The Dreaded 'D' Word
Big white wedding, stacks of presents, all your family and friends and the flowery cake! It's supposed to be one of the proudest days of your life. It's supposed to be the start of a new chapter but for Viv Brownlee it was the beginning of a very short and not so pleasant chapter.
It can happen to someone’s parents, to someone else, to a friend of a friend, but it can’t happen to me! How wrong was I?! Here's my story of marriage gone wrong that led to a signature on the dotted line.
'I'm all alone, there's nobody here besides me' (As sung by Shrek!
In May 2006, nearly three years after getting married – my wife left me. Like all newly married couples we had our problems and differences, but I thought we had worked through most of them. My wife made some decisions in the first year of our marriage that caused serious problems for the next year and a half. But we worked through them, got out the other side and started building our lives and marriage again. Then, completely out of blue, my wife didn’t come home for two nights and arriving home one night I discovered she’d taken her stuff while I was at work.
When we eventually did meet and talk I was angry but more than anything else I was confused and frustrated. Like any man I felt helpless as I couldn’t solve the situation or fix everything!! More than anything else though I felt ashamed because I thought it shouldn’t be happening to me. The feeling of shame was so strong I didn’t even want to tell my family.
Pep Talk Rally!
I had the usual manly chat in my head that we all do when somthing goes belly up. I told my self it would all be ok and that I was man enough to handle it. I threw myself into my job and didn’t tell any of my work colleagues for two months. I cut myself off from my family and told them nothing. I put on a brave face for the few friends that I confided in and lied to everyone else, pretending everything was still OK. I put into place my tried and trusted coping mechanism of making fun of the situation and of myself and laughing off any concern. It was when I was walking home from work one night thinking I needed to have a drink to get to sleep that I realised that I was drinking too much. Fortunately I managed to stop myself from becoming a fully fledged alchoholic.
For the next 6 months I lived in the hope that something might change. It didn’t, and as I realised that I couldn’t make it on my own, I eventually started to share my story with people. My family were much more understanding than I expected. They weren’t ashamed of me and stood by me. So much for those fears. I started to spend time with great guys from my church - doing life with people again and actually managing to have some fun. I stopped being so insular and realised other people were going through stuff as well.
The 'D' Word
As I managed to open up and discuss the situation with family and friends, I realised that I had to move on and that I couldn’t stay rooted in the past. I had to move past my hurts and fears and applied for a divorce – another thing I never thought I would face. Divorce is a strange world with solicitors, family law courts, financial agreements, Nisi’s (not the sea monster in a loch in Scotland), decree absolutes and affidavits. Thankfully there were no arguments or further animosity; the divorce went through in, what I have been told, is good time.
Coming Out At The Other End
I’m out the other end of it now, single again after 5 years of marriage which leaves me with another set of worries, of feeling scared and lost. I’ve had to try and deal with all the issues that came up – insecurities, rejection, shame, fear. No matter how strong, capable or intelligent I considered myself I was unable to deal with everything.
I’m ever thankful for the amazing support I got from all my friends in Hope City Church who helped me through it all. The journey isn’t over as I still have many steps to take; in fact it’s really only just begun. Through it all, the main thing that I have realised is that the only solution is putting God first in everything and even when I don’t understand I know He has it all sorted. So I decided that no matter how bad I felt or how depressed I got I would still come to church, help out in church and enjoy the church services. Apart from keeping active I made a concious decision not to blame God. We had both made choices. I began to understand more than ever how true what God says in the bible is. He did give me strength on the days I wanted to hide away, he gave me courage to face up to my feeling and most of all he helped me understand that there was life after this marriage. God has filled me with potential and he's going to be there to help me reach it - my world was not going to fold in on itself! Trust me there is hope out there!
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