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I am going to come right out of the gate today and tell you that today’s episode is not going to be a fun one or an easy one to share for me personally. But the prayer in my heart is that today’s episode really helps to bring value to your life and your marriage and maybe even healing to your heart and to your marriage if that’s what you need right now, whether you’re currently walking through a tough season, or perhaps you’re hanging on to past hurts and wounds, refusing to let them go and it’s impacting your marriage and your entire family in a negative way right now.
So halfway through the year, here we are, and I’m still clinging to my word of the year for 2022 which is relatable. So again, some parts of what I’m going to share today, I just want to let you know that honestly, they’re going to be hard to share. I’m going to share about some of our brokenness and messiness from the early days of our marriage, and the prayer on my heart truly is that you’ll find something in this that’s relatable to you and that something I share about will stir your spirit and cause you to cry out to God and to partner with Him to take action and to move forward to improve your own life and your own marriage in some way.
Jeremiah 29:11 says that God has a plan for your future that’s good. And He does, He totally does. He has a plan for your future, your life, your family, and your marriage and it’s good. But the Bible also says that action and obedience and steps forward are what get rewarded. In other words, you’re not called to sit in brokenness and suffering. You’re not called to sit and sulk and to hang on to past hurts and wounds. And I definitely don’t believe that you’re called to seek revenge if you have been hurt in your marriage. Sister, hear me. God is just and He is sovereign. And He’s simply called you to trust Him and to lean into Him and to learn and grow and seek His best plan for your life. And when you do, the results will be so sweet. The blessings will overflow when you partner with the Lord and submit to the way that He’s asked you to live and love and serve, especially when it comes to your marriage.
The Early Days of Our Marriage
So first things first, I gotta give you a little bit of the backstory. We married when I was pretty young, or at least considered young in today’s world where a lot of people are waiting until they’re a little bit older to get married. I was 19 when Chad and I met, we got engaged on my 20th birthday and I was still 20 years old when we got married. He was a little bit older than me at 29 years old. So here I was, a young newlywed, fresh out of college, had barely ever lived on my own before, let alone with another person. And I came into that marriage dragging a whole lot of baggage with me, a whole lot of past hurts and wounds.
My parents divorced when I was five years old and I carried so much confusion and pain, hurt and baggage and wrong beliefs surrounding all of that. So here I was at 19, 20 years old, newly married, very young, very naive – and I want to say this and share this with all love and honor and respect because what I’m about to share, I just I don’t want it to be taken the wrong way in any way because I have so much love and respect for this person that I’m about to share about, my brother-in-law, Chance. When Chad and I first got married, Chad and Chance had lived together for quite a few years. They were both bachelors. Chance is even older than Chad so he was like 34. So, they were two bachelors living together and had been for several years and Chance lived with Chad…and so he lived with us when we first got married. So again, I’m 20 years old, moving in with my husband and not only moving in with my husband but also moving in with my brother- in-law. Oh wow. Just deep breath on that.
Now, I do have to say again that I love, respect and honor Chance so deeply. He is such a good man and he would do anything for anyone, including me. And we actually have this really special and funny relationship, just very much brother-sister relationship where we kind of pick at each other but we know that we love each other so very deeply. Somewhere along the way, I actually gave him the nickname of Tot like tater tot and I still to this day, all these years later, call him Tot. So it actually feels weird for me as I’m referencing him as Chance because to me, he’s Tot.
So, Tot lived with us and there were definitely some good things like I said, he was a very good, good man and very kind but there also were some struggles as you can imagine. I am a 20 year old brand new newlywed moving in with two men and here I am with all my baggage and problems and mistrust, or distrust I guess you could call it, and so here come all these struggles, all these situations…obviously intimacy, privacy, shutting the door to the bedroom, things like that…Chad and I’s sex life just to be frank about it. Tot was in the room right next door to our bedroom and wow, it was mentally and emotionally very challenging. It’s hard to talk about because it was. In my heart and mind, it’s not the way that God meant for things to be. You hear in the Bible where when people get married, they would go off and spend time together just the two of them, just creating that intimacy and that bond and it just really was a real struggle.
