josh’s part: lindsey’s story {part3}

Lindsey posted her story here a couple of days ago. You can read {part1} here and {part2} here.

This is her husband, Josh’s, perspective:

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taking responsibility

One night, I was surfing the internet on my home pc. I wasn’t looking for anything in particular, was really just passing time. On a whim, I pulled up the internet history.

Little did I know that one act would be the catalyst for a life change that would turn my marriage and faith upside down and inside out.

I found history of an email account I knew nothing about, and I had also started becoming suspicious of my wife’s constant texting. I would check the phone, but she had always deleted the messages. Things hadn’t been going well for a while between my wife and I and these were huge red flags to me. We were arguing more then usual, and in between the arguments were cold conversations about separation, disappointment, and moving on.

We worked for the same company, and a few days after I found the email account, she told me her phone had died. I left early that day, taking her phone with me to ‘charge it’ hopeful that it had died before she could erase any messages. I didn’t know what I would find, but I was sick to my stomach for the entire drive home. Then I plugged in the phone, opened her text messages and my worse fear was realized. There was just one message and it was incredibly graphic. I nearly threw up as I read it, both because of the content and because of who it was from.

I knew this man, was friends with him, respected and admired him.

Shock set in, the thought of my wife having an affair absolutely unbelievable. She had always been distant, detached, quiet, and reserved. The contradiction between who I had always known her to be and the evidence in front of me seemed unreal.

When she came home, I asked her a question I never thought I would have to ask, “Are you having an affair?”

A look flashed across her face (Relief? Pain? Guilt?)

Her quiet reply, “Yes.”

I slept in a separate room that night. I couldn’t be near her. I was disgusted by her, by him, by this thing they had brought into my house. I cried more that night than I can ever remember crying in my life. It was as if the final piece of the façade of my life had fallen and I was exposed.

All the while a voice was growing louder and louder in my mind. Through my rage and tears were questions.

Where have you been?

Did you protect your wife from this?

Is she the only one to blame?

God was whispering in my ear, making His presence known in my darkest hour. He didn’t condone what my wife had done, but He used that moment to demand that I look at my own heart.

And my own heart was very dark.

Where have you been?

The reality is that I abandoned my wife long before she abandoned me. I had been gone for years emotionally and physically, pursuing a life that didn’t involve my family at all. I was training for triathlons, playing hockey, mixing in a little golf, and working long hours at a job I loved. The little time I was home, I was inattentive, irritable and unhelpful. I didn’t care what my wife needed, what my children needed. I was a selfish husband, a distant father, and an even worse provider. I was too busy obsessing about and pursuing what I needed to bother with caring for my family.

An addiction to pornography had also consumed me since I was a child. I never really learned how to pursue my wife because I had no need or desire to do so. It was easier to spend two minutes finding the website of choice than spending two minutes pursuing intimacy with my wife. The women on the Internet didn’t say no, didn’t require an investment, and didn’t make demands.

Did you protect your wife from this?

The saddest part of all of this is that I knew this man; knew they had a relationship in and out of work, even knew that he made her uncomfortable sometimes with his comments. But I admired and respected him as a peer and as a Christian leader. He had a great family, a great job, and was very active and well-respected in his church. I just didn’t think their relationship was any big deal, so dismissed the few concerns she raised.

Is she the only one to blame?

I had been involved with another woman at work for quite some time. It started innocently, flirting and joking. We started emailing, some days sending 20 or more e-mails back and forth, full of innuendo and unspoken desire. Emotionally, she made me feel respected. She admired my dedication to work, to my sports, and made me feel attractive and wanted. While things never became physical, the emotional attachment was sucking every last bit of my attention and energy. In just a few short hours the full weight of that question crushed me. The horrifying realization that while my wife made the choice to have a physical affair, I might as well have driven her to his house and walked her to his bed.

