LostOne
03-25-2009, 10:02 AM
I would like to start by saying hello to the group as I am new here. I apologize that this will be a long posting but do not feel as though anyone will be able to offer opinion or suggestion without having a full snap shot of what is and has been happening.
I am 29 years old, have four children all under the age of 6, I also lost my nine month old son about about a year and a half ago. I have been married for 7 years, am employed full time and am a student getting ready to complete my bachelors degree.
The problem that I have is that despite the fact that I love my husband and children, and can say to you that I never want to loose them and that divorce isn't an option for me, I have repeatedly done things to jeopardize my marriage.
A little history would be useful here:
I have always been somewhat shy and withdrawn. Funny thing is my parents say I was bubbly and outgoing until I was 6 years old. My mother says literally she put me to bed one night and the next morning my "light" was gone. I have often wondered about this, did something happen that I have blocked out that set this whole thing in motion? Anyway I was still a promising child albeit a shy backward one. When I was 13 years old we made a cross country move and once again the bottom fell out. I went from a 4.0 student to failing quickly. I almost instantly got mixed up with the wrong people and began a pattern of drinking, promiscuity, and running away. I would drink until I passed out and often put myself into situations where grown men would then have sex with me without my knowledge. Often I had no recollection of such things I would just wake up with no clothes and someone would later tell me what had occurred (oddly no one ever though I was worth enough to tell someone to stop).
Sex has always been weird for me. I have said many times that the sex that I had at this point in my life (age 13 - 20) seemed to occur without me. I can honestly say that I can see it all from a third person point of view. I watched those people (even when consensual) use me. I laid there refusing to make a sound other than the occasional crying. Everyone thought I was a whore but it wasn't about the physical act of sex at all and I never once climaxed as a result of it. Sex served two contradictory purposes 1) to validate me, to make me feel like someone thought I was good enough even if I knew it was a lie 2) served as a form of self punishment, I thought I deserved to be treated in such a manner. During this time of my life I also engaged in quite a bit of self mutilation to my forearms, thighs, and stomach. I never wanted to die while doing this I just felt so numb, I had to feel. It started as a very methodical process. I would run a bath, light candles, turn on an opera, lay out my blades and then carefully drag them across my body and as I watched the blood flow from me and disperse through the water I would slowly start to be able to breathe again. Of course like most things this escalated to the point that I would carry blades in my purse and sneak into the bath room at school or in other public places and make a quick cut to keep me going. I also engaged in extreme binging and purging. Relationships during this period where short lived and never monogamous but no one questioned that due to my age.
Around the age of 20 I had my first REAL boyfriend. We met and moved in with each other within a week. It was a tumultuous relationship that lasted slightly over two years. I was so crazy in love with him and it really wasn't reciprocated. Only a few weeks into the relationship I was scared that I was falling too hard and I cheated on him in the living room of our house when I was expecting him home. I guess I thought if he caught me he would break up with me then it would save a lot of tears later. He didn't catch me but I told him and he stayed. This would occur many times. He passed me around to his friends (sexually) and never really gave me the attention I needed. Towards the end of our relationship the fighting had gotten worse and he hit me. The whole thing was loud enough our neighbors came to my aid. I did break up with him but not before trying to kill myself. I took an overdose of prescription meds and ended up in the ICU in a comma a seven days. All the while I found out later I had been having hallucinations that he was having sex with one of my friends in the room.
After that relationship ended I very quickly met a woman who ended up moving in with me and we started dating (I had always dated women as well as men and had started experimenting with friends as a very young child at sleep overs). She and I dated for two years as well and through the entire relationship I cheated on her as well as outright demanding that she share me with anyone I wanted to bring home from a bar. It was really hard on her emotionally and I would get mad a scream at her that I hated her even though I never really did. When she finally had enough she told me she loved me but couldn't be treated the way I did for the rest of her life. When she walked out the door the last words she said to me was that I would marry the next person to walk through my door.
