Prisoner # 2

Posted on | November 11, 2010 | No Comments

as written over the course of a month, from August to September 20, 2008. As I looked within among all the men I have loved in my life, there were 9 that I was still holding on to. This wasn’t something I knew, it was only what I felt. Where every time I would feel a hit on my self-esteem, I would go to these memories for validation. Because I was unable to validate myself. And so, because I cannot surrender something up until I have let myself feel it: I wrote. I let each of them course through my mind and heart one more time – and I cried, and laughed, and felt acutely so many feelings that I can’t even begin to express it all. And then, I closed each letter of gratitude for each of them with a prayer of Surrender. I gave them each to God, and I let them go as the long-held Prisoners of my Heart. The process of cleaning out the Deepest Cavern was my way of starting to love me…for me.

Brent


I remember how odd his hand felt in mine; how differently it was shaped than Jason’s. How he turned the steering wheel with his right index finger, instead of using the palm of his hand, fingers spread wide. I remember the shift of my entire world when my eyes met his; an electric tingling and jolt, as if my spirit tried to leap through my body just to touch him. I remember the unbelievable strength of his body; the hardest muscles of any man I had ever known – so strong, so tall, so big, so powerful. I felt utterly safe around him. He had the softest lips, the most beautiful lips of anyone I’d ever even seen. He was often too beautiful to look at. He came after me like nobody’s business. He knew without a shadow of a doubt, that I was what he wanted; heart, body, mind, and soul. And he got me.

His testimony was so pure, simple, unadorned with mountains of useless knowledge. He was childlike, sincere, and so very honest. He didn’t hide anything from me, but shared his deepest pain and history with me. Honesty was our motto, and the peace and spirit of God himself echoed through everything about Brent. Calm and untroubled, easy and so laid back. He was always unafraid to love every single part of me; to adore my talents and gifts, praise my beauty and strength, and never be threatened by them. This was a first. And I will never, ever forget it. Our love was so unrestrained, it flowed without hindrance or obstacle. We were both the product of mighty miracles, and this was the blessing for all of it.

Our love was like nothing I had ever felt, experienced, heard about, read about, or seen. It was otherwordly. It was transcendent and unstoppable. Our love was easy, our relationship was simple and entirely satisfying. It was to know happiness in ways neither one of us knew existed. We had both, come home. I remember watching him sleep night after night; the perfection of his smooth forehead and soft lines, being overcome with the thought, “Now, was not this exceeding joy?” How naive for me to think that the hard times were over…well, I didn’t think they would be, but I always believed without a shred of doubt that our marriage, our love, our miracles, the power of “us” would always see us through. He was the greatest man alive, the greatest man I had ever heard of, known, believed existed, or loved. I chose him to be my eternal companion.

And not once, during our courtship and engagement – did I ever have even one single doubt. I knew and felt in my heart, simply – that it was right. In the light and darkness of all I have experienced and gone through, God, I release Brent from the cavern of my heart. I release the impossible expectations that I had of him, and continue to struggle with having in regards to him. I separate Brent from all the other men that I have projected onto him, and give him the right to exist by himself, in his own right, and separate my burdens from him and take back all the men that I have carried through the doors of his home.

In doing so, I release myself and him from the powerful chain that has bound us dysfunctionally one to another. I allow him to exist as himself, by himself, in all his glory and darkness. I release the parts of him that do not serve me in a healthy way, and keep only that which you, Lord, deem sanctioned and holy and beneficial to us both. In this way, I can look and feel for him as just his own, by himself – not the symbolic statue he has been, or the vessel for all my un-grieved loves and un-felt pain and self-hatred and feelings of worthlessness. In this way, Brent will also be able to look at me as just myself – and maybe be able to forgive me all the burdens I laid upon his shoulders to carry for me. I forgive myself for expecting Brent to validate my worth. I forgive him for trying so hard that it broke him. I forgive him for trying to save me, as well as himself. I forgive him now for resenting me for it. I forgive us both for looking to each other, instead of to our higher powers for all our deep, unmet emotional needs.

I give myself permission and allow my heart to grieve him in any way that I need to. Please, my Lord and Savior, allow this release to occur fully, so that I might look upon your Son, and my husband, Brent, in the light that Thou wishest me to see him in. Allow me to see, just him. Of this I ask, of this I pray, humbly, in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

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Category: Brent, Emptying The Cavern, Letters to God

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