Why we should not make life choices at 20

When I was 20, I thought I knew everything. I was living on my own. I was in college and I had my whole career and life before me. I knew what I was going to be and do. Can I go back and slap that girl now?

Seventeen years later I have to say 20 year olds should not make life choices. They think that every promise they hear will be kept and they romanticize life as a grown up. At the age of 20, while there are some responsibilities that are had, they are nothing compared to what they will be responsible for in 15 years. Most 20 year olds don't have kids. Most 20 year olds are not supporting themselves 100%. Most 20 year olds are not married and most 20 year olds can not even fathom what life is going to throw at them.

I can look back at myself at 20 and laugh now as I think about how I thought I knew everything. I was sure of my future and I really did believe in the fantasy of growing up and living happily ever after. I believed the lie of all those movies there everyone road off into the sunset with all of their dreams come true.

I see 20 year olds today and I see them making the same exact mistakes that I made. They believe the fantasy. I know they probably won't listen to me, but maybe those of us who have been there done that got the t-shirt should ban together and really help these poor kids. Maybe we can have an intervention for all of them. Sit them down and tell them all the things we have learned since the age of 20. However, I also know my wisdom comes from having lived through it myself. I have to admit a little part of me gets a small amount of joy from the thought of those immature little 20 year olds experiencing life and realizing that life is not all candy canes and lollipops.

But just the same I still have a list of things I have learned that I would like to pass on to those unsuspecting 20 year olds out there.

1. Someone is going to break your heart.

2. That dream job will not pay you what you think you are worth.

3.The career path you thought you were going to take will not happen like you thought it would. 4. Kids will change your life in huge, good and bad ways.

5. You will get wrinkles.

6.You will gain weight.

7.You will get grey hair.

8. At some point in the future you will have regrets about choices you made.

9. Someone will lie to you and you will believe them.

10. Someone won't appreciate you.

11. The happily ever after you dreamed up will have its ups and downs and it is how you deal with those that will decide whether or not your happily ever after will actually happen.

12. Promises will be broken.

13. Someone is going to fail you.

14. If you are not flexible in what you want or expect out of life nothing or no one will live up to your standards.

15. Life is not about YOUR happiness.

16. Selfish people exist and you will have to deal with them.

17. It is easy to see other people's flaws, so just remember they are seeing yours too.

18. If you have unrealistic expectations you are setting yourself up to fail.

19. No one respects that old person that never grew up.

20. The world is not here to meet YOUR needs and wants.

There are plenty more, but I think we all need to learn some things on our own. I mean after all, even though many of today's 20 year olds have been given every thing they ever wanted, they will have to learn the hard way that life does not owe them anything.

So I say to all the 20 year olds out there, don't believe the lies, grow up and please listen to those of us who know what we are talking about. Trust me, some day you will admit we are right.

Daddy issues

So you went through something bad as a kid or teen; maybe it was from a parent, maybe it was another family member or some random person. What are you doing about that?

I say this to myself for a few things that I have been working on over the years, but I also say this to other people that I talk to on a regular basis. I see people who use their past as an excuse for their current behaviors. "Oh, I did this because..." I'm calling it as I see it people, that's a cop out.

Yes or past shapes us, but are you going to let someone else make you do something you hate, or make you do something you shouldn't? Well, we shouldn't and yet, we do.

It really kind of ticks me off. It is giving power to someone else if we let what they did to us make us be less than our best. Why should they get that kind of power? People in our past made bad choices that affected us, but if we in turn make bad choices because of that then we are affecting someone else and it becomes a vicious cycle of hurt.

I know that for my own girls I don't want my mistakes to make them one day make their own bad choices. Everything we do affects someone, but we have to choose to affect them positively rather than negatively and end the cycle.

It has taken me many years to figure this out so I am hoping by putting this out there I can help someone else avoid the long journey it has taken me. We really all should be learning from other people's mistakes and making better choices. We also should learn from our own mistakes so we don't repeat them. It hurts me to see people hurting due to their own bad choices in life. I want to do what I can to help them avoid them or at least go through the repercussions of their choice and come out on the other side hopefully without having to loose something in the process.

I've taken the spiritual gifts test multiple times and empathy always ranks high on my list. I didn't understand that at first because when I first took it I was young and selfish, but someone explained it to me. He had noticed that even in my young selfishness I still was able to see things from others perspective. That ability to see things from others perspective and in effect care about how they felt has shaped my choices in life.

When I see someone making bad choices or making mistakes I try to see things from their perspective and figure out why they would make that choice. Time and again it comes back to their own personal hurt from the past. Maybe we all need counselling to get through the junk we have been carrying around with us. Imagine how much lighter you would feel if you truly let your junk go. The coolest part of this is we don't have to go through it alone. God is there for us and he also put other people in our lives to help us, but we have to accept that help. Shutting people out and turning our back on people who just want to help us is not the answer. God wants us to ask for help. He is waiting for it, but we have to let go of our own pride and ego and admit that we can't do it alone. We also can't go looking for someone who will back us up in our bad choices. Anyone who supports your bad choice is not looking out for you or your best interest. God did not put them there.

God wants the best for you. Does it stink that we were hurt in the past? You bet it does. Does God want you to wallow in that and hurt others in the process? Uh, NO! And yet everyday, that is exactly what we do. So I say to you now, stop letting your past define you!!! Do the right thing and be the person God wants you to be. You will be better for it and in turn others will be better for it as well.

