Seven years ago I had no idea how I got to the place I was: in the middle of an affair, depressed, obsessed and full of self-loathing.  But I didn’t get there overnight.

During my healing and restoration I read Shannon Etheridge’s book Every Woman’s Battle.  In it she asks a question: If you can’t control yourself before you’re married, what makes you think you can control yourself after you’re married (I’m paraphrasing because I can’t find the page number).

Ahem. Right.

Because the thing is, we hadn’t controlled ourselves before we were married.  When I got married in 1996 at the age of 21 Chad was not a virgin but I was.  Technically, that is.

We had gone as far as we could go before we were married without actually having intercourse. So when we did get married, we began our intimacy off on the wrong foot: one laced with guilt and embarrassment.  We had not been able to exercise the self control we knew we should have.  In fact, half the reason we did get married 2 weeks after I graduated from college was so that we didn’t have to live out the rest of that summer having almost-sex whenever we were alone.  We wanted the real deal.

Reading Shannon’s book in the months after my affair was an eyeopener to say the least (and it turned out to be the single most effective book I read during that period).  I finally began to understand some of the roots of my problem: a fundamental and complete lack of Godly self-control.

Last week a reader emailed me ans asked me how Chad and I managed to say pure when we were dating, how we were able to “wait” until we were married.  We hadn’t, I had to tell her.  Not completely.  She asked me how a girl can navigate through singleness and make it all the way to a future wedding day without sleeping with any potential boyfriends.  And, was it worth it.  My answer to her was almost too simplistic.

Yes, it was worth it.

And to how? Self-control.

The self-control couples need to keep from having sex before they are married is the same self-control that keeps me from having an affair. And its the same self-control that keeps my husband from looking at porn. Its the same self-control that keeps me waking up every day and striving to keep my marriage pure and focused.

That self-control doesn’t change as soon as I sport a wedding ring.  It’s something that should be learned early and learned well. And then it must be practiced.

Or else it is all hopeless.

Which is why today I’m giving away a pack of Shannon Etheridge books. She has been generous to donate four books that I will give away as a set to one of YOU!  Every Woman’s Battle, Every Woman’s Battle Promise Book, Words of Wisdom for Women at the Well and then a copy of the Stephen Arterburn book Every Man’s Battle (a must read for every husband/boyfriend).

Leave ONE comment before 9pm Tuesday telling us what you think about any of this: about self-control, about waiting, about being single, or married, or anything.  Just tell me your thoughts.

Sometimes my husband and I seriously don’t get along.

We’ve been through this, we’ve gone to marriage counseling, we’ve sat in billions of Bible studies and listened to enough sermons to fill a 64 gig iPod.  We even counsel other couples and speak to groups about marriage.

But more-than-occasionally we miss each other. Like really miss.  (Picture unathletic college-me taking tennis as a class and missing the fuzzy green ball over and over again.  That kind of miss.)

We talk loudly and even hang up the phone. We glare and growl sometimes too.  We flop over in bed and turn toward the wall.  We sulk and scowl.  We expect the worst and live in the past. We think mean, selfish things.

Why can’t he just…

What would be the harm in him….

I’ve told him this a hundred times…

But, even so we have a covenant.  We have binding promises.  We didn’t say Until One Of Us Wounds The Other. Or Until You Get Really Mad At Me.  Or even, Until We Really Really Hate Each Other. We said Until Death Do Us Part. It’s forever.

What makes the difference is this: we are learning to live in the gap of the covenant. Because sometimes only one of us is upholding our promises. Love. Honor. Respect.

When he doesn’t hold up his end, I hold up mine. When I fail miserably and say something un-take-back-able, he stands still as my husband, unshaken by something as fleeting as a word in the face of a promise. Even though it hurts and it takes time to get over, we are learning to practice this.

But our example for this isn’t each other (we are far from skilled even at this) or even another couple we admire. Our example is the first Covenant Maker.  The One who stands strong in the face of our adultery, our hatred, our selfish words and actions.

He IS the gap in the covenant. He even stands at the altar with us knowing we will become distracted and trip over our own desires.  He knows we will not keep our promises. He knows we are destined for cheating.

But He lives there, right in that place where we don’t keep our end of the bargain. He doesn’t flop over in bed or think mean things. He doesn’t glare at us and live in our past mistakes.

He wants us to live the way we were designed to live. The way we vowed.

But until then, He’ll live in that gap unshaken by us in the face of unmet promises and He’ll make up the difference when we can’t.

Are you living in the gap in your marriage?

AND THE WINNER OF THE NECKLACE AND CD is Sarah at Sometimes Sarah Writes. She says:

I think I would tie the two giveaways together with one word… beautiful! Hmm… or maybe breathtaking? how about just plain awesome? (: Ok I’ll just go with my favorite christmas song! I love the words of ‘O come O come emmanuel’ but adore the almost’s version of ‘Little Drummer Boy’. Call me a sucker for some good drumming!

Congratulations, Sarah.  And I LOVE your name! =)

An older woman sat across from me in Starbucks on Tuesday.

“Can I just rest here while they make my drink?” she asked me.  The unfortunate responsibility of claiming the table nearest to the barista’s bar, I smiled and nodded my head. I went back to working on chapter twelve.

I could barely hear her through my headphones and as she obviously wanted to have a conversation, I took them out. “That guy over there is really tall,” she noticed. “And very cute, don’t you think?”

I glanced over to see who she was referring to.  An attractive man towered over the others in the line waiting for lattes and peppermint mochas. I smiled at the woman and nodded again. I didn’t know how to answer her.  “But not for me!” she laughed, referring to her age.

“Not for me either,” I replied.

He grabbed his drink and walked past us and out the door.

No one else for me.  Ever. I thought.