In walks my husband. Never having been one to be alone I called some friends that had been trying to set me up and told them to have the guy call me. He did and before she even had a chance to get her things off the porch I had him over, he spent the night, and never left. He moved in and we were engaged within a couple weeks. He would not tolerate my cutting and purging so I stopped the cutting and greatly reduced the frequency with which I purged; I was trying to be perfect for him. Within the first couple of months I had cheated on him with the above mentioned ex girlfriend. I then proceeded to cheat on him with another girl that I went to school with. I always confessed my sins to him so I thought that made it okay. It was only wrong if I was lying and sneaking (I was doing neither). We proceeded with our wedding and a brief honeymoon period followed. Looking back at this I will assume it was because I was pregnant and couldn't go out, at least that is what he tells me. I became pregnant one week after our wedding and things were fine for the next 13 months. I was less than three months after the birth of my son that I screwed up again. To this day I don't know if I am at fault or the victim so I have never really known how to deal emotionally with this one. My husband was working nights, I didn't want to be alone, I called a guy from school to come hang out and watch movies (this is really all I thought I was asking for) I guess he took this to be a "booty call" and even though I tried to pass the time showing him wedding and baby pictures he didn't take no for an answer when I told him I couldn't sleep with him. I cried while he had sex with me but never hit him so I guess I am still guilty. Emotionally I was devastated. I never considered the girls to be cheating so in my eyes I had committed an awful sin against my husband and God. I stayed up all night crying in bed with our wedding photos. I was convinced he would leave me when I told him that morning but he didn't. He actually didn't the most selfless thing of our marriage...he slept with me. He knew if he didn't I would feel that he had rejected me and didn't love me anymore. It was hard but we moved forward from this. I had a few more children during the next five years and satisfied my need for attention and extra lovers through threesomes with other women that my husband allowed. Five years after the first man to infiltrate our marriage I had lost my child and lost any fear that I may have had of losing my family through my behavior. I felt I had already lost everything and really stopped caring about the consequences. I ended up sleeping with my boss. It was not premeditated. There had always been innocent flirtation but as most things happen, too much alcohol was mixed into the equation and the inevitable happened. I was desperate to tell my husband as soon as it happened but I was advised that it was too soon after my son's death and that he wouldn't be able to handle it. I waited as long as I could with the secret eating at me. I told him about three months later. Once again he took the news much better than I had expected and agreed not to leave me. Not long after this incident I was at a bar drinking and although I don't have recollection of this happening I ended up sleeping with someone in the parking lot of the bar in my car. Later that same night I was seen leaving with someone else that I have no memory of. But I ended up at the hospital later that night drunk, under the influence of some type of drug and with the physical evidence of an apparent rape. My husband oddly enough was very mad about these two situations. And had never forgiven me for the second because even though the hospital made me give a statement to the police I was unwilling to file charges as I figured on some level I had most likely been to blame.
I am 29 years old, have four children all under the age of 6, I also lost my nine month old son about about a year and a half ago. I have been married for 7 years, am employed full time and am a student getting ready to complete my bachelors degree.
The problem that I have is that despite the fact that I love my husband and children, and can say to you that I never want to loose them and that divorce isn't an option for me, I have repeatedly done things to jeopardize my marriage.
A little history would be useful here:
I have always been somewhat shy and withdrawn. Funny thing is my parents say I was bubbly and outgoing until I was 6 years old. My mother says literally she put me to bed one night and the next morning my "light" was gone. I have often wondered about this, did something happen that I have blocked out that set this whole thing in motion? Anyway I was still a promising child albeit a shy backward one. When I was 13 years old we made a cross country move and once again the bottom fell out. I went from a 4.0 student to failing quickly. I almost instantly got mixed up with the wrong people and began a pattern of drinking, promiscuity, and running away. I would drink until I passed out and often put myself into situations where grown men would then have sex with me without my knowledge. Often I had no recollection of such things I would just wake up with no clothes and someone would later tell me what had occurred (oddly no one ever though I was worth enough to tell someone to stop).
Sex has always been weird for me. I have said many times that the sex that I had at this point in my life (age 13 - 20) seemed to occur without me. I can honestly say that I can see it all from a third person point of view. I watched those people (even when consensual) use me. I laid there refusing to make a sound other than the occasional crying. Everyone thought I was a whore but it wasn't about the physical act of sex at all and I never once climaxed as a result of it. Sex served two contradictory purposes 1) to validate me, to make me feel like someone thought I was good enough even if I knew it was a lie 2) served as a form of self punishment, I thought I deserved to be treated in such a manner. During this time of my life I also engaged in quite a bit of self mutilation to my forearms, thighs, and stomach. I never wanted to die while doing this I just felt so numb, I had to feel. It started as a very methodical process. I would run a bath, light candles, turn on an opera, lay out my blades and then carefully drag them across my body and as I watched the blood flow from me and disperse through the water I would slowly start to be able to breathe again. Of course like most things this escalated to the point that I would carry blades in my purse and sneak into the bath room at school or in other public places and make a quick cut to keep me going. I also engaged in extreme binging and purging. Relationships during this period where short lived and never monogamous but no one questioned that due to my age.