And there were other problems. For example, the mail would come in and I remember one of them being subscribed to Men’s Health magazine. And to be blunt about it, the cover of that magazine often looks like soft porn. And at 20 years old, I reflect back and I’m like gosh, I was skinny and beautiful, I don’t know why I was so insecure, but you better believe I was so insecure, and these magazines would come and I would just be devastated inside and my confidence would be rocked. It just made me feel, along with all the past beliefs that I was holding, that we were definitely going to be bound for divorce because I could never measure up to these pictures that were coming in the mail. It was causing me so much stress and anxiety. And this is hard to share but here we are being relatable… So I remember one day, a Men’s Health magazine coming in and I was so just wrecked and insecure about it that I actually took the magazine and threw it in the trash can. A couple of weeks later, one of them asked me where the magazine was and I just had to be honest. So I fessed up and I said, “You know what? It’s gone. I put it in the trash.” And I remember that being a huge blowup, that I would dare to take someone else’s piece of mail and dispose of it when it wasn’t mine. But as you can imagine, a 20 year old newlywed, you know, I just wanted to have a safe and healthy and thriving marriage. I didn’t want to be feeling all this anxiety and I for darn sure didn’t want things to be coming into our home that were making me feel like we were headed towards divorce because I already struggled with that right out of the gate.
Side note here – and I want to come at this from a place of love and not judgment or condemnation but I want to speak to the hearts of those of you who are currently receiving magazines like Cosmopolitan, romance novels, soft porn, those kinds of things. Sis, my personal conviction is that those things that you’re allowing to come in front of your eyes and to sink into your ears and your heart and your mind… those things that you’re allowing to come into your home, they’re taking root. I believe that now and I believe that even back then because I knew, and you’ve heard me talk about this many times on the podcast, I knew and I know that the things that we allow into our heart and our mind will absolutely take root and those things will overflow out of our heart. They’ll come out of our mouth and our words hold power. Proverbs says our words hold power, and those things will become our life and our habits. They’re the things that we’ll think on and meditate on and focus on and even obsess over. And the Bible says in Philippians that we’re to think and focus and meditate on what’s good, pure, and true. And trashy romance novels and soft porn, it’s not good, pure and true, and it will directly affect your marriage just like it did in the short story that I shared about the magazine that came in the mail.
A little while after that, Chance, did move out. And today he is happily married to my beautiful sister-in-law. They have two beautiful, wonderful little girls, my nieces, and I love them dearly. And I just look back and I think like wow, how far we’ve come. God is so good and faithful. I prayed for years and years that the Lord would bring someone into his life that would be a blessing to him and that he would be able to enter into a healthy marriage and to have children someday and God answered those prayers. And so that’s a praise that goes hand in hand with that story.
So other things that happened early in our marriage…still silly things but things that affected me. We would be out at restaurants and Chad would call the waitress babe or dear or darlin, things that. It’s so funny because now where I’m at today, way more secure, I call the waitresses dear and hon and all those things that he did back in the day. But I was just not walking hand in hand with the Lord then. I was not set free at that point in my life. And so when he would do those things, it would just wreck me and it would send me spiraling with this chain of thoughts and events and playing it a lot in my head as we’re just out at a restaurant and he’s saying, “Thanks, dear.” It would send me to this space of thinking, we’re doomed, we’re headed for divorce.
Another thing that I want to just expose here as we’re talking so openly and vulnerably about this is that my past relationships and my past sexual sins before entering into marriage with Chad, those things haunted me. I just didn’t see how I could ever be forgiven and how I could ever be set free from those things and I buried them deep down. I never talked about them really with anyone. I just let them eat at the core of who I was and, honestly, at our marriage. I had done some things in my past trying to fill voids, trying to fill the void of the pain and hurt from my parents’ divorce, trying to receive love and acceptance from guys, trying to fix and save other guys because I was just really trying to fix and save myself. And just not having self-respect and not having self-control and not living the way that God asked us to live.
