Tuesday, August 24, 2010

30 Days of Truth - Day 3

So it's about to get hard. This post has been on my mind since I found out about this challenge. I knew there would be a few prompts that would be hard for me. I have a feeling, this will be one of them.

Day 03 → Something you have to forgive yourself for.

I've made mistakes. I've made many mistakes. For the most part, I've accepted my flaws but tried to work on them. I think I've been fairly forgiving with myself overall. Yet there's one situation where I'm afraid I might struggle with forgiveness for the rest of my life.

I fell in love with a married man.

To understand the gravity of this for me, you need to know I value marriage and it's commitment almost more than anything in the world. I think the only thing I place above it would be motherhood. I want both so badly that I can feel the aching in my body every single day...yet that longing isn't just for marriage, it is for marriage with the right person.*  I long to build a life and a family together.
 
But back to the confession at hand...

Since I value marriage so highly, I don't know how to forgive myself for having feelings for someone who is committed to someone else. I fell in love with him before he was married. And once he got married I tried to forget him, to move on. [At first I typed "I tried my hardest to forget him" but I had to erase it because this is 30 Days of Truth and that's simply not the truth. I did try and forget him, but part of my heart never let go and part of it didn't want to. I'm ashamed of that.] But I didn't really move on. I dated other people, I went through the motions, but he was there in the background of my heart. Eventually I let him back into my life as an acquaintance, and before I knew it, it was more than that.
While I never acted on those emotions physically (not so much as a kiss), I was emotionally involved with him. I know it's not right.

I can't forgive myself for this yet, because my emotions for him (although now even more mixed with anger, confusion, disappointment, etc.) are still there. I hate that there is a part of me who hurts that he didn't choose me - before he got married... and honestly, even after.

Someday I will need to forgive myself for having loved a married man. I'll need to forgive myself for having been involved in and impacted someone's marriage. Even without being physically involved, I have to accept that my relationship with him had to have hurt her. I need to acknowledge that my actions in some ways damaged their marriage. (I am not by any means negating his actions, nor am I naive enough to think that if it weren't me, it wouldn't have been someone else. I am simply trying to focus on and own my part in the situation). While I swore I'd never "get involved"** with him while he was still with her, I have to face that my mere presence and interaction with him had me more involved than I should have been. I am no longer involved with him. For now that's all I can do. Someday, I'll forgive myself...

*I've been tempted with the prospect of marriage before. I've even gotten engaged. But I couldn't do it because in my soul I knew it wasn't right.
** Date him or be involved in any form of physical relationship

2 comments:

  1. Please keep up the great work! I really like the 30 days of truth section you are running and it is really making me take a look at my life and come clean with some things that I have kept to myself over the years. It feels good to finally get some stuff off my chest and I have really started to open up to my friends. I love the falling in heels blog and will keep following the remaining days.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks so much for reading, it means a lot to me. This #30DaysofTruth is difficult, but worth it.

    ReplyDelete