I'm sorry if Daddy didn't hug you or tell you her loved you or some kid on the playground told you that you were ugly, but that is their issue not yours. "You are beautiful, you are treasured, you are sacred you are His. You were meant for so much more than all of this." (Mercy Me)

Trust

Trust is a word that can get you into trouble. On the one hand we all want people to trust us. On the other hand, once we break that trust, it is a bear to earn back. I generally am a very trusting person. You have to do something pretty bad for me not to trust you and then I will usually forgive you if you ask me to, but if you continue to break that trust then it becomes harder and harder for me to trust you again.

I do my best to be sincere in what I say even if it does not show in my face. The fact that I tend to be an honest person almost to a fault sometimes I expect the same from others. I have found lying only hurts others and in the end the truth usually comes out anyway.

We have all known someone in our life that was not honest. They may have used dishonesty to make themselves look better. They may have used it because they were insecure in who they are. There are a lot of reasons why someone might think it is OK to be dishonest, but I have rarely found a good reason. Now you may say what about protecting someone’s feelings? Well to a point I understand that, but if the truth is most likely going to come out in the end anyway all you have accomplished is hurting them further.

I am not as trusting as I used to be I will admit that. I have been lied to more than I care to admit in my life. The hard part about that is I don’t want to be an untrusting person. I want to trust people. I don’t want to put up walls to protect myself from being hurt by lies. I want to see the good in people. I may deal with depression and I may have my moments where I get angry, but I do believe that there is good in all of us. It really does take a lot for me to walk away from someone even when they have hurt me pretty bad. I keep thinking about the good things they have said or done. Maybe that makes me a glutton for punishment, but I think that we are called to look for the good in people and not assume the worst.

I think some people assume the worst in me sometimes simply because my natural relaxed face looks sad. That is just the way God made me. My mouth turns down at corners and makes me look down even when I am happy. I have even heard some say that my face does not reflect my words, so I guess this is a soapbox of mine when I want people to look for and remember the good and not assume the worst.

All that being said, I challenge you to three things, first be honest. People really do expect you to be honest, why not give them what they want? Second, expect honesty from others. We live in a rather negative world, why not expect people to tell you the truth. Finally, look for the good in others and remember that. Don’t hold onto this hurt or that hurt. Remember the good that they have said and done and stop looking for the bad. We don’t have to be miserable in life. I have a card on my mirror that says “Pain is inevitable, misery is optional.” Some days it is harder to believe that than others, I will admit, but did you ever stop to think that maybe the pain you see in someone else was put there by you either not being honest, you not looking for honesty in them or you not looking for the good in them?

God gave us each other to love and most days we do a pretty good job of that, but I think the bigger challenge that I put out there for you is to love everyone even when they seem unlovable, untrustworthy or they have hurt you. I can’t promise that your love will be returned, but at least you will know you did what you are called to do and in the end God will bless that.

Don't be a runner

There are people who when things get hard or the are afraid will run from a situation. The figure it is easier to quit rather than try it and fail or end up hurt. The name for this kind of person is a runner. I know because I used to be one. Twice I had jobs that were difficult and caused me major stress so rather than stick it out I quit. I also quit piano lessons, violin lessons and I didn't try certain things I wanted to do because of fear of failure. When I was in 9th grade I actually missed three weeks of school strait because I had missed a week when I actually was sick and I knew it would be really hard to make up all of the work I missed, so I just faked being sick for a few more weeks until my mom forced me to go back to school and face what I didn't want to face. In the end, the make up for missing three weeks of school was so much worse than if I had just gone back after one. I might not have ended up in summer school that year.

You may know a runner or you may be a runner. They may be someone who goes from job to job and it is always with the excuse of the boss was a jerk or some other lame excuse. They may play the victim, or they may go from relationship to relationship looking for that new love feeling that is always at the beginning. There are a lot of different variations of runners, but they all think that it is easier to quit than to actually work at whatever they are doing.

As I said earlier, I was a runner. What changed that? I became a mom. Suddenly I couldn't run without hurting someone else. I had to actually stick it out or my children were going to be affected. I was no longer allowed to quit because I was afraid. Having children is hard, but I am not allowed to give up and walk away, not that I would want to, but knowing that is not even an option has made me not be a runner in other areas of my life as well. I have fought harder to keep things good for them. Have I failed at times? You bet I have, but running is still not an option.

In life we always have the choice of sticking it out when things are tough or running. What I learned from it is when I did run there was always regret years later when I looked back at what I had done. I regret not finishing both of the jobs I left early. In both cases I only had one month left until they were done, but it was easier at the time to quit than to suffer through the hard part.

I have seen women especially who have the runner mentality. Sometimes it is actually from their kids and or family. I have also seen women who run from their friends. They think they are a burden to them when they have drama in their life so they close themselves off from their friends and leave their friends wondering what they did. I'll admit I have been known to do that because I was embarrassed about a situation that I was in and didn't want to admit it to them.

The problem with being a runner is it doesn't solve your problem. It may remove you from a situation, but if you are trying to avoid failing, I have news for you, quitting is failing too and there is a pretty good chance you will end up in a worse situation later or right back where you were. So many of us have a fear of failure, but I have learned that we learn just as much from failing as we do from success and you learn even more from sticking it out and seeing it through to the end because you learn how to be a finisher.

If I could go back fifteen years and talk to my 22 year old self I would tell myself to stick it out, try harder and don't let fear of failure keep you from your dreams. I have learned that I am a stronger person than I ever thought possible by sticking to what I have committed to. Is it hard sometimes and does it really stink when I am going through a slump that doesn't seem to have any hope? Yeah it does! But I can tell you I regret running a whole lot more than I will ever regret sticking it out and dealing with the hard parts. Don't even let running be an option.