As I looked at my wife the next morning, I knew I had taken her and our marriage for granted. More importantly, I knew that I still loved my wife and as much as she had hurt me, I had hurt her in kind. I couldn’t walk away, because I was just as responsible as she was for the destruction of our marriage.

Surviving the aftermath of the affairs have been full of pain and anger and beauty and hope. God stepped into our lives, and offered His hand and His grace to pull us out of our pit of destruction.

Even so, our life isn’t perfect. We still argue, still hurt each other, and are still tempted by sin. The only saving grace that holds our marriage together is our Lord and Savior protecting us and binding us back
together.

I wouldn’t wish what we have been through on anyone; but I also don’t regret one second, because this brought us to God.

And because of Him, I can say with all sincerity to my wife “I love you, I always have.  I will never leave you, and I am sorry I did not protect you from this.”

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Josh, thank you for sharing your story here. Your ability to hear God over the scream of your pain is one of the most beautiful examples of Grace I’ve seen. If you were doing this on your own, you would be bitter by now. I hope this inspires many….  -Serena

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exposed

It was a brisk Saturday morning in early Fall when those words popped up in a chat window on my computer screen.

Melody, my wife, had run to the grocery store and I was home alone, having just logged into an instant messenger service that I used often. The woman on the other end of that post lived somewhere in Kentucky. I had recently made contact with her in an online chat room.

An adult chat room.

I stared at the words on my screen. My heartbeat sped up…palms began to sweat.

How easy it would have been to ignore her post. How easy it would have been to simply have told her that I was not available to meet her later.

It was the moment of decision. I had recently started chatting again after a ten month hiatus. I started back innocently enough with sports chat, but quickly migrated back to the seedy and titillating adult rooms full of other bored, lonely, checked-out people looking to connect with someone…anyone.

I had taken a break from chat rooms because ten months earlier I had done the unthinkable. I actually agreed to meet a woman face-to-face that I had met in a local chat room. My private, virtual life and my flesh-and-blood “real” life intersected. Nothing happened that day, but as I sat across the table from her at a local restaurant, I realized I had crossed lines that I had vowed I would NEVER cross. I came home that day and took Yahoo Messenger off of my computer and stopped cold-turkey.

For ten months…

“I can be in Birmingham tonight if you want me to be.”

Ten months later, I sat staring at those words on my screen…watching the cursor blink…knowing she was waiting for a response.

I typed “Ok” and, after what seemed like forever, finally hit “send”.

At that moment, paralyzing fear and intense excitement rushed through me simultaneously.

Terrifying fear because I knew what she was coming for and I knew that I would cross that final line and go there, if for no other reason than because she had driven all the way from Kentucky and I felt some twisted sense of obligation.

The excitement flowed from playing with the forbidden. I think a needy and desperate part of me also relished the fact that someone was willing to drive over 350 miles to meet me.

I crossed the line that night and never even got her last name. Today I can’t even remember her first name. I never spoke to her again, but the damage had been done. I had added physical adultery to my secret life of pornography and chat rooms. I crossed a line that I never imagined crossing. The lies I had fed myself for years about pornography being innocent and “something men do” and “not a big deal” mocked me as I drove home that fateful Saturday night.

One word consumed my thoughts. Adulterer.

The shame I felt and the contempt I had for myself was suffocating. Oh how far I had drifted. What I thought was innocent and “not a big deal” had been literally sucking the life out of me. I was a shell of a man completely checked out…thinking only about the next alone opportunity I would have for my fix.

And then I thought about my precious wife and my kids. Telling Melody what I had done was not even remotely on my radar. I vowed this was the last time and was successful in white-knuckling it for another nine months. Nine months later it happened again.

And again.

And again.

And, again.

By the time my secrets came out, it had happened seven times. Seven times over a three year period.

Secrets. Lies. Cover-up.

I was a desperate, conflicted, empty shell.

