Kelly made a slight change this week and instead of Show Us Your Life she asks for us to Show our Ministry. Here's mine...
My name is Kristin and I am a believer in Jesus Christ who struggles with infidelity, pride and control issues.
I grew up in an average family. I can’t say that my childhood was horrific or that it was perfect. As a family we had our own hurts, habits and hang ups but nothing that I consider to have been a major influence in shaping how my life turned out. I was saved and baptized at seven years old.
I was a pretty good kid growing up and never really gave my parents that much trouble. I dated the same boy all through high school, made good grades, was a leader in our church youth group and basically did what was asked of me.
I received a full scholarship to the University of Montevallo and began my freshman year in August of 1993. College was a new world and I quickly realized I wasn’t home anymore. I pledged a sorority and began getting involved in a world that was completely foreign to me but exciting and something I enjoyed.
I did begin drinking and experimenting with drugs but I feel those never became issues for me. I could take it or leave it. It was never something that I feel I struggled with. Not to say I didn’t have my share of drinking stories but just not an issue that I feel I would say I struggled with.
My first year away passed rather uneventfully and I began my second year. The partying and drinking increased but again, I didn’t feel it was out of control. In fact, I was always the one who kept everybody else in line and usually ended up being the Designated Driver or put various friends to bed before they did anything to further make fools of themselves. However, as an adult and especially as a mother I look back now on some of the situations I placed myself in and cringe. I am extremely fortunate nothing worse happened to me.
One night a group of friends were in Birmingham hitting the local bars and we met up with some guys we all casually knew. One in particular paid me a whole lot of attention and brought me drink after drink. I had seen him around and felt like I kind of knew him so I trusted him and we spent the evening talking, drinking, dancing and get to know each other better. I take full responsibility for my drinking that night but the night ended in a way that shaped my views of relationships and sex for years to come.
I have vague recollections of that night but I do remember him driving my car and taking me back to his apartment. Things got physical and I do remember telling him “no” but I was so impaired from the alcohol that I didn’t have the mindset to be very forceful in my protests. That was my first sexual experience and later I remember feeling extremely shameful and not sure if this was date rape or I brought it on by my actions beforehand. I was 18 years old.
After this experience I became very reckless with my behavior and jumped from one guy to another for the next few months. I assumed that it really didn’t matter anymore since the fact that I had always waited for the “right” person was no longer an option. I put myself in extremely dangerous situations and am very fortunate that God didn’t allow anything else to happen to me. I began dating an older man and thought this relationship was finally going to save me.
I became pregnant 2 days before my 21st birthday and I was petrified. I told my parents and they were devastated but supported me. I married the man and quickly learned that most of the things he had told me about himself were all lies. Imagine waking up one morning and finding out every single thing your spouse ever told you was a complete lie. We divorced a little over a year later and I obtained full custody of my son.
Life chugged along with nothing major going on and I met my current husband. We married and I thought I finally had it all. The one glaring problem with our relationship was that he was married to someone else when I first met him. Again though, he was my ticket to happiness and a stable life so I plowed on ahead full throttle.
We now acknowledge we made several mistakes in the beginning of our relationship and hurt many people.
I had my second son about 2 years after we got married. My career had taken off and I was in the best place financially I had ever been in. We were by all accounts blissfully happy.
I had an ideal husband. Thoughtful. Handsome. Smart. Funny. A good Dad. And he would want me to throw in rippling muscles here too. From all outside eyes we had a great marriage. Compatible. Spent lots of time together. Took fun trips. Went on dates. Everything seemed perfect. Then it wasn't.
I never meant to have an affair. I honestly ignored all the signs and warnings until I was well in over my head and quickly drowning in deceit.
The reason our marriage almost failed was the strongest example I personally have ever had of how Satan works in our lives at times. I was this close to losing my marriage and my family over what I thought were greener pastures.