We all have critics in our lives we don't need to be our own. Don't let anyone take away your dreams most especially yourself.

You are strong

Over the last year I have seen lives crumble, marriages end and people break. 2010 has not been a good year for many people. I want to say this though to all of you, especially the women who I personally have seen hurting. YOU ARE STRONG!

I know that in a world of either big egos or big insecurities a lot of women have been made to feel like they are not valid for one reason or another. Stay Home moms are made to feel bad because they have chosen to stay home and take care of their family rather than go out and have a career of their own. Moms who work are made to feel bad because they can't be their for their kids when they need them. And whether they work or not women have been made to feel bad for loving their family so much that they give up their own dreams to be there for them.

I say it is all a load of garbage. Supporting your family does not make you weak. It does not mean you have no life of your own. It means that you love your family and you are doing what we are all called to do, which is serve one another.

I have chosen to stay home and do the Marriage Playbook with my husband from home. I have followed my husband from city to city as he changed careers. I have driven my children to swim lessons, choir practice, dance class, gotten them ready for school every morning, packed lunched, washed every ones clothes, bought groceries and been there to cheer all of them on as they have done what they have wanted to do. So do I do this because I have no life? No I do this because I love my family and I am serving them and that is OK.

I think women get a bad rap for giving things up to support their family whether they work and support them financially or they stay home and support them emotionally. I am not saying that we should not have something that is our own. I personally love to read and take pictures. I enjoy hanging out with my friends or going to the movies, so i won't let it be said I have no life and all you other women out there should not let it be said about you either.

We are strong women. As I said in an earlier blog, no more buts. My heart aches for the women I have seen crushed over the last year. Their mistake if you can call it that was loving and supporting their family.

We deserve respect for what we do. We deserve love for what we do and we are strong because of what we do. God did not give us a spirit of timidity 2 Timothy 1:7, yeah I know I said that in my last blog, but it bears repeating because we keep forgetting.

When did it become wrong to serve your family? I think in our world of selfishness and worldly me-ism those of us who want to serve and help are looked down on. So I say to you, be strong in what you do, don't let someone else make choices for you and don't apologize for who you were called to be. God has a plan for you, just like he does for me :)

No more buts

How often have you been known to have someone tell you what you should do or their opinion of what you should do and then you come up with some reason why you can't do it. I know I have said, "Yeah, but..." more times than I care to admit. As someone who has counseled people I have heard it many times. "Yeah, but if I do that..." or "I would but..." It is so easy to "but" our way through life.

What if you stopped giving reasons for why you can't do something and started giving reasons for why you can. 2 Timothy 1:7 says "For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline" So if God didn't make us timid, why are we acting like he did? Why do we keep coming up with excuses for why we can't? We are stronger than we give ourselves credit for and we can do more than we think we can. 2 Timothy 2:1 "You then, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus"

I wish I could say that I have always believed in myself and have never made excuses for why I couldn't or shouldn't do something. I have made excuses for why I couldn't do certain jobs, why I didn't try out for a play and why I didn't speak up when someone had hurt me. It took some hard realities hitting me and a realization that I have kept God from showing up and showing off, with my "buts" and "nos" to stop and ask myself "why not".

I hear it on a regular basis, especially from women. "I want to talk to my husband about "insert issue here", but I am afraid of what he will say or do." or "I want to do that, but I don't think I would do a good job." or "I would try that, but I'm scared." There are thousands more reasons and excuses why we don't do or say what we should do, but there are very few that are actually legitimate.

So I challenge you and I challenge myself to say yes more and take that risk that scares us to death. If we fail or it doesn't go well, so what. We learn something and grow whether it happens or not. One of the things I respect about my husband is his "no fear" attitude. He is never afraid to call someone and ask for something he wants. There have been times that he has told me something he was going to do and that little voice in my head has kind of made me nervous, but I have learned that it has gotten us far with things I never thought possible. Even when we have been told no or ignored, it was always a chance worth taking. Someone told me once, "the only way to fail every time is to never try."

I am currently looking for a new job. I could easily say that I can only get a job in child care because that is where most of my experience is, but it is not what I want to do. I have made the decision this time to go after the jobs I never thought possible. Will I be told no sometimes? Yes, I will, but I will never hear yes if I don't at least try. What are you going to say yes to today?

Why did I stay

Over the last month I have been asked to share our story in an interview that someone is working on for a possible TV. I have to say it is not easy going back through and going through all the gory details. We are used to telling the condensed version of the story.

We let jobs, kids and depression and other people come between us in our marriage and it very nearly ended in divorce due to infidelity. While I hated the idea of being a divorced woman, I did not see a way out of it in light of all that had occurred. I was preparing for my future as a single woman. I had been offered a job in Nashville, we had the divorce papers drawn up, we just had to file them. Then in a last minute rescue mission our marriage was saved due to prayers, repentance and a changed heart for both of us. I had felt all along that it could be saved. I even told people that I felt like we would reconcile especially once the other woman was no longer in the picture. I trusted God to heal us, but at the same time I had to take steps to move forward in case we didn't get there due to hardened hearts.

When he came back and asked to work it out, I didn't trust him to mean it. I had heard that story before only to have him change his mind and tell me he didn't want to work it out anymore. He bruised my heart on more than one occasion and trust was no where to be found in me.