And then my two worlds collided and I was exposed. It was a beautiful undoing. Pain and relief rushed into my empty soul at the same time. Witnessing the heartache and anguish that Melody went through was unbearable. Melody’s deep, anguishing wail from behind our locked bedroom door will forever haunt me.

I went to an intensive in Minnesota and began to understand sexual addiction and my own woundedness and started the journey of recovery. It took much more pain before I finally reached my bottom in 2002. I knew that recovery was worth it so that I would not hurt Melody and the kids, but that was not enough. I had to get to the place where I believed in the core of my being that Tray Lovvorn was worth recovery.

Early one morning as I was reading through the Gospels, this thought occurred to me:

“God knew all about my sexual addiction and my seven affairs when he saved me.”

That was the day I began to understand just how amazing and scandalous and wonderful God’s grace is. I began to uncover layers of unbelief that skewed my view of God and His tender mercies toward me. I ran to promises like Zephaniah 3:17:

“The Lord your God is in your midst,
a mighty one who will save;
he will rejoice over you with gladness;
he will quiet you by his love;
he will exult over you with loud singing.”

I chose to believe that God saved me because He loved me and because He delighted in me and not because of anything I could offer Him. I spent years delicately managing my personal reputation and He showed me His love and favor when I doubted it the most.

No matter what you have done or how far you have strayed, God is right now singing over you. You can surrender…and stop…and rest…and listen to the beautiful song or you can choose not to believe it and go on with your efforts of self-righteousness.

My prayer is that you will stop and listen sooner than I did. That it won’t take as much pain and heartache in your life.

He is singing over me…

He is singing over you…

Do you believe it?

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Traylor, thank you for breaking your heart open again so we can see how deeply you have been healed. It’s an honor to host your story. -Serena

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You can find Traylor on Twitter, read more of his writing here and watch a video with he and his wife Melody here.

found:lindsey’s story {part2}

…continued from part1

Those three simple words, “I don’t care,” harshly illustrating the depravity of my soul, my sin for all to see. And then, we are caught by my husband not long after it started; that lack of caring resulting in a selfish recklessness that did not bode well for hiding a secret such as this.

My husband is devastated; full of fury and hurt. Each and every minute spent in each other’s company is agonizing, painful, full of grief, and often anger.

Consequences for the affair come swiftly, and come hard. I feel my identity being ripped away; the separation violent and bloody. When I made my choice, I threw away the beauty of being a wife, a mother, a friend. Trying to put that skin back on in the aftermath feels uncomfortable, like I am trying to wear clothing meant for someone else, someone more worthy. Shame sets in, and I do what I have always done. I start wrapping layers of protection around me; trying to numb the pain.

But there is also love, has always been love between my husband and I. The only tenuous thread we have to hang on to in the middle of the storm raging between us. My first real glimpse of God occurs the morning after, when my husband says “I love you, I always have.  I will never leave you, and I am sorry I did not protect you from this.”

That first new bond between us is made in an instant, a feeling of awe and the gentle sigh of hope that he (and He) could still love me, after what I’ve done. God is already moving, rushing in to take back what has been lost.

But the sad reality is that I am not ready to be found, and won’t be for a long time.

In my mind, I start to place blame, because it is easier to bear then the pain. There is no explanation, no reason I can give that will make who I have become any less horrifying, any less sickening. But I carry the damage of a childhood filled with sexual and emotional abuse that taught me that I was an object, to be used. A childhood filled with abandonment and neglect that taught me that I was unlovable, unwanted. And this man, this first experience with a “Christian,” taught me that God surely had judged me, and deemed me unworthy. Why else would He allow this man to walk in and destroy my life, allow this to happen to a desperate girl making her first attempts to really seek Him?

These thoughts batter the aching rawness of my heart, as I slide into a world of depression and self-pity that will not budge for almost a year. I go through the motions of attending counseling and recovery, try to use God as a band-aid over my gaping wounds instead of as the Healer, and say what everyone wants me to say. But inside I am screaming and fighting, wrestling with God and what He is asking of me.

