Chastity, marriage, annulments and feeling like a failure

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terri_fortner

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I think that summed it up in one sentence. So here is the run down. I am not yet a convert to the Church. I am waiting for my annulment, that has been granted but still must go to the final appeal. My husband is finally getting his paperwork sent off to get his annulment started. Mine took so long I thought it was never going to happen, but my husband was overseas durring that time, and I was pregnant with our first child (my third) so there were no real issues. Now that he is home and we are not fighting all the time anymore I am strugging to stay faithful to what I know to be the truth. My husband isn’t Catholic. Some days I am lucky if he even believes in God. He trys to respect me, but its hard. I tell him no, I shut him down ALOT! but I know I can’t keep it up for much longer. I am certain I can’t do it and keep my husband too. HELP!
:banghead:
I am also dealing with some other things about my other two kids not living with me and why its taking so long, and what on Earth the good can be of them not being with either of their parents. But that is a seperate issue for another forum. I am a multi-stressed person. Which brings me back to my problem.

I have gone over it a million times. I know that I need to be obediant and follow the teachings of the Christ. I am not even sure what I asking for here, I guess I just need to hear from some people who are living this too. I feel like such an alien sometimes, I mean my husband’s been gone for 15 months and I don’t want to have sex with him? And the kicker is he is totally hot! Like all buff and muscular and tall and just HOTTTTT. Not helping, at least my first husband was short and fat, it was easy to not have sex with him. :rotfl:

Thanks in advance!
 
Failure? They say courage is the state of any virtue at its testing point. You are showing great courage. You sound heroic to me. And it is obviously not that you don’t want to have sex with your husband. It is that abstaining from sex right now is what you believe to be best for your relationship with God and, ultimately, for your relationship with your husband and children, too.

If you are trying to enter the Church, but haven’t entered yet, you still ought to find yourself a parish and a pastor. Talk to a priest, a real person with skin on, a person put on this earth to make the love and mercy of God accessible. Do not worry that you have not converted yet.

Hang in there. If you ardently pursue God, you will fail sometimes. But God won’t. You want God and God wants you. God thirsts for you, even when you fail. He isn’t going to let you slip through his fingers. Trust in that basic truth is what keeps all of us from becoming failures.
 
Thanks for your kind words. But I see it coming. I even feel like I have already crossed the line with the amount of affection I show my husband. He is still my husband. He sometimes doubts my motives behind my rejections, and I don’t ever want him to think I do not love him. I was hoping to hear from anyone who is going through a similar situation. Like I said before I feel like such an alien compared to the rest of the world, I feel like I have no one to talk to about this, like there is no one who is going through this too. I try talking to my family, but they aren’t Catholic, and the one who is doesn’t have any clue what to tell me, she was just confirmed at Easter.

Maybe this is just another cross I need to carry. Its getting really hard to carry all these really big crosses. I hope they shrink soon or I will not make it up that big hill. 😃
 
Dear Terri…
No one should be going through such a situation and it is not created over night either… so chances are there really are not very many other people in the exact same situation right now.

You are saying you feel like you are on the verge of giving in to the temptation to sleep with this man even though he is not actually your husband in a marriage blessed by God. That means you are tempted to fornicate…
If that is what it is, then the question is this: Do you believe its fornication and do you believe it is a grave sin? Do you realise it or attempt to ? The other question is: do you love Jesus, is He really real to you as well as His words about “go and sin no more?”.
You see, I understand that you are highly tempted, and I know exactly how it is when you go further and further down that road… how easy it is and how hard it is to turn away.
I also know the experience of feeling like **** the next day because I was slave to my flesh and felt I had betrayed Jesus big time.
These things we dont do… because we love our selves, God and the person we are with… thats the goal.
But you have to sit down and explain to your husband WHY it is that you withdraw from his invitations… Tell him that you love him and are nuts about him but that right now you need his help so you dont end up in a mess, because you have come to realise some things… even if he does not share your world view. It wont be forever.
I feel sorry for him, but you have to communicate… otherwise you will soon have him really frustrated.
I hope everything works out for you. 🙂
 
Oh we talk about it, we talked about it unil I was sick of talking about it before he came home, and he promised he would help me, and I told him I need him ot be storong for me when I was weak. He promised me he would. And honestly, sometimes I totally get it, and I know its a sin and other times I am looking for the loop hole. Heres my most recent reationalization. If everything happens outside of time for God then it doesn’t matter if m=our annulments are granted this week or two years ago or three years from now. They will take affect for all time. Like when Jesus died on the cross his death washed away all sins from all time. That paper varafies what we already know in our hearts. So any sex we have would not have been a sin b/c all marriages are assumed valid until proven otherwise.

Like I said, most of the time I totally agree with the teachings. Others I know its just my little devil trying to get my to damage my relationship with Christ, but it makes such good sense. :confused:

So you really think there aren’t other people who are awaiting annulments who are already remarried? I hate going to therapy because their solution is to be more intimate with my spouse, and they just don’t understand that I can’t do that. They have no other solutions after that. I am pretty sure I can’t communicate with my hubby any more then I do. Although I would love it if he would talk to me more. He is very quiet and hard to read. He keeps it all in, and I know its is because of his past with his exwife and his time in the military. Again I am getting off track.

Thank you for your encouragment.
 
You don’t say if you’ve found a real person whose skin you can see to talk to. Talk to your pastor! Even if he can’t change anything, he can give you encouragement. I have found this enormously helpful in my own life, even five minutes here and there. Also, many parishes have support groups for persons who are divorced. You might find what you’re looking for there.

Jesus had Simon of Cyrene. Mary had Jospeh. Ask God to send you help, too. There have been many times when my pastor could not help me in the way I had hoped, but God has always provided what I needed. I mean really…Simon of Cyrene? Who woulda thunk it, when that day started? But you know, you have to ask and you have to be looking to take what God has to offer. When on the Via Dolorosa, you don’t have a choice.

By the way: if what you wind up needing from the Lord is a broom and a dustpan, God will still love you, and not a whit less than he loves you right now. That is the main thing, and it is something to rejoice in. (I have found rejoicing to be a great antidote for the torment of temptation, too.)
 
I have as close personal friends two people, one a woman, the other a man. Both went through RCIA and had applied for anullments. They finished the year of RCIA except for coming into the Church and receiving sacraments. Both had spouses who tried to understand. It was difficult living as brother and sister for all concerned (four people).
It took another year plus of struggling, but the annulments finally came through. It was a painful two years for all four and whether during that time they ever slipped up, I cannot say. I just don’t know and never tried to find out. I could only pray for them and give an empathetic ear. Oh, the joy when all was over… Believe me you are not alone in this. Many others are in similar situations. 🙂
 
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