A Kitchen Table: choose your own parable

When we were newly married and had only good to look forward to in our lives we bought a big beautiful solid wood kitchen table.

I remember being in the furniture store that day. We looked for something beautiful. We looked for something that would expand to fit our growing family. We had no children, but we knew we would. Of course we would. A million of them and we'd all live happily ever after.

When we found our table we both loved it. The salesman (realizing that we were young and dumb) told us that he once saw a woman wash her kitchen table with a wet washcloth. He was horrified because real wood should not be washed with water like that.

We nodded solemnly swearing to never water our table. We'd buy the expensive cream to polish it once a week. We'd always use a tablecloth and coasters. And really how dirty could it get? We were humans, not pigs. We went home the proud new owners of this beautiful table.

Our large family was delayed and looking at that table broke my heart. It was too big. Too big for the tiny dining room it occupied. Too big for the two of us. Too big for most things. I hated it. It represented everything I didn't have and so desperately wanted.

Then we had kids. 2 of them. And do you know what they do to that table?

They EAT AT IT. Every damn day.

They spill milk in the cracks which open to new leaves. They smear oatmeal and blueberries along the side of it's beautiful wood grain. They climb up and stand on it.

The notion that a meal can happen without food winding up directly on the table is beyond me. If I don't take a wet washcloth to it at least twice a day the filth becomes caked on. Like a living tree I'm afraid it would begin to grow around the remnants of meals trapping them forever deep inside the wood.

 

It no longer looks empty to me.

That table was in perfect condition for nearly 2 years. And now.....well it has no hope of ever being entirely clean ever again.

But it's ours. It's the table that we gather around 3 times a day.

Draw your own parallels.

Karma Angels

I wanted to take the computer and smash it to teeny tiny itty bitty unrecognizable pieces. Naturally I texted our friend Scabs to see if she’s ever done it. (Survey: who would you text if inquiring about smashing things?)

While her disclaimer states that she doesn’t condone violence her immediate response was “Do it.” Smile.

I didn’t because I like my computer, but don’t be surprised to find a post about pieces of computer bits flying around my backyard sometime in the next 20 years.

Within an hour of our conversation I got a text from Husband who works at a behavioral health institution. “I just got punched in a gut by a crazy”

Another disclaimer: In his defense, he doesn’t typically refer to the people who live there as “crazies” and we have a healthy respect for mental illness at our house - since 100% of the people who live here deal with it.

I laughed so hard I couldn’t stop smiling. In the ever-eloquent words of Scabs “the karma angels are watching out for me”.

 

I love the lady who punched him in the gut. With all my heart I love her.

Would it be inappropriate to show up and share a plate of brownies with her?

Follow Through

The thing that I keep getting caught up in lately is follow through.

Husband will say something and blow it off.
He'll set up boundaries for himself then ignore them.
He says he'll do something, say something, be somewhere and he just doesn't. Shrugs it off as if it doesn't matter.

This just not doing things doesn't compute for me. If I say something I do it. Or at least I have the decency to come up with a good excuse.

I get no such excuses from Husband. And it triggers me BAD.

I want to somehow enforce SOMEthing. I want him to understand that grown up human beings are reliable. I want him to know that this is unacceptable. And I want to somehow make stuff happen. I want to follow through for him. Force him to do what he said he'd do.

Because it seems to me that someone ought to.

How's that for codependent?

Addo Recovery: a new recovery tool

I haven't started this program yet - but I am going to before too long (I hope!) and wanted to share the information with you in case you are interested.

When I started looking for help online there was so very little available. I can't tell you how much I love seeing new programs like this popping up all over the place. And when it's specific to the wives? Clearly that has a special place in my heart.

I clearly have a lot of work to do, and anytime I can get help doing that I'm happy to take it.

So I'm inviting you too, if you'd like to have some information, sign up here.

Besides, the website scrolly downy thing is awesome. :) Check it out.

All I Ever Wanted

Disclaimer: Nothing is all I ever wanted. Nothing. Because I want a lot of things. In fact I might be demanding. Whatever.

But this week I asked for something special.
I wanted a week of peace.
I wanted a week of not talking about or worrying about it.
I wanted to just not think about addiction or emotional trauma or heartbreak.
I wanted zero breakdowns and zero moments stressing.

[insert laugh track here....because remember? addiction knows no holidays.]

Husband was on board and even made some extra efforts to avoid stress triggers for him. He paid all the bills and promised not to look at any of our financial accounts. (Some poor investing decisions are really stressing him out.) He followed up on some outstanding projects. He went above and beyond to be sure he was as prepared as he could be for this week.

Miraculously it was all going well - until it wasn't.

Tonight as we were talking he gawked at my boobs, took a deep (turned on) breath (does anybody else hate the deep turned-on breath?) and informed me (for the 25th time in 2 days) that he wanted me.

I sortof lost it.

At 7:25 on the first night we might have some time together in 3 weeks I told him to leave until he could calm down and act like a human being.

At 7:28 he told me if I was worked up I could leave.

So I did. Gladly.

I grabbed a good book and my keys and headed out.

I got my haircut. (yay for haircuts!)
I sat alone in an calm and peaceful IHOP booth while someone brought me a drink with a straw. I'm typically the straw fetcher around here. It's nice to be waited on.
I listened to my own radio station as loud as I wanted.
I got closer to ready to host book group.

And when I came home I felt a little better. Though not ready to enjoy any kind of conversation with Husband because I fear I'd say something horrible to him.

Here's what I wonder: Will I ever stop resenting him wanting me? Will I ever grow up and stop wishing for stress free weeks realizing that life just isn't like that? Will I ever be truly OK with this being my life for more than a few weeks at a time?

I have plenty moments when I'm resigned to this. I realize that my life might not look like other people's, and that I might not live the way that I always thought I would and that's OK. But I always come back to this feeling of disappointment. Wishing it was different. All of it different. Wishing I could have all I ever wanted.