Around the age of 20 I had my first REAL boyfriend. We met and moved in with each other within a week. It was a tumultuous relationship that lasted slightly over two years. I was so crazy in love with him and it really wasn't reciprocated. Only a few weeks into the relationship I was scared that I was falling too hard and I cheated on him in the living room of our house when I was expecting him home. I guess I thought if he caught me he would break up with me then it would save a lot of tears later. He didn't catch me but I told him and he stayed. This would occur many times. He passed me around to his friends (sexually) and never really gave me the attention I needed. Towards the end of our relationship the fighting had gotten worse and he hit me. The whole thing was loud enough our neighbors came to my aid. I did break up with him but not before trying to kill myself. I took an overdose of prescription meds and ended up in the ICU in a comma a seven days. All the while I found out later I had been having hallucinations that he was having sex with one of my friends in the room.
After that relationship ended I very quickly met a woman who ended up moving in with me and we started dating (I had always dated women as well as men and had started experimenting with friends as a very young child at sleep overs). She and I dated for two years as well and through the entire relationship I cheated on her as well as outright demanding that she share me with anyone I wanted to bring home from a bar. It was really hard on her emotionally and I would get mad a scream at her that I hated her even though I never really did. When she finally had enough she told me she loved me but couldn't be treated the way I did for the rest of her life. When she walked out the door the last words she said to me was that I would marry the next person to walk through my door.
In walks my husband. Never having been one to be alone I called some friends that had been trying to set me up and told them to have the guy call me. He did and before she even had a chance to get her things off the porch I had him over, he spent the night, and never left. He moved in and we were engaged within a couple weeks. He would not tolerate my cutting and purging so I stopped the cutting and greatly reduced the frequency with which I purged; I was trying to be perfect for him. Within the first couple of months I had cheated on him with the above mentioned ex girlfriend. I then proceeded to cheat on him with another girl that I went to school with. I always confessed my sins to him so I thought that made it okay. It was only wrong if I was lying and sneaking (I was doing neither). We proceeded with our wedding and a brief honeymoon period followed. Looking back at this I will assume it was because I was pregnant and couldn't go out, at least that is what he tells me. I became pregnant one week after our wedding and things were fine for the next 13 months. I was less than three months after the birth of my son that I screwed up again. To this day I don't know if I am at fault or the victim so I have never really known how to deal emotionally with this one. My husband was working nights, I didn't want to be alone, I called a guy from school to come hang out and watch movies (this is really all I thought I was asking for) I guess he took this to be a "booty call" and even though I tried to pass the time showing him wedding and baby pictures he didn't take no for an answer when I told him I couldn't sleep with him. I cried while he had sex with me but never hit him so I guess I am still guilty. Emotionally I was devastated. I never considered the girls to be cheating so in my eyes I had committed an awful sin against my husband and God. I stayed up all night crying in bed with our wedding photos. I was convinced he would leave me when I told him that morning but he didn't. He actually didn't the most selfless thing of our marriage...he slept with me. He knew if he didn't I would feel that he had rejected me and didn't love me anymore. It was hard but we moved forward from this. I had a few more children during the next five years and satisfied my need for attention and extra lovers through threesomes with other women that my husband allowed. Five years after the first man to infiltrate our marriage I had lost my child and lost any fear that I may have had of losing my family through my behavior. I felt I had already lost everything and really stopped caring about the consequences. I ended up sleeping with my boss. It was not premeditated. There had always been innocent flirtation but as most things happen, too much alcohol was mixed into the equation and the inevitable happened. I was desperate to tell my husband as soon as it happened but I was advised that it was too soon after my son's death and that he wouldn't be able to handle it. I waited as long as I could with the secret eating at me. I told him about three months later. Once again he took the news much better than I had expected and agreed not to leave me. Not long after this incident I was at a bar drinking and although I don't have recollection of this happening I ended up sleeping with someone in the parking lot of the bar in my car. Later that same night I was seen leaving with someone else that I have no memory of. But I ended up at the hospital later that night drunk, under the influence of some type of drug and with the physical evidence of an apparent rape. My husband oddly enough was very mad about these two situations. And had never forgiven me for the second because even though the hospital made me give a statement to the police I was unwilling to file charges as I figured on some level I had most likely been to blame.