This Weekend

 

via flickriver.com

*Friday night, I told him I feel like he's on emotional overload -exploding at every little spark. (he's recently started really getting really into recovery reading, and it's taking a huge toll on his emotions: trying to process everything, accept that he has to be okay with imperfection...)
*He agreed.
*I told him I've tried to detach and protect our little huddled mass, and prayed for guidance.  The guidance I got?  It's time to spend time apart.
*He disagreed.
*But agreed to take a mancation for a week.  It's camping weather anyway.
*He said, "I wish you would have talked to me before praying about it."
*We discussed -once again -my gut-feeling to turn Black Opps OFF while the kids are around.
*He told me I needed to loosen up.
*He got called into work to raid a house with SWAT (drugs and child porn case).
*He came home and stayed up until 2:45 am with me watching "Bomb Girls" -a TV drama about women in WWII who built bombs.
*We went to bed without VALIDATION sex because sex is off the table right now.  (Also: saying sex is off the table somehow turns me into a 15-year old boy who chuckles and says, "So when is sex going to be on the table?" Har, har.)  Validation sex is not healthy sex.
*Saturday morning, we had another heavy conversation before we even got out of bed.
*He told me there's such a thing as healthy lust.
*I told him I used to think so as well and then shut the heck up before I went into full-blown control/fix mode.
*He told me he was trying to decide if it was time to put sex back on the table (see?  it's kind of funny) and I suggested praying about it and then he said, "But I'm the type of person that has to think things out on my own before I pray about them."
*I took it personally. 
*I took it silently.
*I took a bath.
*I stewed. Literally and figuratively.
*I came out swinging.
*I never come out of anything swinging.
*A few days ago, my husband remarked, "You're so much like the woman I fell in love with eight years ago.  A little more ballsy, but it's all good..."
*I verbally attacked him about how I always pray first, how I'd NEVER go to him first because HE isn't my Savior, and how I WOULD NOT loosen up over the video game because it was my GUT telling me to keep the kids away from it (as opposed to my brain).
*He got defensive.
*An hour of heated discussion later, we came to:

1. He didn't mean anything by his comment of "thinking things out before praying about them" and he wasn't discounting MY experiences with prayer (which even if he was, I should have been fine with except I still want him to validate me.  And I shouldn't.  But I do.  And I'm working on it.  but anyway)
2.  He would stop playing the video game around the kids.

*He ended the conversation by saying, "Just FYI, if you come at me with the tone you did this morning, I will get very defensive."
*I told him that was okay.
*He said, "Yeah, but if you approach me with a nicer tone, I'll be more approachable."
*I told him sometimes I need an aggressive tone under my belt to help keep my courage up -otherwise, I'll cave to fear before voicing my honest feelings.  I felt it was okay, so long as I was respectful of him.  And hey look!  We still like each other.  We didn't YELL.  We didn't hate or name call (which we've never actually done anyway). 
*He was confused.
*We went on a double date (with the baby) and had a rollicking good time together.
*When we stopped at Sam's Club on the way home, the other couple took off toward the snack aisle, and my husband took me in his arms and laid one on me.
*I couldn't remember what was next on the list even though it was right in front of me.
*My husband is an amazing kisser.  He deserves a medal, or something.
*We came home, put the kids to bed, sat up and watched a romantic comedy together.
*We stayed up after the movie and talked.
*He told me he'd thought during the date about my comment after our *ahem* discussion that morning.  He told me he decided I was right.  He couldn't censure himself or his tone because we SHOULD be straight up with each other, "Like the stupid couple on the stupid Notebook."
*My husband makes me laugh when he says stuff like that.
*The baby put herself to sleep, and my husband fell asleep in MY arms which was kind of sweet and also kind of noisy because he has allergies.
*Sunday morning, we slept in and were late to church.
*I cried when my counselor taught the little Primary kids about the Atonement, even when my son loudly announced, "and DEN they whipped Him all over the back wiff a AX!"
*I cried when I came home and my husband told me his body has been begging for relief and was in quite a lot of pain but that he was taking deep breaths and telling his body no and he didn't want me feeling pressure to "help."  Which I did because that's what I'm programmed to do.  He told me he could sense that I was feeling pressure, and only brought up the issue in hopes that I would relax and quit stressing about it.
*I hugged him.  not too closely.
*I went to bed and dreamed my husband cheated on me.
*I woke up in the middle of the night with my heart pounding and fairly smothered him in validation snuggling (which is sometimes healthy).
*I just got a text telling me how much he enjoyed this weekend.
*I didn't realize my husband was a fan of rollercoasters.