Where are they now?

Oh, my friends, I have so much to say right now.  I could probably write ten different blogs on different subjects.  But I will start with an update...

So where are we in this journey?

First, I'd like to say that I no longer want to or need to stay anonymous.  My name is Taylor.  I have no secrets.  And if my husband and/or his family see this blog, I don't care.  They should learn a thing or two anyway.

In November, we had a pre-hearing where our lawyers discussed things in order to petition the judge for what we each wanted. I didn't ask for anything.  I didn't just "lay down and take it".  I knew what I was doing. I trusted God to make sure that He would make Luke give me what I was due.  And if he didn't, I knew He would sustain us no matter what.  After all, who are we to ask the unrighteous for help before we ask God?

"When one of you has a grievance against another, does he dare go to law before the unrighteous instead of the saints? Or do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world is to be judged by you, are you incompetent to try trivial cases? Do you not know that we are to judge angels? How much more, then, matters pertaining to this life! So if you have such cases, why do you lay them before those who have no standing in the church? I say this to your shame. Can it be that there is no one among you wise enough to settle a dispute between the brothers" --1 Corinthians 6:1-5

I didn't "get" much.  I got my car.  And we basically agreed that I could take anything in the house that I wanted.  But I didn't take much either.  Like I said, I knew God would provide. I just took what I needed.  I didn't want to fight, not that I really think he would have. But I just didn't care to try either.  It wasn't worth it to cause a fuss.

So I moved out on December first with my youngest and my oldest (she's mine anyway, so he doesn't get her).  Before you say, "How can you split the kids?!?!"  It was just what worked for us.  Growing up in a broken home, I resented my father so much because I was forced to go visit him when I didn't want to.  My ten year old daughter doesn't enjoy going to her biological father's house as much as she should because she feels obligated to go.  I didn't want my kids to grow up with that.  And since my youngest (who has had extensive medical problems that I have taken care of since birth) is closer to me, and my oldest son listens to dad better, it just worked out that two of my sons live with dad full time and my other son and daughter live with me.  We have no formal parenting time arrangement either.  We go by our work schedules and we let the kids decide when they want to see us.  It's worked well for the last month.  I see my boys almost every day if just for a moment, but more often much longer.  We are doing well...I think anyway.  I know my kids are not completely doing alright because their family was just torn apart, but we are getting by.

According to the courts, the divorce will be final in February.  No specific date yet, but that's what I was told after our pre-trial thing in November.  It broke my heart.  I cried through the whole thing.  I must have looked like a blubbering idiot to the judge, my husband and his lawyer.  Actually, I bet my lawyer was taken aback too.  It's like I had no control over it though. It just flowed. I prayed extensively for the crying not to happen, but it did.  I wasn't scared or worried, just sad.  It hurt to hear my husband say to the judge that our marriage was beyond repair when he didn't even try.

But that's a moot point now. I've been out of the house for a month.  And I feel good.  Life isn't perfect, but I'm doing it with only the help of God.  That's all I need.

Last night, it came to my attention that my husband blocked me on Facebook.  Now it's not like I was even talking to him through that or harassing him or even looking at his page.  He just out of no where blocked me.  Didn't change our relationship status, didn't "hide" me, didn't just de-friend me.  No, he blocked me.  Seems extreme, and shocking, and hurtful, doesn't it?  I cried, I puked, I shook and yelled obscenities out to myself in my house (which I have worked hard not to do over the last nine months).  I prayed.  And I freaked out.  I ended up calling my mom on Skype and talked to her for an hour and a half.  I confessed a lot.  Many many things that have happened in our marriage.  Things that I have not told anyone in order to keep my husband's reputation in our community and church intact.  I felt better afterwards and I came to a decision....

I took my wedding ring off, and decided I'm done praying for restoration.  I do want restoration for my marriage. I do want my husband back and my family to be together.  But this is not my husband.  He is so far gone in hurt and anger that he is making awful, sinful, hurtful choices.  I want restoration, but not with this man. I want salvation for my husband before anything else.  And right now, I need to hand him to God to work on, because all he's doing is tearing me apart.  So my prayers from now on will focus on what God is doing in me, and maybe every once in a while I will pray for his heart.  But not our marriage. It needs to die before it's resurrected. (See Bigger Miracles)

So that's where I am now.  I'm doing alright.  In fact, read this:  "I am more 'Me' than I have been in forever..."  I can do this.  God's got it!

"I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." --Philippians 4:13

I am more "Me" than I have been in forever...

