hands on.  Again people said, "Why does she torture herself?"  But I understood.  She had to make it real to feel and then to start the process of healing.  The thing these two amazing women have in common?  They have both forgiven the person who almost destroyed them.
     In reading Patti's book, I faced the pain I had caused.  It was difficult to read her words, to feel her pain and to know I had caused another woman to feel like she did.  But I had to face it to make it real.  I had to face it to forgive myself and let go of the guilt I had been carrying around for many years.  To let go of the hatred I had for myself.  What I did was selfish and I was trying so desperately to get what I needed that I didn't even consider the damage I was doing to another human being.  We have all hurt others.  We have all denied what we did was that bad, but to hear that person's story and face the feelings you helped cause is a difficult and painful realization I needed for the healing process, the forgiving, to begin. 
     Some may ask why I would admit to such a failure.  Why would I admit to my selfish behavior on line for anyone to see?  Because, I'm taking the power from Satan.  He can no longer throw in my face what I have already admitted.  When people say, "You had an affair with a married man."  I can say, Yes I did and not only has God forgiven me, but I have forgiven myself.  It can no longer be used against me.  Satan has tried already.  A person who should support me said to me weeks ago, "I'm praying that you and Dave don't end up having an affair." This was Satan throwing my past in my face. This person obviously has no idea who I am or how I truly feel.  At first these words cut like a knife and all I could say was "Thanks".  I felt the stab of Satan telling me I will never be healed, I will never be good, I will never change.  He does this often.  I have been falsely accused since then of this same behavior, but Ephesians 6:12 says "For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms."  I'm grabbing the knife from Satan's hand.

     God has been speaking to me about this for the last week.  I knew this day would come when I was to write about this and I am completely resting in God, my will is aligned with His.  Let the chips fall where they may as He is in complete control of how and where they fall and my trust is in Him, not this world.
     The true message here has nothing to do with affairs, it's about making it real.  We read fiction and we can picture the characters, the places they travel and the feelings they experience, because it is not a threat to us.  We read scripture and hear messages about Jesus and what He wants for us, what He has done for us.  It's to big to be real.  It makes a nice fairy tale.  It's easier to keep it at a distance for several reasons.  It's difficult to believe that someone would suffer for us like that.  Why?  Because we don't deserve it.  We don't want to believe it is real because the demands on our behavior seem too great.  It's just too hard to live by all those rules.  Sometimes when things are too intense we distance ourselves from them.  It happened so long ago that it's hard to imagine it.  To make it real, you have to picture it, over and over.  Read the scripture over and over until it becomes a part of us, until it becomes real.  It has to be internalized.  As Patti pictured her husband with another woman until it was real, imagine Jesus as the spike was driven through His wrist.  I winced when I typed that, but seriously this God in human form with all the feelings and emotion that we possess took a spike through His wrist for you.  And that was just a part of what He went through.  Imagine that, feel that pain, He loves you that much.  It's easier to know somebody loves you because they sent you flowers on your birthday or showed up to pray with you in the middle of the night or talked you down off a ledge where you intended to jump and end your life.  These are real because you were there and you saw it with your own eyes.  
     We keep God at a distant just like the first settlers in America or our great great grandparents because we only have the stories.  We weren't there.  The difference between the Bible and history books is that the Bible is God breathed.  Read it and picture it.  Study it because you were on His mind as He took His last breath.  Ask the Holy Spirit to show Himself to you.  I believe The Holy Spirit is our picture, our feeler, our God inside of us that makes the stories in the Bible real to us.  He was sent to help us understand Jesus, to tell us all about Him.  Ask Him to.  Get to know Him.

     What happened in my affair?  His wife was left with two special needs children and suffered a stroke.  The guilt about choked me.  He ran off with another woman and started his third family after I dumped him.  Will I ever face her?  Will I ever apologize to her?  God knows she deserves it, but He also knows when and if this will happen.  I could run up there right now and face her to ease my conscience, but it would be another selfish act.  What if she is not in the place she needs to be to benefit and be blessed?  God will tell me when and if I am to face her and what I owe her.  And I will do it.
     This was not the worst thing I did in my life.  The worst was to disrespect her, to disrespect my children and his.  To disrespect myself and to disrespect God.  We wonder why bad things happen, why we make wrong choices.  I was planning my suicide when I went to him as my friend and as a result we had an affair.  I would have ended my life and left my kids without a mother.  So I exchanged one selfish behavior for another.  I was in pain.  You have to experience pain to cause it.  But this is no excuse.
     What happened to Patti and her husband?  I have not been blessed with meeting Patti and I think it would be very emotional.  This is where I usually find some quote that is in line with whatever I have been writing about, but today, I will let Patti tell you how her story ends.  In the back of her book is a section where she thanks all who supported her in writing her story.  She saves her husband Rick to be the last one she thanks.  Here is the last paragraph of her words to him.  Amazing!

As I have often said to you, I will be forever thankful that you did not go to the grave with your secret. I am thankful. Even though what we went through was the most painful event of our lives, we made it, with our marriage intact, stronger than ever! Thank you for being honest, and earning my trust once again. - Patti Snodgrass - Surviving Your Worst Nightmare - A Guide for the Betrayed