I do not want to believe His love for me.

I do not want to obey His commands.

I do not want to let go of the control I think I have.

I do not want to let go of my crushing unbelief.

Our church continues to surround us, fills our lives with grace and stories of a merciful and loving God who abhors what has happened, who weeps with us, who is waiting for us. And then, an angel befriends me. A sweet and precious woman of God obeys His command. She patiently teaches me who God really is, what faith really means, what salvation is.

Only then, do I truly repent for my sin. I have been “sorry” for a long time. Sorry for the pain, sorry for the heartache, sorry for the consequences. But not until this moment, as she walks me through accepting Christ as my Savior, do I finally feel the weight of my sin, cry out in agony and beg forgiveness over what I have done against my Father. Only then, do I forgive myself.

Since then, this journey towards God has been rough; full of steps forward and back. Even so, I can so clearly see the devastation of my life without Christ, and have found such precious hope and beautiful peace in the promise of my life with Christ. It certainly has not been easy; this process of letting go of all that I was in order to claim all that God wants me to be. Learning how to receive grace and learning to accept that

I am forgiven,

I am loved,

I am free.

I am constantly reminded that I am a work in progress, our marriage is a work in progress, and always will be. We don’t have it all figured out and we still have trouble sometimes trusting and seeking God and honoring each other as we should. But He loves us anyway, understands our pain, and knows our hearts. And He has been so faithful, capturing our souls with Truth and showering us with gracious love in a million different ways each and every day.

My husband and I are on this journey together, our goal united. We live and breathe everyday to glorify God through our new life and love, our marriage, our painful past. Simply so that others may know Him and love Him too.

And now that you have read our story, I leave you with a question and a challenge.

Whatever you are doing, whatever you have done, whatever has been done to you…Are you willing to stop, willing to take a deep breath full of mercy and power and love, and allow your story to become His story?

He’s waiting for you, and He loves you right now, as you are. Even in the midst of your own abyss.

That’s what grace is.

That’s who God is.

All you have to do is cry out, and believe.

“I waited patiently for the Lord; he inclined to me and heard my cry. He drew me up from the pit of destruction, out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure. He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God. Many will see and fear, and put their trust in the Lord. -Psalm 40: 1-3

Lindsey is on Twitter and you can read more of her writing here.

lost: lindsey’s story {part1}

“Battle not with monsters lest ye become a monster; and if you gaze into the abyss the abyss gazes into you.” -Friedrich Nietzsche

I stand up from my desk to meet him. Before I turn around, I put on my fake smile, my friendly façade. Hand to hand we touch, a handshake, a formal introduction. Our eyes lock, and I am immediately unsettled…a violent reaction crashing through me, a hint of darkness and devastation.

I blink, unsure of what just happened. I want to snatch my hand away, furiously wipe his touch away, turn and run away. Dancing around the edges of my unexplainable fear is the awareness of professional etiquette, of maintaining my composure. I can’t run away, because this is my job.

We casually chat, the talk of strangers in a business world. He asks me to lunch to learn more about the company, to network. I want to say (scream) no but my boss is standing right there. I say yes, because this is my job.

I don’t know, then, that the Holy Spirit is frantically beating at the doors of my hardened heart at that exact moment. Warning me, trying to steer me away, before it is too late.

The next day, we walk to lunch. His gaze slides over me, up and down, settles. He glances back up and catches my eye, says “I like your shirt.” I blush furiously, mumble thank you, try to change the subject. I am all too aware of the meaning behind his comment. We keep walking, because this is my job.

We enter the restaurant and sit. I am nervous, won’t meet his eyes. I play with my napkin, play with my fork, barely eat. I answer his questions about company culture, people, and expectations. The lunch drags on, and he seems to grow aware of the awkwardness, my discomfort. He says something funny, the mood grows lighter. I start to wonder if it is just me, misinterpreting his actions, his words, his glance.