While being interviewed I was asked why I stayed after he cheated. I didn't know what the faith background of the people I was talking to so I wasn't sure how to explain it if they didn't understand the concept of forgiveness in Christ how did I tell them that if it were not for the fact that we are called to forgive I could not do it? The pain was very real and the lack of trust was overwhelming, but in the end it came down to love. I loved him, to this very day I still do. I may not be very good at showing it at times and I let myself get distracted very easily, but no matter what I love him. I knew that if he was willing to make this work then I could forgive and we would take steps to fix us.

We began praying together every night and I got a job that I was surrounded by fun people all day. That helped me a lot because after 6 years of being a Stay Home Mom, I had not had real adult interaction that did not involve a play date or at least a mom's night out. I was happy again and he was too.

Over the last 3 years we have been working on learning how to have a good marriage and we have been telling our story to help others not go down the road and make the bad choices that we did. Do we follow our own advice? I would love to say we do, but unfortunately we are human and we make mistakes. I'm a Stay home mom again and while I have more adult interaction than I did, it is still not enough. He works multiple jobs and is gone from us a lot and we don't have the family time that we need. We also don't pray together like we should. Why am I saying this now? Because I am saying that it is easy to screw up again and we do and we will, but when we realize that we are doing it, we have to stop and take a look at the choices we have made and look at ourselves and change ourselves. I can't force him to be faithful to me for the rest of my life, just like he can't force me to have a smile on my face all the time. The key is to work on yourself and pray for the other person and let God take care of it. We can only change ourselves and sometimes it takes being shaken to the core to realize you screwed up again. 3 years ago I was shaken to the core when he cheated, but out of that I looked within and changed me and drew closer to God.

I have to admit, I have not been doing my part lately and I just now realized it. So do I regret staying? No, I do not it was what was best for my family, do I think we will always stay together I hope so and pray that we will, but if we don't keep God in the center of our marriage I can guarantee we won't survive. So let me encourage you. Please! Please keep God in the center of your marriage. Pray for each other, pray together and grow in Christ, because without Him there is no chance.

bad choices

At some point in our lives we all make bad choices. Sometimes those choices hurt us and sometimes they hurt others, but someone always gets hurt. It is easy to look back after bad choice was made and see why it was a bad choice and how you could have avoided, but the hard truth is you change it once it happens. We can either choose to live in the past and hold onto past hurts resulting from bad choices or we can let it go. That is easier said than done of course, but in all comes down forgiveness.

Forgiveness is not saying that what someone did was ok, it is saying that you are going to let it go and let God handle it. The same goes for forgiving yourself. If you kick yourself for everything you have done, you just end up miserable. I have begun to learn that confessing it to God and to whomever you hurt is the best way to be free of the unforgiveness for yourself.

Forgiveness is actually not for the forgiven it is for the forgiver. Releasing the forgiven from the bondage of your hurt while it may good for them to know it also releases you. god tells us to forgive others as He has forgiven us. If we don't forgive others then how can we expect God to be forgiving when the things we have done that has hurt Him are so much worse.

I fight with myself quite often about letting go of past hurts that I have committed. Hind sight is 20/20. We can easily look back and see where we have hurt people, but at the time we either didn't realize it or just didn't care. I tend to fall into the I didn't realize it more times than not, but there are those occasional times where I want the other person to hurt because they hurt me.

The Bible tells us to be slow to speak and quick to listen. I know I screw that up, A LOT! I was raised to speak my mind and while there are times that is a good thing there are times it is not. I find myself trying to fix the situation and sometimes I just make it worse. I hate hurting people, especially people I love and yet I do it. I have baggage from my past that I have tried to carry around with me and it just keeps getting heavier making my back hurt and making me cranky.

I have to work on me right now and deal with all of that baggage. While a few years ago I did deal with some of it, I think I left some of it behind. I feel as tho past hurts have caused me to be angry with myself for letting them happen. I think of all the things I could have done to keep them from happening and I hate myself for it, even tho most of the hurts that I have held onto could not have been stopped. I was young and not very strong. Now I am strong and older, but those same insecurities keep coming back to haunt me.

Oh if there were only some magic pill that would make me forget all the pain in my life. I've called it depression and to a point it is, and I have been trying my hardest to deal with that, but I think also there is that young girl in me that is screaming and doesn't want to let go of what hurt me.

I don't have answers to any of this. I try to forgive and I confess, but somehow I always fall short. I can't believe it is all my fault. I have to believe that there are outside forces at work. They put those seeds of doubt in our mind and cause us to withdraw to keep from being hurt again. When we withdraw from one thing we look for something else to fill that void. For me it was reading and being on my computer. For others it might be someone else or drugs or alcohol. We all desire to feel important, we just don't always go about attaining that desire in the best way.

So there is no revelation here there is only regret. Regret at mistakes and regret at words. May we all find a way to forgive each other and ourselves.

Watching the film

In football, teams will watch films of their previous games to see what they did and did not do well. They take that information to make adjustments to hopefully play better the next week. What do you think would happen though, if they never watched film and lost game after game, year after year? They would have a lot of bad habits to break that they had created over the years.

In marriage, we tend to never look at film and then we act surprised when our marriages fail or hit a major season slump.

What if we looked at our "films" on a regular basis? It could be a weekly thing if you are in a slump or a monthly thing if you think things are going great. Or it could be whatever works best for your marriage. I can see times in my own marriage where if we had only been watching film on a regular basis we never would have gone through a slump because we would have caught our mistakes before they became a habit. Around the time the girls came along I (Bethany) made the mistake of putting the girls before Ace. I thought Ace was a grown man who could take care of himself, but the girls being just babies and toddlers needed me to take care of them all the time. We got away from dates, we never talked and he was working WAY too much. If we had been watching out for those mistakes they might not have become bad habits that were hard to break and unlearn.