Which by the way, the way He asks us to live is so good. He’s so kind and gracious and loving. His word and the way that He asks us to live, it’s not like this strict rule book because He’s a mean or judgmental God or a harsh dad. He’s a loving Father who truly wants the best for us and has the best plan for our life. And it’s like, He’s always just saying, “Baby girl, I’ve got something better. Would you trust me? Would you follow my word? Would you follow my lead because I’ve got something better. I want the best for your life. Please follow these guidelines that I’ve laid out for you because it’s the best thing for you. And I lay out these guidelines for you because I love you.” Think about your own kids. You lay rules. You lay guidelines, you set expectations for them. Why? Because you love them and you genuinely truly want the best for them. It’s just like that with God, only so much deeper, so much bigger because He is a good Father. He is ultimate, supreme, and sovereign, the most loving, the most gracious, the most kind. He’s your Abba Daddy. I could go on and on about that and about His goodness and what He means to me and how I view Him as my Abba Daddy, just like Jesus did. The Bible says that we’re co-heirs with Christ and I just think that’s so absolutely awesome. But I’m digressing here – back to my past relationships and sexual sins just absolutely haunting me and affecting our marriage.
God set me Free
The awesome thing is that God truly loved me too much to let me stay in that dark, broken place where I was a physical, mental, emotional train wreck. All of that stuff I just shared led to massive health problems, anxiety, and of course, marital problems. I had so many problems with my heart and my physical health that I had to go have tests run on my heart, and to be frank, I was on the brink of heart attack. I was having so much anxiety and my heart was racing so fast so frequently, that I knew if something didn’t change, that dying of a heart attack at a super crazy young age was actually very much a possibility in my life. Thankfully, our good God, our good Father, the Lord, He loved me too much to let me stay there. And He began to really work on my heart and work in our marriage over the years that unfolded.
And in 2011, I really just began to seek the Lord and His wisdom. I sought out a life coach and I learned about things like forgiveness and gratitude and honor. I stepped into a relationship with Jesus. And God washed me clean and set me free of my past. He partnered with me to rewrite my belief system and He began to just speak into my heart and my life and into our marriage.
The Lord has been so gracious to Chad and I throughout our long journey, it’s going to be 20 years before we know it. My goodness, we just celebrated our 16th anniversary this summer. Yes, 16 anniversaries over 17 years together. It’s been a wild ride, a true journey, for sure. And God has spoken so many things into our hearts and lives in marriage over the course of the time that we’ve been together. But there are three main things that really helped us to find healing and freedom within our marriage. And so that’s what I want to share with you next.
Your Spouse is not Your Soulmate
The first one is the realization that Chad and I were not and are not each other’s soulmate. Let me just say that again. You and your spouse are not, should not be considered each other’s soulmate. I hear so many people saying, “He’s my soulmate.” “She’s my soulmate.” And it just kind of tugs at my heart when I hear that because I think we put so much expectation on our spouse to fulfill us in the way that only God can fill that God shaped hole in our heart, that void that only he is capable of filling. But somehow, whether it’s the fairy tales we watched as a child or just wild crazy thoughts that go through our own head as we’re starry eyed at the beginning of our marriage when we step into it, we think our spouse is our soulmate. He’s my everything, he’s going to fulfill me, it’s gonna be perfect, amazing, just this extravagant fairy tale. And then we’re let down or disappointed. And then we get further down the road into our marriage, and we still put these crazy unrealistic expectations on our spouse and on our family. Our birthday rolls around, Mother’s Day rolls around, and we think, “What are they going to do for me? What is he going to give me, what is he going to bring me.” It’s Valentine’s Day, “How big is the bouquet of roses going to be? I can’t wait to see what he does for me this year.” And then he forgets, or he brings a small bouquet and we’re let down, right? Maybe it’s time that we shift our thoughts and our expectations to realistic expectations or heck, even better, maybe it’s time that we shift our expectations from what can I get to what can I give? How can I serve? How can I show love? How can I add value to my spouse and to my family on my special day? On my birthday? How can I show love to my family in an even deeper way?
