Day 9...Love and marriage

March 22, 2008
Weight: 239
Walk: About 4 miles, 1 hour, 5’31”
Location: Home

Back home and I made today my longest walk yet. Not only was today long, but loaded with hills. It was a great workout. The weather is chilly, but the sun keeps it warm enough to be comfortable in just a sweatshirt. This was a new route to me and I likes a lot. I think I will try to do it whenever I have the time.

For my walk I spent most of the time thinking about my marriage. I am in a battle between my will and just letting God’s will take place. My wife wants to separate to have some time to herself and I don’t really know how to handle this. I love her so much and I know she loves me, but I also understand how she has felt suffocated through the years by me. I can now clearly see how my fears and self serving ways have wreaked havoc on our marriage. I guess I just feel that now that I have noticed this and am taking steps to heel myself and address my fear that things can be healthy and we can build a strong relationship. I’m just not sure that its enough.

This is the dilemma of the recovering alcoholic. I know that I need to just let it go and let God’s will unfold and I am willing to do that. I just ask for patience before we rush into anything. Perhaps I should just let her go and if she comes back it is what was meant to be and if she doesn’t, well, the same. It would be a much easier situation if it were not for our children. I really worry about putting too much change on them and am not sure how to handle the situation.

I know that I must continue to work on my own recovery and that must be first above anything else, but it is really hard to ignore my relationship with my wife because she is so important to me and I truly want what is best for her. Am I what’s best for her? I know that in the past I proved that I wasn’t, but I do have hope that we can be there for each other and rebuild a healthy, strong relationship based on love and compassion rather than guilt and fear.