So what does looking at film in your marriage look like. My suggestion is a date where you just honestly take the time to talk and listen to each other. Knowing what your film session is, you can come prepared to bring things up that you would like to work on or reinforce something you think you did well on. Let me caution you not to make this a gripe session, but to come with only one or two things that you really would like to work on and two or three things that are good habits that you would like to continue. Even the Detroit Lions do something good once in awhile and need to be encouraged to keep that up.

When you first start watching your films there may be a lot of bad habits you need to break and it can be tempting to try to correct all of them at once. That's really not a good idea though. It can be overwhelming and you will be trying so hard to fix everything that you won't work hard on any one of them. Pick the most important ones first or pick the ones you know you can fix quickly so you can move onto the next one. Before you know it your team will be winning and it will get easier to find those good habits to reinforce and harder to find the bad habits to fix. Now that does not mean you can stop watching film, it just means it will be a little more fun when you do.

Now go watch those films!

The Twilight myth

I finally broke down and read the Twilight series. I wasn't planning on reading them, but I got sick and a friend loaned them all to me and over the coarse of about a week, I read all four books. I have to say the books are addicting. I finally understood what all the talk was about.

When talking to Ace about them he made a comment about something he does not like about the movies. He has seen both movies, but has not read the books. He said that they give girls a false idea of what love is like. After thinking about that for a day I began to see what he meant. The love that Bella and Edward have for each other is extremely intense. They fall in love over a short period of time and their love is is impossibly resilient. Their love survives, rouge vampire attacks, werewolves and the fact that he finds her blood and smell like a drug. That kind of love just is not real.

Early on in a relationship we all have been known to be on that adrenaline high. It feels great, but we can't function on that kind of high for extended periods of time. Eventually our bodies build a tolerance to the adrenaline and that new ooey gooey love feeling fades into a more manageable love. It can still be intense, but the way the love between Edward and Bella is what little and big girls dream about. The thought of a guy willing to do anything for you, the guy that will vow to protect you and wants to spend forever with you is every girls dream. Throw in the forbidden part that makes it all dangerous and these girls are setting themselves up to fail when it comes to love.

I'll admit, I love the story and the movies now, but I also know that I can't hold onto the dream of a man that would rather die than live his life without me. Its no wonder so many marriages and relationships fail when Hollywood and novels put such unreal expectations into our minds. Things become comfortable and mundane and we long for that rush of love that we either once new early in our relationship or that we have seen and read. We think if we leave and or cheat that we can find that kind of love and maybe this time it will last. We are all adrenaline junkies, hoping for that high again, rarely realizing that it is only temporary. But it is when that high fades that real love can really shine. Being strong enough to get past that desire for the temporary high and live for the comfortable feeling of lasting love is what true love is all about. Sure there will be times where you want there to be more or things won't be great, but we can't doubt our love. Doubt will only make us crazy and doubt will only cause pain for us and the one we love.

As my husband has been known to say, the grass is greener where you water it. Where are you watering?

Who am I?

I have been married for 13 years and I will admit it has not been
easy. I love my husband and I love our two girls, but for years I let
them be my world and I was just there to serve them. I had no identity
other than Ace's wife or Lennon and McCartney's mother. My husband is
in radio and I would go help him at events before we had the girls and
I actually had a name tag made that read "Ace's Wife" I didn't bother to
ask for one that said Bethany because no one knew who that was, not
even me.

I'm a Christian and early in our marriage as we moved around a lot and
found churches, I would see the other Christian women and think I was
supposed to look, talk and dress like them. I rarely bought myself new
clothes, but when I did, I didn't know what I liked so I had to take
someone with me to help pick out the "right" clothes. Sweater sets and
capri pants if I was with friends and big t-shirt and jeans with I was
with my husband. I was hiding who I was behind all the supposed to's
and should be's.

It took a big hit to my marriage for me to even see that this was
happening. My husband and I nearly divorced about three years ago. I
had been a stay home mom for 6 years. We had moved so much with my
husbands job and I had been home so long that my teaching license had
expired. As I thought about my life as a divorced woman, I was
terrified, first because I didn't want to be a divorced woman and
second because I didn't know how to be anyone besides Ace's wife and
Lennon and McCartney's mom. What could I do besides take care of the
house and children? I ended up getting a job at a Day care because it
was all I knew, no one else would hire me because I didn't have
experience as anything else.

We ended up reconciling, but I still didn't know who I was. I knew
that I enjoyed photography, but all I did was take pictures of my
kids. I knew I liked to write, but all I did was blog about my family.
It is three years later and I still ask myself who Bethany is. I have
changed to dressing like I want to instead of how I think everyone
thinks I should, but I have not picked up my camera except to
photograph my kids. My husband and I wrote a workbook on marriage. Can
you guess what I wrote about? It was about being a wife :)

I do want to have an identity and I will admit that I am closer to
being Bethany than I was three years ago, but I still wonder what
people see when they look at me. Do they see Bethany or do they see
Ace's wife and Lennon and McCartney's mom? And if they do see Bethany,
who do they think she is? Who do I think she is?

Your box of snakes

When you have been hurt by your spouse, how do you you get past the feelings of hurt? It is easy to sulk and become withdrawn if you are the one who has been hurt, but is that best for your marriage? I think Not! And yet thats what some many of us do. We sit around and play the poor me role and by doing so we are not making things better, we are actually making things worse.