Only when I accepted I could not manage my life and completely turned it over to God did my circumstances change. Yes, I had to put in tremendous effort, but that beginning point…that surrendering to God is what started the ball rolling. Yes, there was hurt and immense pain, disappointment, anger, bitterness and an overwhelming sense of failure. But now I can say with complete certainty there is peace. I hadn’t had peace in such a long time. I have it now and I won’t do anything to jeopardize it again. My life is far from perfect but having peace again is something I value every single day.
I became close to someone in my office and a few conversations turned into long lunches, then spending more and more time together, then emails throughout the day, then an ongoing physical, emotional and mental affair that continued for 2 years. It got to the point I considered life without my husband and my children in order to continue to have this relationship. At one point I convinced myself that my children would actually be better off if I weren’t a part of their lives. This man had a wife and 2 wonderful children as well. Not only was I throwing away my children’s security and happiness but his children’s too. I had myself convinced it eventually would be better for everyone if we were together because then we would be so HAPPY. The myth of happiness that we let ourselves believe. The myth that Satan perpetuates in our minds.
My husband found out and confronted me with my affair on 3 separate occasions and each time I begged his forgiveness. I cried. I pleaded. I made all sorts of promises. I swore it would never happen again and every single time I failed. The definition of insanity…right? Doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results. And every single time he said he forgave me and we tried to put it behind us. We didn’t go to counseling. We didn’t pray about it. We just said we were going to be okay and then we went right on along the same path and we couldn’t figure out why we kept getting the same results. We would take a fantastic trip together, just the two of us, and think that was the way to get our marriage back in focus. And each time we ended up back at square one. I distinctly remember one of those trips out of the country and sitting in this beautiful location at this beautiful restaurant and not having a word to say to each other. I wanted to be somewhere else with someone else and my husband knew it.
I put my marriage, my family, my career, my reputation and everything that mattered to me at risk for absolutely nothing. But, at the time, I thought it was everything and I couldn’t see past the facade of that relationship to see how much I was truly risking by being in it.
I remember walking in once on my husband, literally on his knees, praying, after I had yet again broken my promises and yet again been found out. I don’t know exactly what he was praying for. The ability to forgive? Strength? Courage? I actually laughed at him and remember saying, “Good luck with that…it doesn’t work.” I had allowed Satan to have such a stronghold in my life that I didn’t even believe in prayer any longer.
I would be driving home after work or a business trip, after spending time with this other man and thinking that I didn’t want to feel guilty anymore. I didn’t want to feel convicted about what I was doing. I didn’t want anymore guilt. I wanted to do what I wanted to do and not have to think about the consequences or feel remorse. I asked God once to just let me go. I was so angry and disgusted that I shouted out loud in the car, “LET ME GO…LEAVE ME ALONE” and I heard a barely audible voice reply so kindly and patiently “I can’t.” I have never audibly heard the voice of God until this day. And I felt a warmth and a peace and I wanted to give in to it but my will and my control won out and I pushed it aside…for a time.
I am very fond of a quote by C.S. Lewis: God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks to us in our conscience, but shouts in our pain. Pain is God's megaphone to rouse a deaf world."
About a year into my affair I became pregnant. I was almost certain my husband was not the father of this baby and I panicked. At this point my husband did not know I was having the affair. I told him I was pregnant and that I did not want to go through another rough pregnancy. He knew things weren’t right with us even though we hadn’t verbalized it yet. He agreed a baby was not a good idea. When he came home from work that day I had already called and made an appointment to have an abortion for the next day. I knew if I waited I wouldn’t be able to go through with it. He went with me to the appointment and all along I let him believe it was his baby and we were making the right decision. This is one of the hardest things I have had to forgive myself of and I am still not there yet.
Even after this experience, I kept trying it my way. Even after sacrificing this child to cover up my sin I went right back to the other man. I quit my job to try and remove myself from seeing him every day and within 2 days of leaving I was seeing him again even more than when we worked together. I couldn’t break this bond I thought we had no matter what I tried to do.