I wrote this as a Facebook status which really is what prompted me to start writing again.  This was like God saying, "It's time. I'm letting you speak out again."  I just wanted to share it on here for the record.  Who knows...someday I may need to reread this to get back to this point!

This isn't going to make sense to some of you, and to others it will make perfect sense. There will be a few who have no idea what I am truly talking about but will totally understand without knowing. And then there will be that select few who are going to see this and immediately judge me just because I'm popping up on their newsfeed, then maybe they will actually read, and that will lead to talking negatively amongst themselves about me, saying I'm being fake...and yadda yadda. Bear with me while I declare something....

Life is really hard, and frankly, it's really scary too. I've never had to do it on my own. I've always had people around to save me whenever I asked. Some of it their fault for not letting me do stuff on my own, and most of it my fault for not letting them let me do stuff on my own. Although, I am so grateful to have had them in my life, I'm abundantly grateful NOT to have them in my life to save me right now.

For the first time in almost 33 years, I am genuinely being me, only me. Not a daughter, not a sister, not a wife, not a mom, just me. This is the least "fake" I have ever been. God gave me a journey that is harder and sadder than I could have ever wanted to go through, but like we all say, "There's a reason for everything." He wanted me, only me. He needed me to find me, to know me. And He needed me to need Him and only Him so I knew that I could do anything through Him.

I'm proud of myself tonight because I did yet another thing on my own. Something so small and insignificant probably to most, but something that made me so proud because I did it. All the small things I do on my own, build up into one big thing. Finding a job, making a budget, moving furniture, endlessly unpacking, shoveling snow, putting together five shelving units, a desk and a filing cabinet/printer stand, making candies, cooking dinner from scratch, reading the Bible daily and making sure I make the time for that, cleaning the stove, negotiating a fair price for plowing my driveway, attending to other business like Friend of the Court, car insurance, bills, etc., truly and faithfully tithing, getting the kids to school on time while trying to figure out a new routine, making and sticking to priorities, and generally troubleshooting life... They build up to me growing up, to me having confidence in myself for once, to me not being the victim all the time, to me relying on the one and only thing that I should be relying on--God.

I have no idea what the future holds, only God does. The only thing I can do is pray about it and trust His will be done (and that I will be able to accept it when it does happen). All I do know, though, is that I am walking into the future a totally different person. A person I actually like and have faith in. I know I can do anything. It may be hard, it may be sad, it's probably going to break my heart even more, there may be times when I still want to curl up in my bed and give up, but you know what? God's got this...and that's all that matters.

Been A While

Yes, yes it has....

I last wrote in August.  That was one of the hardest months for me.  I hit a pretty significant low in this whole divorce adventure.  I actually contemplated suicide, which I only told one person and I am sure now if my mom is reading this, she's flipping out.  Don't worry.  I'm ok.  And I made a promise to myself ages ago that if the thought of dying to get out of life's pains ever came back in my head, I would tell someone.  Only one person though.  And they would help me.  So we're good.  No worries.

At any rate, that's how low I was.  After that I wrote this blog: Seek Ye First.  I took that very seriously.  God clearly spoke to me saying that I wasn't putting Him first in my life.  I am proud to say since that happened, I have read devotionals first thing every morning every day ever since.  But that's not all.  I really seriously put God first in everything.  I talk to God before I go to a friend when I am sad, mad, confused, etc.  I ask God for help when I don't know what to do.  I make sure nothing comes before Him and my relationship with Him and my need to learn more from Him.  God is everything.  As He should be.

After that blog post though, I kept thinking to myself that writing every day on this journey, filling my fans in on epiphanies I was having, having profound things to say about devotionals or my readings in the Bible, all that stuff was part of me seeking God.  But it wasn't.  I was seeking attention. I really wanted more readers.  I wanted to inspire others with my faith.  I was doing it for the wrong reason.

And that is why I took a break from writing.

That....and God made me do it.  He knew what I was doing and how I was going off on a weird path with this whole blogging thing and decided to give me writer's block.  Everything that I wrote sounded really dumb.  I have a few drafts saved on here to prove it (which shall promptly be deleted).  When I couldn't get the right words out any longer, I started looking back at what I was doing and saw my flaws.  I was wrong.

I thought several times I would come back and write, but I didn't.  The main reason is because I was still working on getting God first and foremost in my life, and I didn't want to allow the blog writing (and acquiring readers) to get in the way of that.  I put my big girl pants on and did what was right.  I let God lead me.

The last couple of weeks I've begun writing blogs in my head without even really knowing it.  They became Facebook statuses.  Just thoughts I had and wanted to speak out into existence, to no one in particular.  And that's when God told me I could write again.

So I'm back.