If this is what we are doing then it is time to STOP! Yeah it stinks when you have been hurt, but holding onto a grudge or withdrawing from your spouse is hurting you both. I have said it before and I will say it again, FORGIVENESS IS NOT JUST FOR THE PERSON WHO DID THE HURT, IT IS FOR THE PERSON HURT TOO!

Physical and emotional intimacy with your spouse is a must, but when you are holding something between you, it is like you have a box between you filled with snakes so you can't even reach over the box without feeling like you will get bitten. Have you been there? I know I have. I've been hurt many times. Sometimes getting over it is no problem, but other times I start filling that box with snakes. The longer I do that the bigger the box gets and the harder is is going to be to get them out of there.

It has taken me a long time and yeah I will admit it I am still known to do it, to learn how to get past the hurt. I've even been known to be hurt by my husband's hurt. That really doesn't help, it is like having two boxes of snakes between us, it is possible to get them out of there, but sooner or later one of us is going to get hurt more. That hurt is really just going to hurt us more. It is literally a venom to our marriage. It can be sucked out, but there will always be a scar there because we never should have put the box there in the first place.

So what's the first step of getting past it? Well, first you have to acknowledge that you are hurt by what was done. Sometimes it is obvious, but sometimes not only does our spouse not know we are hurting, but we don't even realize it ourselves. We have put that box of snakes there without even knowing it. So we have to acknowledge to ourselves and our spouses that we are hurt.

Next we have to ask ourselves if we have a legitimate reason for being hurt. Did our spouse do something that they knew would hurt you or did they accidentally do it? These two scenarios have different action points. If they did something they knew would hurt you then you have to talk to them about why they did it. Open communication between the both of you is a must if you ever expect to have a good marriage. Sometimes their answer may hurt more than what they did, but it needs to be out there. Hopefully, they won't try to put it all on you and what you have done, but sometimes that does happen. If that does happen then you need to acknowledge your role in what happened, but they need to take responsibility for what they did as well.

If they accidentally hurt you or they didn't even know they did, then that takes more of a look at yourself. Why are you hurt? Is it an ego thing? Is it a selfish thing? Is it some childhood trauma that it reminded of? Why are you hurt? Getting to the root of why it hurt you will help you work through the process and you can work on yourself here and hopefully fix improve whatever brought you to that point. Depending on the reason you are hurt, you may need counselling to get through it or you may just need to grow up and get over yourself.

After you get to the why of the hurt, the best thing to do is to pray about it. You should actually pray about it as you go through each step, but here specifically you need to pray to ask God to help you through the hurt. God is great at taking that box of snakes and getting rid of them if you will only ask. He can throw it far away from you and make it easier to get close to each other again. The important thing here though is we can go back looking for that box to pick it up again. During an especially hard point in my marriage I would pray daily for God to get me past the hurt and each day he would say "Let me take it from you Bethany.", but by each evening I had gone back in search of my box of snakes. It was like I enjoyed having that pain there. I wanted my husband, but I had rather reach toward him over that box of snakes rather than getting rid of it all together and getting as close to him as possible.

Finally, we need to strive for that intimacy with our spouse again. Intimacy is not just about sex, although that is an important part of it. It is about the closeness between you and your spouse. Do you ever touch your spouse and not feel like they are there? I know I do. We can talk or hold hands and it is like he is not really there. Now I can ignore it and do my best to get past it or I can acknowledge it and do something about it. Maybe we have not had quality time in awhile. Maybe we need a date that is not just watching a movie where all we do is sit in a theater and focus on something else besides each other. Or maybe one or both of us is trying to put that box of snakes back between us.

If you can't keep the box of snakes from between you, eventually one or both of you is going to get filled with so much venom that there is nothing that can get it out. Don't let that happen. Trust me there is much more pain there than you will ever feel from a hurt in your marriage.

Forgive them, get rid of the box and don't pick it back up.

Life after an affair

My husband had an affair. There I said it. That is not the easiest thing to say, but the thing is, it is true. Something even more hard to say is that it happened more than once and that he and I are still married. Many people can't believe that I would even consider staying married to him after an affair and before we went through it I would have been right there with them. Then it happened and while we did originally intend to divorce, (we even drew up the papers), things changed and we worked it out. So how did the affair happen and how did we manage to make our marriage work? The long in short of it is we got lazy and then we stopped being lazy.

When we first started dating our worlds pretty much revolved around each other. We were students with part time jobs, but our free time was pretty much spent with each other. Even after we got married and had jobs with opposite schedules we valued our time together so much that we would squeeze it in whenever we could. Even if we were watching football my feet were in his lap. Then kids came along and we were so busy with them that our free time was spent resting or just vegging on the the couch. He was working way too many hours and neither of us thought about the importance of making that time for each other. Eventually he found someone who would give him the attention he needed and I fell into a pit of depression due partly from the lack of attention I was getting and partly because we lived in a brand new city and I had two kids under 4. This pattern continued for a few years until we realized that we were in fact our own worst enemies when it came to our marriage.

Everyone thinks affairs are never going to happen to them, or they think that who ever has the affair is the only one in the wrong. After going through my husbands affairs, we both realized that neither of us had invested into our marriage like we should have. We also realized that boundaries had to be set. The boundaries were not because my husband was likely to have another affair, but because all marriages need them. These boundaries include never being alone with someone of the opposite sex. This goes for both of us. It is not ok for me to be alone with a man who is not my husband and it is not ok for him to be alone with a woman who is not his wife. It protects not only us, but the others as well. Another boundary we had to have was counseling someone of the opposite sex. Because we have a marriage resource and have been through our own junk, there are quite a few couples that have come to us for advice. We truly believe that because we have been through our junk we can help others with theirs, but we also have a rule though that the women need to talk to me and the men need to talk to my husband. By that same token we agreed not to share personal information or problems in our marriage with someone of the opposite sex. Basically these boundaries keep us from being in any situation with someone of the opposite sex that could ever lead to something it shouldn't or that even looks like it could. I know that there are people who think it is crazy to have those kinds of boundaries, but if you look at the people who have had affairs most did not have these boundaries in place. The thing about affairs is usually people don't set out to have them, they just fall into them by crossing lines and slowly fading away from their spouse and toward the other person.