The weeks pass by, and we fall into an easy work relationship. He is funny, charming, charismatic, as we talk about work, family, God, church.

The mention of God, of church fills me with wonder and hope, and makes me dismiss my initial feeling about him. I have been lonely, empty, scared for so long. The devastating fallout of a childhood full of abuse and neglect and the crumbling pieces of my marriage have been crashing down for years. I follow the rules, I am a good girl, but I also define myself as a victim, see the world through the eyes of despair. So nothing seems to be changing. And I think that maybe, this thing called God, can help. And maybe, this man so full of God, can help.

One day, months later, we talk about my childhood, the effect it has had on my marriage, my relationship with my husband. He asks, “Are you together?” I look at him, at first confused, my naivety wrapping itself around me. Then I realize what he means, and that feeling from the first day we met rushes back in. Only this time, I ignore it, and I shake my head no, too embarrassed to say out loud how empty my marriage has become, how I have failed my husband emotionally, physically.

I needed a friend.

And in my desperate need, I made him my savior.

Not understanding, then, that a line had just been crossed. Not understanding that he, as a Christian, knew better then to ask those questions, knew exactly how he should proceed in the care of my unsaved soul, of my destroyed marriage. I am unaware that he is a sex addict, a predator…and that I am now his prey. So he didn’t do what he should because he had also been lonely, empty, scared for so long. Hurting and hiding and running from a God he knew intimately.

This pattern in our relationship goes on for months. The ebb and flow of casual friendship interspersed tragically with more moments like these. Inappropriate connections and conversations designed to keep me attached to him, dependent on him. Me willingly hanging on to and encouraging the slivers of attention and acceptance dangled in front of me, the small doses of hope meted out whenever he sent me Bible verses or talked about God.

By the time it finally happens we are both already lost. We have continually compromised, steadily given in to the monsters inside. We have gazed into the abyss of our hearts and justified our need, our selfish desire for far too long, flirting with disaster. All the while Satan has waited, crouching, laughing for the final surrender.

That first kiss…so violent, so needy, so demanding. I close my eyes and lay back, breathless with the dark release, trembling with the pounding of the demons flinging themselves into an orgy of victory in my soul.

In this moment, I am no longer following the rules, being a good girl, being a victim.

I willingly become a whore.

I shatter then, resigning myself to the pull of my dark need as each stolen moment passes and days full of agony and shame drift by. I know I am drowning in a foul pit of destruction, know I am bending and swaying to Satan’s siren call.

And the most devastating knowledge of all, the foretold rottenness ingrained in the very nature of my humanity uncovered, raw, exposed…

I don’t care.

found: lindsey’s story {part2} is here….

Lindsey is on Twitter and you can read more of her writing here.

i walked into an affair

In 2006, I walked into an affair.

At that time, my husband, Brian, and I had been married five years and our oldest son, Chance, wasn’t yet a year old. This man and his wife were close couple-friends of ours. We went on family vacations together, spent holidays together, our kids played together, we did ministry together… close.

I could make up excuses to how I let this happen: “I came from a divorced family”, “I grew up without a dad”, “My mother was abusive”, “My husband was distant”, “The other guy made the first move”… blah blah blah… but what it all boils down to is this:
I made my own grown-up choice and I WALKED INTO adultery.

I walked into a relationship that didn’t belong to me and didn’t walk away until I let it overtake two years… no… THREE years of my life.

In April of this year (2009), I finally told Brian about my affair. The affair had lasted two years, but I let it steal three from my family and me by hiding it and not revealing it in all its ugliness.

You see, secrets were something I kept well. I had a lot of secrets, so I thought, “why not just add this one to the list?” I never told ANYONE. I was never caught. But as I tried to keep this one hidden, it felt as if my soul was tearing away from me. The affair was no longer taking me away from my marriage and family, but now, I was stealing ME from myself. Worst of all, it was claiming everything I ever had with Jesus.