I made a very weak attempt at seeing a professional counselor at one point and after talking to me and giving me some written tests she asked me if I had ever had a drug or alcohol problem because I had such high addictive behavior qualities. I remember walking out of her office and never going back because how dare she lump me into the same category as drunks and addicts. Little did I know I had an addiction to this toxic relationship the same as any drunk or addict ever had.
After being confronted a third time by my husband and him telling me he couldn’t do it anymore and he was leaving me, I remember talking to God and saying, “I can’t do this. I can’t seem to walk away from this other relationship even if it costs me everything. But, if you will help me get this person out of my heart and my mind and my life I’ll try but I can’t do it by myself. You have to help me.”
After I prayed this I made a decision to have no contact with this other person. I started out telling myself I would try to go a week and not call or email or see him. I honestly didn’t know if I could do it but I knew I was going to try and see what happened. I called and told him that if he had ever cared anything at all about me in the least he would walk away and never contact me again.
One week turned into a month…then 2 months then 6 months and so on. I made a promise to my husband that I would never hurt him like I had again and it’s a promise I intend to keep with God’s help. September 20th marked 3 years since I made that decision.
We started seeing a counselor together and we made an effort to do what it took…whatever it took…to heal our marriage. And it took a lot. It was work. It was not easy in the least and it still isn't. It is a daily affirming of our commitment to our marriage.
Here we are 3 years later and we are in a better place than we ever have been before. We are closer than we have ever been before. Yes, he still does things that I could break his neck for and I’m sure I do the same…but our stake is in the ground. We aren’t going anywhere. I begin my day each morning with a prayer thanking God for my husband, for my children and for peace again.
As an added blessing God chose to give me a 4th pregnancy and our beautiful Colin was born in July 2008. He will never replace the baby that I aborted but he is a constant reminder to me of God’s grace and forgiveness.
Not everyone has to go through something like this to understand God’s faithfulness but I’m hard headed. I have to crash into that brick wall before I learn God’s lessons.
It’s my prayer daily that God continues to strengthen my marriage and makes me into the wife and mother my husband and children deserve.
I tell you all this to assure you there isn’t anything in your life right now that is bigger than God’s grace and God’s faithfulness.
He has so many blessings he wants to pour out into our lives but we prevent him from doing so by our choices and sinful nature. It’s only when we surrender and tell him we place our burden in his hands that we can begin to heal and begin to experience the life he wants for us. Sometimes it takes 2 years…sometimes longer…but God is faithful.
I cling to John 3:30—He must increase and I must decrease. This verse is a jumping off place for me daily.
By becoming involved with Celebrate Recovery I have learned the steps and tools I need to help me manage my life. I can look back on the events that happened during my affair and see so clearly the steps I could have taken and how that place of surrender is exactly what starts the ball rolling.
For the first time in my life I have developed friendships with women. I always viewed women as competition, rivals or obstacles to something I wanted. God has blessed me beyond measure by bringing me the women He has and helped me see them as the gifts that they are in my life.
My husband and I have full disclosure between us now. I check everything I’m doing by asking myself if John were standing right here with me right now would I say that? Would I flirt like that? Would I accept that lunch invitation? I am extremely aware of my behavior and where to now draw the line. In the past my line was clearly not defined and I pushed it further and further.
Another verse that I remind myself of constantly is Matthew 16:24-26—Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You’re not in the driver’s seat; I am. Don’t run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I’ll show you how. Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self. What kind of deal is it to get everything you want but lose yourself? What could you ever trade your soul for?
Thank you so much for letting me share with you. I now am leading a group of amazing women each week at Celebrate Recovery that are dealing with a whole host of issues: Eating disorders, divorce, suicidal tendencies, cutting, anger, fear, alcohol and drug addictions...you name it. I am so very fortunate to have this opportunity to minister to these ladies and help them work their steps and get to a place of healing.
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