So once we figured that out we lived happily ever after right?...Wrong, we are still learning even to this day how to have a happy marriage. We found we need to fight. Both of us have the bad habit of avoiding conflict, but after not being honest with each other to protect feelings we recently learned that we have to be honest even if it leads to a conflict. Overall, we are still learning how to have a good marriage. Really thats good though because if you think you can't still learn new things to make your marriage better, then your marriage will never be as good as it can and should be.

ssssshhhhhhh someone said S - E - X!

Let's go back to the book of Genesis for a moment. When God created Adam and Eve they were naked and they were not ashamed. Then of course sin came along and they realized they were naked and there has been a stigma about nakedness and sex ever since, but lets stop and think about that. Why should we be ashamed in front of our spouse? If we truly are two becoming one as the Bible says then there should be nothing to hide and yet everyday couples are embarrassed to talk about sex with the one person they are supposed to talk about everything with.

I will be the first to admit that has happened in my marriage. Both of us were afraid to talk about certain things for fear of what the other may think of us. And of course if we can't talk about it with our spouse because we are too embarrassed then there is no way we can talk about it with our friends.

So here's my question, what if we did talk about it? What if we threw it all out there, shared it all and just got real? Would the world end? Would our marriage end? Would we be struck with a bolt of lightening from heaven? Chances are the answer to all of those questions is no. Personally I have found the more things I keep secret from my husband the more trouble there is in my marriage. I didn't say something because I was scared of what would he would say and vice versa. The thing is though, we found out once we finally talked that we both were thinking the same thing.

Now I am sure most of you are thinking "oooooeeeewww wonder what she is talking about." Honestly it was not anything torrid, we both just felt that we needed it more, but it could have been anything and we should have felt the freedom to discuss it openly without fear or embarrassment.

A lot of Christians seem to look at sex as a taboo and therefore never talk about it, but God created it so why shouldn't we talk about it? Ever looked for a book about sex in a Christian bookstore? Sure there are one or two in there, but they either make them sound too technical or it is all about nice sweet making love, lights out in your bedroom after the kids go to sleep. There is never one out there that tells you to mix things up and sneak away during the day. I have yet to see one suggesting other rooms or even role playing. For that kind of thing you have to go to a regular bookstore, but of course Christians can't be seen in that part of the bookstore. What if your small group leader were to walk by on his way to pick up the new Joel Olsteen book and happen to glance down the aisle and see you with that kind of book in your hand. Why he might actually think that you and your spouse, dare I say it, want to have great sex. We can't have that now can we?

Come on people, sex is ok and you do not have to have missionary position sex in your bedroom with the lights off with the intent of making a baby in order for it to be cool with God. I'm no sex expert so I don't feel qualified to write a book about it, but I really would like to find a Christian author who would write about sex and be real about it. I feel like it is almost impossible for Christians to admit they have and enjoy sex. I was once unfriended by a Christian friend on facebook because I dared to take one of those facebook quizzes that mentioned sex. She felt the need to email me and tell me why she was unfriending me and to tell me that sex is something that should not be talked about. Oh my goodness really?! Sorry but not talking about it causes more problems than talking about it ever will.

Tell each other what you like, tell each other what you don't like. Can you imagine doing something to your spouse for years only to find out years later that they didn't like it, but they never told you because they were scared to hurt your feelings? Talk about hurting someone's feelings, they would break my heart. If you don't know what you like then explore it together, maybe you will learn something new and like it even more. As a Christian I don't believe in watching porn so I am not suggesting getting ideas from there, but if you have to go to the sexuality section of a real bookstore and look for a book that will give you more ideas then do it. Don't be afraid to be "naked" about what you want or try something knew.

Also, it is ok to talk about sex with your friends of the same sex. I personally learned a few things by just talking with a friend of mine. Your spouse can't always tell you certain things about sex or your body simply because their parts are different so it can be good to have someone of the same sex that you can just hang with that feels free to talk about sex. I've actually talked with some friends about sex and we managed to help a friend who was having pain during sex. If she had not felt comfortable talking about it with us, then what? Sure you can ask your doctor, but again everything is so technical.

So all I'm saying is get real about sex. Its ok to have it, its ok to enjoy it and for goodness sake it is certainly ok to talk about it.

Its hard being a shoulder to cry on

In our lives we have all come into contact with people who we feel like we can just talk to in times of trouble. They are great listeners, they give great advice and they are always there for us when we need them and when others need them as well. But have you ever stopped to wonder whose these people turn to?

One thing we talk about in The Marriage Playbook is having a 12th man. A 12th man is the person who is a fan of your marriage. They are there when you need to talk and they encourage you when times are tough and give you great advice. You can tell them anything and they listen without judging and they can even tell you when you need a good slap on the head.

We all need a 12th man. So the question is are you being a 12th man or are you only taking from your 12th man. Sure we all need to lean on someone from time to time, but just like you have to deposit money in a bank in order for you to withdraw cash, you have to deposit your time as a 12th man.

