The Night Of The Tornado

I’ll always remember the day my whole world came crashing down as the night of the tornado. It was May 28th, 2019, and we had our first real weather threat of the year. A larger tornado was traveling across the side of the state I lived in and was making its way to the area just south of us. It was close enough that we decided to make it an evening of hanging in the basement. The kids were actually having a really good time. Their favorite blankets and stuffed animals all piled up on top of them in the back of a closet.

My husband was distant, and I guess I just took it as general anxiety over the weather. I kept doing what I do and would go upstairs to look out the windows or step out on the deck. Weather like this is thrilling for me. There is a buzz in the air that makes me feel energized and alert. We knew it would pass before bedtime as they always do. After maybe two hours, we went back up to finish the evening out like any other night.

(As I am writing this, I am reflecting on what happened next. I can already feel my hands having that sensation where they feel like they are going numb.)

In my bedroom, I had two sitting chairs I loved, and he sat across from me. What he said is a blur to me. I don’t remember much about the conversation except two things; he confessed he had been “relapsing” and the explosion of shrapnel flying by my head. Except it was in my brain, and all my memories of what I thought was real were mirrored in the bloodied debris flying by my vision. I have no idea what I said or what I was feeling beyond anger.

Then I did what all betrayed spouses do in a frantic effort to gain safety; I controlled. I gave rules and demands of how things would go from now on. I asked questions and was given answers that later I realized were “trickle disclosure.”

To fix the pain, I shut him out. I had to. He wasn’t safe, and I wasn’t safe either at that moment. I think if I’m really honest with myself, I knew it was over. In the days followed, I felt grief the most when I realized I might never know what it’s like to be held by him again or to laugh in the kitchen while we make dinner together. Yet, I was so desperate for him to make it right. Why wouldn’t he? He loved me, right?

This has been a battle in my marriage for a very long time. I don’t know marriage without this, but the hard part was I thought healing had occurred. So the biggest betrayal was really my own denial. It wasn’t three years earlier where I let my husband know I couldn’t live like we were. Being married to an unrecovered porn addict was so hard. I longed for a marriage that had intimacy and connection in it. So while I believed him when he said he didn’t use porn anymore. Still, I had a disconnected and isolated spouse. We deserved so much more.

I got informed. I wanted to understand what recovery meant. Then I felt bold. I asked God to show me the way; give me the resources so we could finally be what we were supposed to be for each other. So I set a boundary, but it came off more like an ultimatum because of my frustration. I couldn’t live like this anymore, and I didn't know how to get out of this space of disfunction any other way.

It wasn’t long after this we sat together across from a therapist who was also a sex addiction specialist.

So now, during this trickle disclosure on the night of the tornado, I realized he was forcing me to hold a boundary that I made almost three years previously. I could not be married to a porn addict who didn’t take their recovery seriously. He knew my line, but yet he didn’t do the right thing. This is why I was angry. I felt like such a fool, and because he was a ministry leader, I also felt embarrassed. So I stepped away. I couldn’t support him anymore. For years I walked with him side by side as we figured it all out. I was holding him back and preventing my own healing as well. I just wanted to find all the tiny shrapnel pieces that represented my life with this man to find their way back together. My children, ministry, friends, homes, and our experiences to come back together in healing and restoration.

Like a tornado, it builds up, and when the atmosphere is just right, it takes shape. It carves a path in the earth and doesn’t discriminate. Neither does betrayal trauma. It carves deep wounds that only take time to heal. The scars will always remain as a reminder of what happened. What you do with those scars matters most. Will you hold on to the trauma, or will you allow yourself to heal from it? Healing isn’t easy, and it does take time. Now I look back on that evening with a heavy sadness. No one ever knows when disaster will strike, and that’s the beauty of destruction. If you knew it was coming, you wouldn’t succumb to it in a way that you truly learn from it. Embrace it and grow from it.