This week in 2011 started what would be the most painful year of my life. A year that has left me shattered in pieces and forever changed. Over the past year I have kept very quiet about everything that had happened. I felt the enormity of the situation demanded discretion. I didn’t want to say or do anything lightly. I didn’t want my personal life played out on the net for all to see.
One of the things I repeated over and over to myself and the select few who knew what was going on last June was, “No matter what happens, I want to look back from this a year from now and say I handled this with Integrity.” In keeping with that I have tried my very best to not say anything disrespectful or demeaning about my husband. I also felt that meant being silent about everything unless asked. I now however feel in an effort to heal and pick up the pieces, it is time for me to tell my story.
June
A year ago this week I was getting ready to see my husband graduate from Basic Training. We had just spent the last 9 weeks apart, with very little communication. My mom flew out for the week and we proceeded to drive to South Carolina to watch Allan graduate and become a citizen. The three days we spent together were a little strained and awkward. Giving my husband the benefit of the doubt I wrote it off as him just being in a very tough physical and emotional situation and that he was exhausted. Upon returning home I found some very convincing evidence that he had started an inappropriate relationship with a female solider at basic training. Because I was told he wasn’t able to use his phone during the beginning stages of this next round of training, I sent him an e-mail asking him for an explanation of what was going on. At this point my husband cut off all contact with me for three weeks, culminating in a facebook message letting me know our marriage was over. Crushed, I didn’t know what to do, I prayed constantly, sought some Godly council and moved forward with the plans Allan and I had made prior to boot camp, hoping that at some point soon, we would be working on repairing our marriage. The plan was I was going to quit my job and head to Washington state, where I was supposed to spend the summer prior to moving with Allan at the end of the summer to wherever the army was going to move us. So the end of June saw me moving forward with “the plan," not knowing if there still was a plan. I trained my replacement at work and packed up my life. My sister flew out to Kentucky and joined me on a cross country drive to Washington State.
July
The beginning of July saw me leading an also preplanned mission team to Uganda. Honestly, by this point I wanted nothing to do with Uganda! The pain I was feeling felt like one more knife stab from a country that has wounded me time and time again. But, the plane ticket was bought, and I had responsibilities. So off I flew for a month in Uganda.
The teams goal was to do a women’s conference. I had felt going out that God was probably going to “make me” share with these women the current situation I was in. I wondered how many of them could relate, and how my struggle with my Uganda husband would be real to them. I didn’t want to get up and talk about my failing marriage and the deep pain I was in, but God confirmed with me it was what I was supposed to do. I shared with the women the feelings that I still have today, that my enemy in this situation is NOT my husband, but it is Satan who wants to deceive and destroy us both. That my enemy wanted me to believe that I had no hope and no future, but that God promises me different. That God promises me that as his child, he has good plans for me, and that I hold to those promises that I KNOW, and not what I was feeling every day. I shared with the women my deep desire to handle this like a woman of God and woman of integrity. I gave them tips for what I believed God was telling me that looked liked and encouraged them to live the same.
So many of the women came up to me and told me they were going through the same thing. Many came up and prayed for me or asked me to pray for them. I feel if any good has come of this situation, some of it was there. I remember naively thinking after the conference, okay God, I did what “I needed to” now things can return to normal.
During this time, there were several times when I felt God asking me to pray for my husband and my marriage with an urgency I have never felt before. I woke up one night so unsettled that I needed to pray for him right then. I will probably never know what was going on in my husband's life, or in the spiritual world at that time. I only know that through this all I kept holding on to the hope that all things would be restored.
My time with the team in Uganda was restorative. I felt I could still be in Uganda, I could still love the people, I could still be used by God in my brokenness.
Originally I had planned to stay in Uganda for a few weeks after the team to spend some time with my in-laws. However, because of the way things now were I didn’t feel comfortable going to my in-law's, as they were unaware of the situation and I didn’t want to be the one to tell them.
Soon after the team left, I found myself alone and isolated in a cheap hotel in Jinja. Because of my mental state, I was turning a city that was once home into a lonely and foreign place. I spent a lot of time alone grieving.
One night as I was returning to my hotel a couple of guys were sitting in the patio/bar connected to the hotel. They invited me over to join them. I knew this was a bad idea, to hang out with Ugandan men I didn’t know alone, but I let go of my better judgment for some company. After so much rejection it felt good to have someone interested in me. I sat down and ordered a Fanta and talked with them for a bit. That is one of the last things I remember doing. I woke up the next morning in my hotel room, naked and alone. To this day most of the details are still absolutely blank. I do remember wondering when I woke up that morning, after piecing together what probably had happened, if I should try to find some emergency contraceptive in Jinja. I also remember distinctly thinking that if I needed it, it was too late, because it is God who breaths life.
I flew home a couple of days later and tried to go on with life and pretend like nothing ever happened.
August
My father has always said my greatest weakness is that I always try to handle everything on my own, that I don’t want to depend on others for help. This was certainly true of my behavior all through August. Me trying to heal alone from a broken heart. Me trying to heal alone, and deal alone with the trauma that happened in Uganda.