You don't have to be a 12th man to your 12th man, you can pay it forward and be there for someone else. Spending all of your time withdrawing from your 12th man will not only deplete your account, but it will also deplete them. I have seen from both sides the effects of taking and never giving and it is emotionally draining for the 12th man. Think about it, if the only time someone ever talked to you it was about their problems would you want to talk to them.

With that being said I ask that you give back and also just say thank you or do something nice for the people who have been there for you. Sometimes a 12th man just wants to go hang out and not talk about problems. Take them out for dinner. Go do something fun and make a rule you won't talk about your problems for the night. You would be amazed how much better you both will feel when the night is over.

I also ask that you be there for someone. We all need a 12th man. Be there for them, don't judge them and listen to what they have to say. It won't only help them, it will also help you get your mind off of your problems too.

Where's the love? Its not enough!

Time and again I meet couples who have been married 7, 10, 13 + years and they tell me that the love has faded in their marriage. First off let me say this is totally normal. That new love feeling in the first few years of a relationship does not last. As great as that feeling is it can't last. That love is a chemical reaction in our bodies, an adrenaline rush, but over time our body adjusts and no longer releases the adrenaline from that feeling. So then what? Is that the end of the marriage? For some people yeah it is, but it does not have to be.

When that love fades we can choose to continue to love our spouse. Each morning I get up and choose to love my husband. It is easy to do now, but a few years ago I didn't even understand what that meant. I had to make it a habit.

Have you ever tried to stop a bad habit? Whether that habit was smoking, not exercising, or eating poorly that bad habit did not go away over night. In most cases you have to replace that bad habit with a good one. The same thing holds true with marriage you have to replace the bad habit of just expecting to feel love with choosing to love. The first few weeks of making that choice it can feel awkward, unnatural even, but the more you do it the easier it gets.

So what does choosing to love look like? Well, it is not getting up each morning, looking at your spouse and going, "love you" and going on with your day. . Choosing to love your spouse is putting them before yourself. This can mean husbands watching the kids so your wife can have a girls night out once a month. Or wives this can mean making a nice food spread before he watches the game with his friends. It obviously varies with each couple. What shows love to you and your and your spouse is going to be different than what another couple does. The key here is that you are making an effort to show love, not for what you can get back in return, but because it is the loving thing to do.

Now you may be asking yourself, but what if I don't feel like I love them anymore? You may have heard the expression "fake it till you make it" well that is sometimes what you have to do when you are choosing to love. When my husband and I nearly divorced a few years ago, he asked a friend of his what he was supposed to do since he didn't feel any love for me. His friend asked him if he had asked God to give him that love back. My husband said he had never thought of that before, but he started praying that prayer and choosing to love me and eventually he was able to find that love again. Before i started choosing to love my husband, I pretty much took him for granted. I loved him, but didn't really take any time to let him know that I loved him. According to him, it didn't even show on my face. However, once we went through our "junk" I was so sure of my love for him that I began to make the effort to choose to love him everyday. Before that you probably could have asked him if he was sure of my love for him and he may have said no, but now you would get a definitive YES.

So take the time this week to choose to love your spouse. Stop waiting for those feelings to be there and replace a bad habit with a good one. Don't expect things to improve over night and don't expect immediate love returned from your spouse, especially if your marriage is in a slump season, but just see how it affects your marriage. God can and will show up and show off.

Just sayin

After having facebook for a few years I have begun thinking in status updates. It is almost like I think people care that I need to refill my water bottle or something. Honestly I don't think that, but I still think to myself, "Beatlemom needs to refill her water bottle." So to indulge myself I decided to start a new blog. Can't really say what it is going to be about yet, but once I figure it out I'm sure it will be must read.

So I thought for this blog I will start with my favorite way to communicate, status updates.

Lazy days are the best

Football all day is great, but only if you care about who is playing

why can't my 6 year old do anything by herself?

why can't the girls put themselves to bed

why am I up at midnight on New Years day?

Not a fan of the creepy Coldwater Walmart

I love my new heart rate calorie counter

I'm scared of salt and the bloating it creates

my chiropractor is the bomb

can't wait for school to start back

wanna see Blind Side

My husband is worth forgiveness

I know I should cherish my girls at each age, but I'm tired of needing a sitter

I still blame my pregnancy for why I have belly fat

January is gonna be a crazy busy month

not sure this is the blog I wanna create, but just feel like writing right now

I have so much to say, but can't always get it out

The Marriage Playbook is awesome, hope we get more support this year

I can't believe this shy little girl can now speak to audiences Thanks God and Ace for helping me with that

I really should go to bed

I'm glad tomorrow is saturday, really hope my children let me sleep in

hoodies are the most comfortable shirt ever

I have $50 worth of Kohls gift cards, what should I buy?

I want a set of weights why doesn't Kohls sell that?

I like Tebow, but so glad he is done playing for Florida, maybe Tennessee will stand a chance at beating them now

my husband is amazing

I am blessed

I need to remember what I have instead of what I don't

time to recommit

really wish I had a free maid, oh wait I do if only the children would actually help

blogging made my heart rate go up 5 beats a minute, imagine if I were in a rant

I haven't ranted in awhile am I mellowing

wonder if my college friends still think of me as the b word cuz I really was back then, but it was all my depression that I really needed help with

thank God I finally got on meds for depression, I hated me like that

I've missed working out this week, I hope I get to go back to it next week, if not I am going to the Y, my butt is finally showing results

my husband can't get the computers to sink up and we are all frustrated by it, I just wanna print

just sayin