Why I apologize to my kids

         

Sometimes ... I have mental breakdowns. And those friends and family that are closest to us know the hell our little family has been going through the past 6 months, things are just starting to look brighter, stabilize and hopeful - but sometimes , I still snap. My husband and I are utterly exhausted due to his new work schedule of night shifts and our youngest son having some serious sleep regression and separation anxiety - we started this new difficult season after coming out of a gruelling experience that was probably the most compounded stressful time period of our marriage ( if not my life.) 

As I started, sometimes I snap, and for a few reasons , this morning was one of them. My husband was grumpy, my toddler was being an A-hole (straight up)  and my 18 month year old was being so possessive and clingy . My husband made a dig at me ( in response I think to a dug at him - let's be real) it was probably like a level 3 offence and I had like a level 17 reaction. I screamed, I cried, I threw a damn carton of eggs ... Who in their right mind does that? And then stormed off to go cry some more - all in front of my two little boys and my husband who was holding on to his compsure by the skin of his teeth. 

After I calmed down, I was SO humiliated. So embarrassed. I didn't even want to see my husband let alone acknowledge my toddler-level tantrum. Of course, once Ryan had calmed down, he came and found me and talked me off the ledge (he's giving me extra grace due to extra hormones!)I of course knew I had to, and did, apologize to him for my outburst and then went and sat down with the kids to restore our standard of relationship.

I know my boys are young, and may not understand everything I say to them - but I'll tell you one thing, I'm often shocked at what they do understand, so I always try to cover my bases. Something with Nehemiah (3 1/2 years) we've really been working on is yelling when he's angry (where oh where could he have gotten that from?) I try really, really hard not to yell at my kids. Sometimes I have to walk out of the room when Nehemiah is just pushing the boundries as far as he can get away with. But something I've been trying in my life, to teach him, is not to yell or respond emotionally. When Nehemiah yells at me, although it easily gets my blood pressure pumping, I try as calmly as possible to say: " Nehemiah, mommy doesn't yell at you, please don't yell at mommy." But the thing is - then you need not to actually yell. It's. Hard, but it is working. 

So this morning I apologized to my boys for 

1. Yelling 

2. Not having self control over my anger 

3. Talking rudely to their father 

4. Throwing things ( I cringe even writing it #facepalm) 

Of course Nehemiah was like, ."..okkkk... I forgive you ... Can I watch my show again ?" But I really feel it is a small way I can show respect for them and hopefully earn their trust that when mommy screws up, she will own it and fix it. Resulting in teaching them to do the same; practice self control by trying not to yell, be mean or get physical when we are angry , when we do mess up - own it and apologize to those we hurt, know that we are loved and will be forgiven and given another chance to grow. The only way I can expect my children to grow in that maturity, is to model it first myself - even when I fail. 

loving you is more important to me then killing you

I don't really even know where to begin. A lot has happened since my last post, a lot of overwhelming stuff, that I didn't even know how to share if I wanted to. Everyday is a roller coaster, full of ups and downs, I tend to write I guess in the downs, but lately I have been WAY to down to write anything. The past two days, however, I have been surprisingly happy, and that makes me more happy, but It's a fight to hold unto that happiness. I think I am at one of the hardest points in my life so far, really having a hard look at my life right now as a mother, as a wife, as a friend, as a sister/daughter and as a Makeup Artist.

I'm so far from perfect. Everyone knows that, I demonstrate it on a regular bases, but I am not really honest about it with myself, I think very few people are. For about two months now, my husband's and my relationship has been really strained...as a result , I've gotten mad a lot of people, it has to be somebody's fault we are so dysfunctional.  I  start down the blame game and try to blame  the in-law's,  I think to myself "look at this man she gave me, he can't do anything for himself cause she did everything for him, if it hadn't been for her constantly accommodating her boys, my marriage would be so much better...and ugh...he's just like his father and he had no idea how to connect heart-to-heart and now I am stuck without being able to connect to my husband cause he was never taught relationship skills on an intimate level..."  And then I catch myself ...going through a list of all the people that have shaped Ryan and I to become who we are today, but ya know what? The only people that can save my relationship with husband, is him and I.It would be soooo much easier to look for people to blame, but I think I need to have a little more courage and be a little more honest with myself, I am responsible for my actions, regardless of what people or life throw my way. That is empowering in a way, but scarey at the same time, but if I have a problem, I can take responsibility for it, and fix it. The only thing I can do about the problems I see in our marriage is change my contribution. I can't control Ryan, I can try, but it will backfire. I can nag at him all I want, but is that all I want? An accommodating husband? Is that what this great romance, passion and love has been reduced to? Mutual accommodation? I think a lot of marriages have been, it's sad, I see these couples regularly who are interacting, but not really interacting, so lonely, dreams crushed. Who falls in love or gets married with the hopes of finding someone that will accommodate them for the rest of their life?