Wow. Is that not mind blowing? Game changer. But ultimately, it’s the realization that you and your spouse are not each other’s soulmate. And that fulfillment, that expectation should never be placed on your spouse. Only God can fulfill you in that way that you have complete contentment and peace.
In fact, just the other day there was something between Chad and I and I was frustrated and I felt let down and what I did was I went and hit the shower, I turned on worship music and I remembered that my fulfillment, my complete peace is in the Lord. And He began to work on and soften and speak in my heart in a way that I was then able to forgive Chad and even forgive myself for putting these unrealistic expectations on him and for thinking for even one second that he could fulfill me in a complete way. He can’t. He’s only human and it’s not his fault. It was never his role to fill. He’s not my soulmate, that role belongs to Jesus. Only God can fill that God shaped hole in your heart.
Forgiveness
The second thing is forgiveness. Oh my goodness gracious, forgiveness is a whole topic. It’s a book. It’s a lifetime of content. But it comes down to this…forgiveness is about releasing. When you forgive someone, when you forgive your spouse, when you forgive others, it does not justify what was done to you. It does not mean that their behavior or what happened was okay. It’s simply releasing and letting go. It’s freedom for your own heart. And like I mentioned before, we’re all human. We’re going to make mistakes. We’re going to let each other down. Your spouse is going to let you down and you’re going to let your husband down because why? Because we’re a sinful people. We’re only human, we’re going to make mistakes. And there are going to be boatloads of forgiveness required for your marriage to thrive, to find healing and freedom. It’s going to require you to allow your spouse to be themself and to be who they are and who God created them to be instead of comparing them to past experiences, to your dad, the past boyfriends, to your brother, to someone who abused you. It’s forgiving those people, those past experiences, and forgiving your spouse when your spouse falls short. This continues to help us even today because like I said, marriage takes a boatload of forgiveness and it’s an ongoing thing because we are a broken, sinful people.
We are on the same Team
The third thing that helped us find healing and freedom in our marriage is the realization that we are on the same team working towards the same end goal. Let me say that again. You and your husband are on the same team working towards the same end goal. And here’s the big secret…Don’t ever quit on the same day.
Chad and I have walked through some tough stuff, you better believe it. If you’ve been listening to the podcast very long, then, you know some of our wild and crazy stories, some of our highest highs and lowest lows. And I encourage you to go back and listen through some of those episodes where Chad’s been on the show with me. We’ve talked about some of those hard things we walked through, from loss and grief to absolute financial ruin, to health situations, to extended family situations, to the tough things we walked through at the very beginning of our marriage. If you’ve ever seen the movie, The Greatest Showman, that is basically our life and our marriage in cinematic form. Like we’ve been on top of the world together and we’ve been to the bottom of the barrel together. But this one thing has remained true – We’ve never quit on the same day. We’re on the same team working towards the same end goal just like you and your husband are. And that little piece of advice has served us so, so well.
God created your marriage and He says that it is good.
I want to close this today by reminding you that marriage is a good thing. God created man and God created woman and He said that it was good. God created marriage. God created sex and intimacy. He created that for several purposes but pleasure is one of them. Procreation is one of them. Companionship and partnership is one of them. God did not create man and woman, I really don’t believe, to be alone. He gave you your spouse for a companion. And he says that your marriage is good. And so I absolutely want to speak truth and life into your heart and your marriage and tell you that it’s worth working on. It’s worth the hard days, it’s worth admitting when you’re wrong and forgiving and repenting and asking forgiveness of each other. It’s worth loving each other through the hard times. It’s worth growing and learning and failing and succeeding together. It’s worth being on the same team. God created your marriage and He says that it is good.
