"...and He will give you the desires of your heart."

Gosh, Diary! The last time I wrote was a while ago! I'm sorry to keep you waiting.

"Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart." Psalm 37:4

I love that I can boldly claim anything from the bible as truth. Even when I doubt, and I do, God's word always prevails, no matter what I do, where I go, what I say, God's word is always truthful. And with all these communication problems with my hubby have risen, he has done his best to love me like Christ loves the church, and sometimes, more often than not, I walk all over that. Through this bought of depression that I've been in, I've become extremely selfish in our relationship, and I'm not thinking about where he was coming from. Sometimes, I can create drama in my head between us when he sees that nothing is wrong! I guess that's why God made man the head of the household and leaders in our world; men's brains are calmer biologically than women's brains. (Please don't get mad at that. Its been scientifically proven that men don't have as good of connection between the right and left hemispheres of the brain as women do, and that's why we can multitask better than men, but that's why men have calmer brains then women.) I wrestled with God, with my faith, and although I feel weak from the fight, God gave me the desire of my heart, which was to communicate better with Andy. God knew what he was doing when he allowed us to get a smaller apartment, because now we have to communicate not only about paint, but what we're getting rid of, and we're both having to see our sacrifices for each other. For the past couple of days, we have had to be in close proximity, painting our living room in our new place, and when I do something I don't like to do, I tend to talk while I do it, which has allowed him to see that I'm crazy as a loon, but at least now he knows where I'm coming from, and we're starting to repair the hole that I've created.

During the engagement process, people like to give you advice. Let me tell you about some of the advice that DOESN'T work.
#1) Pick your battles. Um, no. If you pick your battles, he doesn't know why you're so upset with him, and you're pushing all those feelings away and not being truthful. Plus, you're not communicating, which is so important in a marriage. However, don't yell at him about stuff you haven't warned him about. Ex: Normally when my hubby makes coffee, he leaves rings on our white counter tops, to which I have to scrub out with bleach, breaking my fingernails, and making me mad. I blew up at him before warning him, to which he responded "Don't you know I'm leaving them there for a reason?".... However, when I was calmer, I explained to him how hard it is to scrub the counter tops, and that I would appreciate it if he would be more mindful of his surroundings and BAM! I haven't had to scrub my counter tops in a week!
#2) Don't say everything you're thinking. While there is some truth to that, you're still not communicating, and its still bad. Talk to him about the stuff you're thinking when you're not upset. Guys aren't mind readers, and whatever you're thinking about will gnaw at you until you say something.

However, while I've been focusing on my communication with my hubby, my communication with God has gone down hill. And most of the people I talked to about our situation asked me "How's your walk with God?" I've got to admit, its not the best, which is probably why all this drama is rearing its ugly head. My life is tumultuous when God isn't first. And going back to the verse at the beginning of the entry, my desire has changed from communication with my hubby to communication with God. And I know that once my walk with God is at its best, my marriage will be at its best.

What a scary conversation!

(From Sex And The City, Season 2, Episode 16, "Was it good for you?") Samantha: "Who you are in bed is who you are in life! I've never met a man who was good in bed that wasn't good in life....Soon, everyone will be pansexual. It won't matter if you're gay or straight." Carrie:"Just whether or not you're good in bed." Samantha: "Exactly!"

...DO YOU KNOW HOW FREAKING SCARY THAT CONVERSATION IS?! Let's break it down, shall we?

"Who you are in bed is who you are in life." ... I don't know about this statement. Why must our mentality revolve around sex?! Yes, humans are sexual creatures, but why must we be labeled by someone's opinion of us sexually? Who we are in bed is not who we are in life! How does 30 minutes in the sack compete with the 16-18.5 hours one is up during the day? Yes, if you're good in bed, you have unbelievable confidence, but to me, that's all sex is. Sex is all about confidence in your ability to make your partner weak in the knees, and that's not all about the bedroom! You can make your partner weak in the knees by the way you dress, the shoes that show off your calves, how well you keep your body fit, your body language, your intelligence so that you can play the flirtatious mind games, etc. And isn't it amazing if we say someone isn't good in bed, that their confidence level plummets, along with their self esteem and dignity? Maybe instead of focusing on the sexual desires, as the media would have us do, we should focus on the person, and the beauty that lies within. Sorry, Samantha, that's strike one.

"I've never met a man that was good in bed and not good in life." ... I'm sure they're out there. Strike two, Samantha.

"Soon, everyone will be pansexual. It won't matter if you're gay or straight." ... WHAT?! Its hard enough to wrap my head around transexuality, much less pansexuality?! "Pan" means "all", "sexuality" means "the state of being sexual", so being pansexual means you have sex with everything? I don't get it! First of all, no offense to anyone who is, but I don't want to be pansexual. I'm created to be attracted to men, not women, not animals, and not people who think they were born without gender (which I think is a laughable concept. You may not have been raised with society's concept of what gender is, but if you have a woohoo, you're male, which is a gender, and if you have a wahoo, you're female, which is also a gender. Everything has a gender. Even asexuality is a gender! Everything in nature needs to reproduce, so God provided all living creatures with 3 genders, male, female, and asexual [those who can reproduce without aid]. If you're human, you are not without gender. Period.) Even my computer doesn't understand pansexuality! As I type it, the computer thinks I'm spelling it wrong. When did sex get so complicated, and how can I unlearn the complicated things I know?!  Strike three, Samantha! You're out!

Remember why you married him

As I have been struggling with newlywed life, a lot of my friends have been giving me advice, and while they were all very pertinent to the situation at hand, my cousin Caty gave me great advice. "Above everything else, remember why you married him." Why did I marry him? His humor! Andy's humor can get me out of any depression, any angry situation. He says stuff so asinine sometimes it just makes me laugh! Well, upon his arriving home from work, I swore I was going to be mad at him until he apologized. We made it thought dinner, and into Target to do some grocery shopping, and he starts getting me to laugh, and all my anger towards him melts away. We started acting goofy, and pretty soon, we're having a really deep conversation in the middle of Target's grocery! And for the first time today, I smiled, and it was because of him.

Whoever said "laughter is the best medicine" wasn't kidding. Laughter causes hurts to begin to heal, the communication lines to open, and grudges to be let go.  And Andy knows as long as he can make me laugh, things are good between us.

Thank you, Lord, for giving me a man who you knew I needed, and thank you for his humor!
Thank you, friends, for wanting to make sure I'm okay, and offering me your ear when I need it.
 And thank you, Caty, for your sound advice: "Above all else, remember why you married him"