It's a fight sometimes, not just to slip into the motions, just lie down and say, "You Win! I give up" . Sometimes I feel like it would be so much easier, to just have a roommate rather then a husband, actually, I know it would be so much easier. Much easier to just live our separate lives, have our separate visions, our separate dreams, our separate schedule, just be friends, without having to sacrifice for the other person. Sacrifice...not a word you hear often now unless it's about getting ahead in your career, but what about getting a head in your relationships? The thing about sacrifice is ...it's so bloody expensive. So I am faced with the question, how much is it going to cost? How much does having a living, breathing, loving, healthy relationship with my husband going to cost me? And better yet, do I want to pay it? ...should have thought about that before I signed the life contract. I think I know the answer, I know that deep down inside of me, I am willing to take who I am and invest that daily into our relationship so that our dreams, visions and life do become one beautiful love-filled life. But it's to take the first step, to put the gun down and not say "You win! I give up!" but to put the gun down and say "loving you is more important to me then killing you" HAHA! It's funny, but so true... if anyone, anyone could say something nasty about you, from who would if hurt the most? The people that you love!! When you have constant martial spats, and are tearing each other down, you are literally killing each other.


A friend and I were sharing last night and she was talking about a conference where she was at and the speaker said "When I fight with my wife, and tear her down,disrespect her, I am actually fighting with myself at the deepest of levels, because we are one." That just spoke such truth to me, holding unto every grudge, constantly judging my husband and watching him for every screw up, I am making my own life a living hell. I married this man, and said I would devote my life to him, why then, when a huge part of my happiness and well-being is dependent on him, would I constantly be sabotaging it by being a psycho bitch to him? I need to forgive him for his mistakes and release him for my nagging death grip and focus on what I CAN control...myself.

Sex...to wait or not to wait? That is the question.

I love sex. Pretty much always have,I love the electric charge through your whole body when your going in for the kill, and all the fun through to the end. Therefor, logically, you would think that sex would be easier once you get married not harder...and maybe for some people it is, but that has not been my experience so far.

I've made a number of bad decisions in my past, a lot regarding relationships and men and that has brought a lot of baggage into my life. Which, besides a bitter heart and a black soul, I was functioning fine with; however, once I got married these issues got huge, magnified times a hundred, especially in the bedroom. I asked my husband as we were lying in bed after a blissful morning (he's got the day off work and the baby has been sleeping all morning...what else are we gonna do?) Why was it easier to having meaningless sex with men that meant nothing to me, then have meaningful sex with a man who means everything to me? "I don't know" my husband responds sleepily . And neither do I, but I have a couple of ideas why it might be a little harder for me to relax now.

I think one of the worst feelings in the world, is lying in your loving husband's arms after great sex (as he starts to dose off,) and feeling like a whore, because you are remembering the other guys you've experienced this with. It TOTALLY ruins the moment. Guilt and shame and disgust rush in overwhelmingly instead of love, peace and just pure bliss. Now I'm lying there, trying to come to terms with how deeply I am in love with this man and want to give him everything, but I've already given so much away.I start to get angry at myself tears coming down my face,Ryan continues to snores away. I poke him to wake him up, and I tell him I am sorry for my past decisions, I can't even be specific it's too painful. But he knows, He kisses me sleepily on the head and tells me he loves me, he's forgiven me a long time ago and he's chosen to forget about it all, and so has God. This isn't the first time we've had this conversation, it comes up quite often. Usually when I feel close to him or really loved,the guilt comes in.

I heard growing up, in books, sermons, videos, pastors, whatever, all say to wait till you get married to have sex. And they would go on to explain why it's so important, you don't want to give little pieces of your heart away and only have a broken dirty used heart to give to your spouse. But why did I never listen?! That has been so major on my heart since Ryan and I have had to fight through this battle for me. How do you communicate to unmarried people and couples something they can't comprehend. Like I said, up until I was married, although I had had a few broken hearts and bumps and bruises, I thought that I was fine.My one night stands or friendly hook ups weren't that bad at all. I wasn't a broken woman, I wasn't just throwing myself at men. I had everything under control. But it's one game to sleep with someone that you don't see all the time or you'll only see for so long, it's another thing to sleep with someone you see all the time, and you are going to continue sleeping with and seeing for the rest of your life. Brings some weight into it. And maybe that's one of the reasons why we young people don't listen.