In my secrets, I was holding back any and every blessing I could have been or given to my kids and husband. I thought I was self-preserving… but in reality, I was self-mutilating my heart. I was failing at everything. In my quest to prevent complete brokenness, I soon found myself failing even that.

Brokenness ensued… and I embraced it.

The next six months proved to be the most trying time of our lives. After some prompting from Brian, I ended up telling all our closest friends and family about my affair. Some were gracious… some were not. That’s part of the package of sin… and I had to learn to not own their feelings as my own. That’s a whole ‘nother post though.

In our time of healing and recovery, there were times of good and bad. Sometimes, we clung to each other, grateful because we almost lost each other. Then there were the other times, when we didn’t know if our marriage was going to weather the storm.

Brian and I dove head first into counseling and life-coaching, dealing with our issues face-to-face 3 to 4 times a week. We needed surgery on our marriage. It was brutal, painful and exhausting… but every minute was worth it, because God was stitching us back together better and tighter than we ever were before.

In all rights, Brian should have left me but ultimately chose to stay. We didn’t want a divorce, but a divorce HAD to happen. We divorced our old marriage, and took on our new one. It was painful. Though there were many bad memories in the old marriage we didn’t mind getting rid of, there were also just as many wonderfully BEAUTIFUL ones we had to abandon roadside. We mourned our losses. We still find ourselves mourning those sometimes, but today, we also find ourselves making brand new, even more amazingly gorgeous memories… untainted by the memory of an affair.

One of the biggest healing agents to our marriage was prayer. Not just ours, but prayers from friends and friends of friends. We ASKED for prayer.

Allow me to stray from my story for a minute and address something. I have received over 1,000 emails/notes/messages of people sharing how they have experienced or ARE experiencing an affair and their marriage didn’t/isn’t survive(ing). The reason is simple: Satan still has a hold on it.

I’m not saying that there’s an easy fix to the dilemma at hand or that your situation isn’t complicated. You’re definitely wedged in between a rock and a hard place. What I AM saying is your marriage hasn’t completely been handed over to God.

Maybe the affair isn’t over.
Maybe your spouse can’t get over the hurt.
Maybe you can’t trust they won’t do it again.
Maybe you just can’t forgive.
Maybe your spouse won’t change.

Maybe the relationship can’t heal right because it wasn’t broken enough. Sometimes, when you break a bone, it doesn’t heal correctly. The only way you can ever get that bone to work correctly for you is if the Doctor RE-breaks it and you sit… and allow it to re-knit itself. Both of you need to choose to be broken, but you CANNOT control or choose for your spouse. You can only choose for yourself.

“Breaking you” may mean you need to tell your secret not only to your spouse and family… but to your community… your church. Let all the secrets out (I’m not saying to reveal every little detail, in fact, I would advise against that. Tell your story in categories… not in details) so you may be released from Satan’s hold. Satan cannot bind you if you don’t give him a rope and duct tape.

After telling my story, only my actions proved my new boundaries. Revealing it all left me raw. Friendly male encounters that didn’t used to faze me now left me feeling VERY uncomfortable. I knew this was good.

My boundaries had changed. Instead of running up to “the line” and testing how fast I could stop before stepping on it, I deeply planted a very thick hedge in front of the line. If I were ever to get bumped towards the line, I would wrestle with that hedge a bit, but would be SO far from that line I’m certain I would never cross the line.

Today, Brian and I have a marriage that is stronger than it’s ever been. We are finding ourselves more in love than we ever thought possible. Our healing has been nothing short of a miracle… but His miracles aren’t only for us.

Three questions for you:
1. Are you willing to tell your story? All of it?
2. Are you willing to be TRULY broken?
3. Are you willing to plant that hedge?

None of this is easy… but I can assure you, it is ALL worth it.

Jenni can be found on facebook, you can follow her on twitter and you can read more of her writing on her website.

Thank you, Jenni, for sharing your story with us!