Keep Getting Up

Sometimes the hardest thing about being in a difficult place, in a difficult relationship, is getting back up...and getting back up again.  How many times do I cry and hurt alone and wonder why I do that.  Why do I allow it to bother me so much.  It's easier to be self condemning than it is to call things what they are.  And, self condemnation makes it really hard to stand back up again.  So,  each day, I am trying to remember that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ.  None.  At all.  Not even a little bit.  And if He chooses not to condemn me....then, who am I to think that I should?  I do believe in taking responsibility for my actions and lack of actions, but responsibility is not the same and condemning myself.  Responsibility means standing back up, acknowledging the past and choosing to change in the future. 
I know that I have lots of growing to do.  But, at the moment, just resting in the fact that the Father loves me is really important.  If I focus on all of the garbage and all of the pain, I think I'd climb under the covers for a year.  It's simply too hard.  I wanted to be a great wife.  A marvelous mom.  I wanted to be welcomed into my extended family.  I remember picturing how great it would be to have that extended family.  How was I to know that I'd have a mother in law who hates me...and tells people bad things about me...and that my husband would never find it within himself to stand for me?  I am strong.  I really thought that through the years I would win her over.  I thought that she would see that I'm kind and that I am raising her grandkids well and be happy with me.  It is not to be.  I have yet to find anything that I do right.  And, as my husband ages, he becomes more and more like his mother.  Frightening for the one who has endured her disdain.  Who has had her visit and had to keep silent.  Who spoke once on behalf of one of our foster kids and was forced by her husband to apologize...though his mother had completely annihilated the child's sense of self esteem.
I will not live this way anymore.  The way she feels about me does not make up who I am.  I am a child of a loving Father who only asks that I walk one day at a time with Him.  Who sees every fault and yet declares me faultless.  Who blesses me.  Who protects me. And, amazingly enough, who delights in me.  Greatly.  Wow.  But, it's hard to live like it.  I feel hunkered down.  Thank goodness that He is the lifter of my head, because sometimes I can barely do so. 
People have a sense that I have great confidence and that I am brave.   I guess that I am.  And, I can withstand much.  But I broke.  Completely.  I'm surprised that I have come through as well as I have because there was a moment over a year ago when I knew it had happened.  I knew that the relationship was mortally wounded.  I knew that no amount of apologizing was going to make me feel better....though the apologizing didn't happen...so I guess that thought didn't matter.  It was with clarity that I knew in the middle of a tirade that I absolutely couldn't live like this anymore.  I couldn't live shaking when he was around.  I couldn't live crying myself to sleep.  Though, sometimes that still happens...but, somehow, it's actually better now because I don't expect him to try to make it better.  So, I cry and then I get up the next day and live.  And then I do it again.  And, I find that I cry less.  Laugh more.  Enjoy more.  Am happier.  In the midst of all of this.  I am happy that he is not wrapped around me.  That he is not controlling me any longer. 
And I know that lots of people would be very offended.  But, try as I might, I can't find god telling me that how I feel and what I need is wrong.  When I pray, it is peaceful.  When I read His word, it is encouraging.  I'm not saying that it doesn't grieve Him, but just this last couple of weeks I realized that His grief does not translate into disappointment nor in telling me that I better go fix this at all costs.  He loves ME.  Not the person who cowers around trying to get it right.  Just the bumbling, somewhat clumsy but generally happy and encouraging person that he created.  And that helps me.  It gets me up over and over.  It makes me believe that one day I might actually FEEL like I'm worth that.  I don't yet.  But, I have hope for the first time in a very very long time that I might.
And, yes, I still hope he gets a job in another city.  I still hope that I will have a room to sleep in instead of on this couch.  But, better a couch with little privacy than a big bed with animosity.  I have to say that I still have trouble sleeping, but in a different way.  Less worry.  But, not terribly comfortable either. ;)  A little difficult if there's company of the kids over and such.  However, I don't worry about it as much.  I'm not out for making a huge great impression. 
I wish that he would quit pretending everything is alright.  That drives me rather crazy.  Being nice is ok.  It's even good.  Being polite.  Learning to relate in a new way.  But, acting like it's all still the same...can I kiss you?  Can I kiss you again?  I shuddered last time.  But, what do you say?  Sure, I guess.  He knows I don't want him to.  He knows that I am hurt.  But he chooses not to care.  He chooses to meet his own needs and make me feel guilty if I don't accomodate him.  That the hardest part for me at the moment.  How to keep getting up and facing that kind of stuff.  Mostly, we do our own stuff and leave it be.  But then, when he acts pitiful, it's hard.  But, I have never had that option...of having MY needs met when he doesn't want to.  Shoot, he won't even offer to take the kids to school at the crack of dawn.  Though he said that when they had to go early he would take it over.  So glad I have a teen driver now to take some of that driving over.  But, I leave when they leave in the morning so as not to get stuck at home with the husband and his wants.  Can't handle it.  Hard to keep saying, "I can't do that...not honestly...not in good conscience." 
But, hey, one small moment at a time.  I dread the next confrontation, but I know it will come, and I just pray to be able to tell the truth.  It's so much easier to want to say what makes him feel better.  I really don't want to make him feel crappy.  Funny how I've always protected him.  Always cared that he looked good.  Always cared that he felt encouraged and built up.  I bet he misses that.