My Story: My Second Marriage: The Run Away Bride

If you are coming over for MugSwap you will want to start here: http://danaraeb.blogspot.com/p/about-me.html

Once we returned from vacation I learned that I was not given the position I so wanted in the police department. The reason given: they did not care for my past decision making and did not feel like I had done enough to overcome my past. Man, that was a pretty swift kick in the gut. At the time I journaled, “I don’t think that’s a hard pill to take. I think it’s the opinion of someone who doesn’t know me.” Of course, my ex-husband used this as an opportunity to tell me how horrible my past truly was. I closed that journal entry praying for God to open my ex-husband’s heart and that would be my last entry until 2007.

During the next four months before our marriage one other thing became really clear to me. As I was walking out of one of the many churches we looked at for our ceremony my ex-husband turned to me and said, “I thought you were supposed to be losing weight for this, but every time I see you you seem to be fatter and fatter. “  I think this is what I get for sharing my life long body image issues, he found something that hurt and used it to his advantage. My ex-husband fought hard against pre-martial counseling believing he wasn’t the one who needed help and that I would benefit more from counseling then he would. We eventually decided to just fly to Las Vegas with my best friend and her husband. We selected Labor Day weekend and proceeded with planning. 

While planning I knew that something was not right I should not feel so unloved by someone I was supposed to spend the rest of my life with. I spent many an afternoon in Renee’s living room trying to sort all of this out. The term “equally yoked” came up again as it did in my first marriage. I was again carrying all of the faith, if that makes senses at all. Renee was straight with me, she believed that going to into a marriage with all of the issues we were having would probably ended in divorce. She strongly suggested we stretch out the engagement until we could work things out. Of course when I tried to suggest this to my ex-husband he was furious and believed I was being brain washed. He insisted that I end my relationship with Renee if I was going to continue with him. It’s hard to type - I cut off my mentor, my wise counsel, my second mother. 

Two weeks before we were scheduled to fly to vegas things started closing in on me. During idle time at work I looked up an old flame and started an email conversation. You know what they say idle hands are the devil’s playground. With my self esteem in the gutter I let this person refill my love tank with complements and reminders that I was a pretty awesome person. In something I hate to type, I let the relationship move from emails to meeting, to cheating a week before marriage. I was filling a void and I was out to hurt my ex-husband even though he knew nothing about any of it. 

The weekend following my affair my best friend was throwing me a shower. All my friends and family along with all of my ex-husband’s family were supposed to be there. My friends went through so much working planning this party, but I couldn’t bring myself to go. That’s the afternoon that I drove with now where to go. I just drove through my old neighborhoods, by old schools and did a lot of thinking. That’s the day I became a run away bride. I finally went back to my mother’s house and told her what I had done we were not yet too late for my shower, so she strongly suggested that I suck it and make an appearance. Put on a smile and get through the afternoon. I went, I drank too much champagne, but kept my cool. That night I ended my engagement. I gave him some of the reasons why, but did not share the extent that I let things go. 

The days that followed were pretty much a blur except for my best friend standing in my door way saying she didn’t understand why I insisted on being unhappy. She felt she could not stand by me as I did this. And to be honest I am sure she was pretty pissed about buying a ticket to Vegas that wouldn’t be used. 

As I sit here today I cannot remember the conversation that led my ex-husband and I to get on a plane anyway and head to Las Vegas. I think I believed that I had lost all my friends and his family in this process and maybe, just maybe I could be happy. So we did it, we got married at the Little White Wedding Chapel alone.  Then we flew home and my ex-husband insisted that I dump my cellphone and get a new one in the hopes of keeping people from my past in my past. 

The week after we got back, my ex-husband started asking more questions about my relationship with the other man. I wanted it to be over, I didn’t want to discuss it, so he moved to manipulation. I was actually naive enough to believe that he got yahoo to release my emails and he knew all of the details. I broke down and that’s we he knew it was true, I did actually cheat on him. He felt to make things better that it was time to tell me that he continue the relationship with the girl I worked with and it continued for a good part of the three years we had been together. To add even more insult to injury he made it clear and most of their time together took place in the house where we were now living. I was shocked, I was sickened, but I had no leg to stand on since I had just admitted to my unfaithfulness. To be honest, this is where we should have ended our marriage - call it quits, wave the white flag.

To be continued…

*just so you know after writing this I went back and changed my ex-husband’s real name to read “my ex-husband”. I know it’s a little awkward in some places, but I felt like it needed to be done.