Towards the end of August I started to feel sick a couple of days in a row for no reason. While home alone I went out and bought a pregnancy test. I honestly thought there was no way it could be positive. I have PCOS, and Allan and I had been not preventing pregnancy for most of my marriage. I think we had probably both began to think I couldn’t get pregnant. I hadn’t had my period since May, but honestly that is just normal for me. So as I bought the pregnancy test, I thought honestly that I was just wasting seven dollars. Well two pink lines showing a positive test appeared immediately. I almost cried and laughed because it was so unreal to me that I would be pregnant NOW after all that trying.
I called a Dr. to schedule an appointment to see how far along I was. Sixteen weeks meant it was Allan’s, six weeks meant it was not. They sent me to go get a blood test which they said would determine how far along I was. I went and took the test.
Later that night driving in the car with my little sister Sarah, I could no longer hold everything in. I had wanted to wait until I knew how far along I was before I told anyone, but I just couldn’t. So the whole story came tumbling out to Sarah. We reached home and sat down and told the whole story to my other sister Melanie. Together we talked, we cried, we prayed.
The next day the doctor's office called with the blood results. They said I was 16 weeks, meaning the baby was Allan’s. I asked how sure the tests were and the nurse informed me that they weren’t 100% but that there would not be a 10 week difference. They scheduled me for an appointment several weeks later.
September
When I had the first ultrasound, the doctor realized the baby was not a 20 week old baby but more like a ten week old baby. I knew instantly that meant the baby was not Allan’s. I was crushed.
The doctor said my due date was April 25th. In the appointment I knew that date sounded familiar, but it wasn’t until a good twenty minutes later that it hit me, that was my wedding anniversary. It felt like such a cruel joke that the baby, which wasn’t my husband’s, would be due on that day.
October-February
The events of the summer left me in a dark place. I felt bloodied and beaten and like I had been shattered into a thousand pieces. These months were filled with depression and a battle raged in me between the things I know and the things I felt.
What I know:
Jeremiah 29:11
11 "For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."
Romans 8:28
28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
Psalm 103:2-5
2 Praise the Lord, my soul,
and forget not all his benefits—
3 who forgives all your sins
and heals all your diseases,
4 who redeems your life from the pit
and crowns you with love and compassion,
5 who satisfies your desires with good things
so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.
What I find myself thinking:
See it’s true, you are unlovable, your husband left you.
How can you trust God’s plans, when His plan led to THIS?
You have no future, you are now just a struggling single mom.
The future you had planned (serving with Allan in Uganda) has been stolen from you, and there isn’t a better plan left for you.
How can someone so broken love this child the way it needs to be loved?
Things will never be good again.
I have spent months trying to drown out the above lies with the things I know are true. I have spent months daily falling apart into a crying mess (I am sure the pregnancy hormones didn’t help with this).
I am so thankful for the 14 years of walking with God before this, who taught me who He was, and what I know. Otherwise I think I would be losing the battle in my head on more days than not.
March-April
Unemployed and spending lots of time alone, I spent these two months trying to prepare for the life that was coming.
The fog of depression started to lift a little. The crying wasn’t daily anymore, just every couple of days. Although I still struggled with doubts, winning the daily battles in my head became a little easier.
My baby and I were showered with HUGE outpourings of love. All of our needs were over and abundantly provided for. Prayers and words of encouragement were spoken and written for us.
May
The 1st finds me a week overdue and the doctor talking about the baby failing tests on the ultrasound and emergency inductions. By 9 pm my water breaks and I am in the midst of labor. 30 hours later, we start to push. After three hours of pushing, still no baby.
After an emergency c-section he is finally here. Jonah (peace) Clement (merciful, also after my Grandfather who loved Jesus) Mugumya (one who encourages). He is here and he is loved.
The rest of the month finds me a joyful but exhausted single mom.
June 2012
One year later. I am exhausted, emotionally and physically. Themes of healing keep showing up this week. I know it is time for the year of brokenness to end, to hand my thousand broken pieces over to God and let him stitch them back together. I don’t expect the repaired vase to look the same as the one that got shattered, but I do expect that there will be a beautiful mosaic that will be made from the pieces.
I struggle to write this story without the ending...without the good and the glory that all this past year leads to. I don’t have a plan. I don’t know what my future looks like. I do, however, see glimpses of the good, in the beautiful, drooling baby on my lap. I don’t know how I am going to provide for this baby. I don’t know how I am going to explain about his father when he asks. I do know though that God promises to be a father to the fatherless and a husband to the husbandless.
In June of 2004, as I was praying about whether I was going to Uganda for the very first time that fall, God gave me the following passage and told me it was His promise for me with whatever this whole Uganda thing turned into. I believe it is still His promise to me.
Isaiah 51
Everlasting Salvation for Zion
51 “Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness and who seek the Lord:
Look to the rock from which you were cut
and to the quarry from which you were hewn;
2 look to Abraham, your father,
and to Sarah, who gave you birth.
When I called him he was only one man,
and I blessed him and made him many.
3 The Lord will surely comfort Zion
and will look with compassion on all her ruins;
he will make her deserts like Eden,
her wastelands like the garden of the Lord.
Joy and gladness will be found in her,
thanksgiving and the sound of singing.
lonely