We see in TV,movies, advertising, music and sometimes friends sex being so casual and not a big deal. However, good sex is a HUGE deal in a healthy marriage, but most of us never get that part. It's almost like all along you've been wearing these beautiful earrings. You love them and you wear them all the time. Then one day, upon closer inspection, someone informs you, those are real diamonds and they are worth a fortune, you should really be careful. Your dumbfounded, you had no idea you've been carrying millions of dollars around with you everywhere. You still love the earrings, but you also want to protect them now that you know how valuable they are. But it's too late you realize while you've been partying and carrying on...some of the gems have fallen out and you are in no financial position to purchase new diamonds to restore them to their former glory.

How can you know how good something tastes, if you've never eaten it before? How do you go on someones word that "That pie is the best most delicious pie in the world, all pies pale in comparison!" Without having a bite? I hope I figure out how to answer this in time for when my kids are curios. I mean it's more like telling your kids that this is the best pie in the world it tastes so good you can hardly stand it, when they don't even know what pie is. I pray that by sharing my experiences other girls won't make the same mistakes I have. A lot of people say "I've made lot's of mistakes in my past, but I wouldn't change a thing." I would, I would change a lot of nights. I feel like it's not enough to simply say, trust me, you'll appreciate it later, there are too many pressures, too many temptations, too many lonely people to justify decisions making on something so untangible and unexplainable.I pray God gives me the wisdom and the relationship with my kids to be able to communicate properly the weight behind the seemingly small decisions they can make at such a young inexperienced age.

I guess I'll end this post in honoring my husband. Although he was not a virgin when we got married, he only slept with one other girl, and not because that was his only opportunity, but because he wanted to wait until he was married.I know men aren't as emotional about sex as woman are, so they don't always get scarred the way woman do. But I appreciate his constant grace and patience and love with me, as I have to heal my wounds before I can love him fully like I am suppose to. I appreciate the restoration he continues to bring into my life and how damn good he is in bed. ;)

The Logic

So I have decided to create a new blog. Not that my other one was very successful, I would only update it every 3-4 months, but I had to force myself often to come up with content to write about, it didn't flow naturally. However, I am in a new season in my life (new wife and mother), and I need to vent, and write things out to sort them.

Being a wife is amazing, but it isn't easy-especially being married young. My husband and I have known each other for years and have always been good friends and I love him very much, I love having him in my life and I love his company...but what I don't always love is living with him. Sometimes, I would love to be married, but be neighbors-that have lot's of dinner parties and sleepovers. I find this man's socks EVERYWHERE!!! It is actually mind-blowing. Every morning he says to me "Sweetheart do you know where my socks are?" And I reply in my sleep "Check the clean laundry basket..." because I do not have it in me at 5am to say "Check the dresser, or check the floor, check under the bed, check the hamper, check the closet, check the living room, check under the couch, check in the couch, check in the dining room, check ON the dining room table, check in the hallway, check in the entry room, check in the kitchen, check in the baby's room, check in the laundry room,check the car...HOW IN THE WORLD CAN YOU NOT FIND SOCKS WHEN IT'S ALL I SEEM TO FIND EVERYWHERE?!!?!?"...this is one of our marital problems...Ryan just doesn't know it yet. Which leads to the bigger issue really...communication...

Better communication always seems to be the answer to relationship problems, but still most couples, including myself, aren't making it a priority to communicate how they really feel. Whether it is negative or positive, and in today's society where marriage is constantly being attacked by the media I think the Positive communication is desperately needed! But woman, especially, tend to hold back the negative, FOR WHATEVER REASON, I don't know if we don't want to portray the "mother figure" or be the nagging wife, but a lot of woman let men do things that bug them all the time and not say a thing...right away. Then it flips, all the pent up frustration and resentment explodes, all hell breaks loose, and all you can say is negative things and nit pick your husband apart. I was in the shower the other day upset with Ryan over something, I don't even remember what it was, and as I was standing there fuming over it and not talking to him about it, I started this chain of negative thoughts toward him, the thing I was frustrated about at the moment, reminded me of something else he had done that bugged me, which reminded me of something else, and so on and so on, I was getting SO worked up, then I caught myself..."I'm planning my husbands murder and he doesn't even know why he's been sentenced to death!" ..not healthy relationship habits.

So my focus for the next 40 days is to daily communicate how I am feeling(won't he enjoy this lol... He'll probably stop me before the end of the first week and say "Ya know what, just keep it pent up inside, and let all hell break loose once in a while, I think that's easier") both the frustrations, and the things he does that I appreciate...because he is getting much better and does a wonderful job with laundry, taking out the trash, and changing dirty diapers-none of which are glamorous jobs. He is not perfect and neither am I but I love my husband even with his memory lapsing schizophrenia relationship with his socks.