Marriage Poll

[heartlandsahm]

Congratulations! In July we will also celebrate 13 years. We try to attend a marriage conference every few years usually hosted by Family Life Today. We also try to have a weekly date night, although I have noticed that has been getting more pushed to the side, so I will have to make an extra effort to keep that in the forefront. It is hard work AND ours is mainly good with a few difficulties. Honestly, it is an ever changing thing since we are always changing and growing ourselves. Neither of us have "seen" a marriage that stayed together.

[Scarlett]

Since you asked, get ready for a very long reply.

 

I would say in our marriage we have been through h*ll and back. We have been together for 10 years, married for 9, and I would honestly say that there were more bad times than good times through a majority of it. I really love him and he really loves me but we are both from super dysfunctional families. We've seperated for over 6 months shortly after my 7 year old was born, we've done counseling, I've given up on our marriage more times than I could count and just decided to stay with him for the children, he's given up on me, and so on. We've tried a lot of different things. The main thing we struggle with is the fact that he is an alcoholic and the behaviors that come along with that were often pretty darn horrible. I've gotten pretty sick mentally right along side him with the whole alcoholism stuff.

 

I am not a saint either and have my own issues but that alcoholism has been a really doozy. When he drinks, he turns into a really nasty person who is not someone I allow into my home. He's been verbally and physically abusive when drunk towards me. The last straw was just about a year ago when I found out about him getting drunk and committing adultery. He doesn't remember anything but the girl sure did. Since then I'm not sure how we've stayed married. I did a lot of crying and soul searching. I've realized I have to be the stronger person and call him on EVERYTHING. I can't keep quiet to keep the peace anymore. He was horrible to me for the majority of last year, mainly because he felt so badly about his behavior, and then at the beginning of this year, he really started changing.

 

Right this second, I have hope. Tomorrow at this time I might not. It is a roller coaster that I would love to get off of but my beliefs about divorce's impact on children are so strong that I feel it is my responsibilty to do everything in my power. Honestly, I think I would be an overall happier person without being married to him. I live a lot of my life without him right now. However, my children would suffer greatly and I would do anything, including stay in a really hard marriage, to keep their suffering to a minimum. No it is not ideal for them to see our marriage this way but I believe it is better than the alternative.

 

There are days when he does little things that remind me of who he really is and why I love him. Those days are starting to be closer together. So I have hope.

 

((((Pax))))