And I didn’t even look up as he passed by us.  I didn’t want to look up.

I’m not perfect, but I know what my limits are.  I know that if I’m sitting in Starbucks and Tall Attractive Guy sits near me so that I can see him while I’m working, I’d better turn around or leave altogether. I know not to catch the eye of the good looking guy dropping off his kid at school the same time as me.  I know to spend time with the moms rather than the dads at the soccer games.  I do my best not to put myself in the place of being tempted at all.

Because to be honest, I don’t want to have to make those types of decisions ever again. The ones that mean life or death.  I want to preclude them by safeguarding myself before I even get to that point.

Sitting there by myself I would NEVER have looked up to glance at the guy. But sometimes temptation comes in the form of a friendly old woman calling my attention what she thinks is a harmless cute guy standing in the Starbucks line.  But if I linger, and I chat with him and I laugh then it isn’t harmless anymore.  So I stop it before I even look.  Before I even want to linger and chat.

Some of it is that I’m content.

Some of it is desire to be honest and true to the promises I’ve made.

And some of it is just habit that I’ve built over the last six years.

I never want to put myself in the situation ever again to even have the opportunity to make a good or bad choice when it comes to marital faithfulness. Anything less than this is too risky for me, for my husband and for our relationship. So I do all that I can to keep my own heart safe.

Because if I safeguard my own heart, I safeguard my marriage.

How do you keep your heart safe? Your marriage?  Do you think I’m being TOO prudish?

****And, drumroll please.  The winner of the iTunes, Starbucks, Moleskine giveaway is Alece.

She says:

ooooh i love this armstrong pic — but i really loved the one you tweeted. (twitted? i still don’t know proper twitter lingo!)

i gotta say i’m loving your trio. they’re staples of mine as well. i knew we were kindred spirits!

okay, a trio of favorites… hmmmm… these things are seriously hard for me! although i think my perfectionistic self makes them harder than they need to be. but i digress. (i’m gonna blame it on the fact that it’s 6:17 AM. and i haven’t slept yet. even after taking THREE melatonins! (oooh! that’s a trio!!) dang insomnia!)

anyway.

my trio of always-in-my-purse favorites:

minty lip gloss
best pen ever
orbitz mint mojito gum

See, it pays to have insomnia!!  Congrats Alece. I’ll send your package today. By the way, go visit her at Grit and Glory.  You’ll fall in love.

“Are you going to get married someday?” I ask my three-year-old.

She scrunches up two little eyes and a nose in disgust and stomps, “NO!”

“But what if it’s Prince Charming?” I ask, hoping to memory-jog the recent emergence of Prince Charming and Snow White in our video library.

She thinks, relaxes her face and asks, “Is he three?” Apparently an age near hers and a proclivity for watching Strawberry Shortcake top her demand list for a future husband.

However, my older daughter wants to get married. In facial distortions and hand gestures she answers all of my questions.

“Who are you going to marry, sweetheart?” I ask her.

She motions wildly hoping I’ll understand without making her answer with real words.  “Oh, I know.” I tell her, “Garrett, right?”

Her face lights up at the mention of a playmate she’s known since she was 4 months old in the nursery at church.  I want her to tell me her reasons.

“Because we’ve…” and then she uses her hands in an elaborate pantomime of

I

have

no

idea.

Oh no! I hope she’s not saying they’ve KISSED!

Evenly I ask her to explain.  “Because we LOVE EACH OTHER!” she half-whispers, obviously embarrassed by having to talk to me at all about it.

Well, now that we have that settled, I think.

I guess Garrett is her Prince Charming.  Through almost eight-year-old eyes he’s everything she could ever want, most of all the perfect Star Wars conversationalist and Wii opponent.  And that’s okay with me as long as he grows up to love God more than her.

A lot can happen in the next 13 years.

But in reality, Prince Charming is a fake. He’s a tenor-voiced opera singer who waits around(only God knows where)  for Snow White (or Cinderella – two timer?) while she gets chased into the forest by the knife-wielding huntsman, is abandoned in a house with 7 tiny men and falls for the witch’s evil apple.  All by herself. Where is he when the dwarves and forest animals are mourning her death around the glass coffin?

I know, I know. He eventually comes around, kisses her (morning breath) mouth and she wakes up.  All is well, a song is sung and she dances off with a giant diamond on her hand.

It doesn’t happen like that, right?  There are good men.  Amazing men. Men who adore God and serve Him first, treat their wives well and are great fathers.  But even they burp at dinner and leave their jeans in piles around the bedroom.

So how do we prepare our children with high expectations for their future spouses, but at the same time not perpetuate a lie that life will be roses and singing squirrels after they say “I do”?

What do you think?

Raise your hand if you’ve ever taken a spin class.

Now raise it if you’ll ever do it again.

I’ve been taking indoor cycling classes on and off for about 9 years. Off for my pregnancies (and that one time I pretty much got banned from one) and then on again in between.  The first time I endured an hour in a dark, close spin room I wondered one thing:

How did they get their feet to go so FAST?

I mean, they don’t go that fast all the time, but when the instructor calls for a sprint, we all pump our legs as fast as we possibly can but I could never keep up.

After my first few cycle classes (and trying so hard to mimic the form and speed of all the seasoned cyclers) I still didn’t get it.  Now I was armed with dual water bottles, new cycling shoes that clipped into the pedals and some questions:  the girl I asked told me to focus on the PULL not the PUSH.

Oh.

I’d been focusing on the pushing down of the pedal during the sprints.  Doing that, I would never go as fast as anyone else.  If I focused on the up motion and pulled the pedal rather than pushed it, immediately I could spin my feet as fast as the rest of them.

It had nothing to do with physical prowess or fitness, but it had to do with how I completed the action.  What I spent my focus on.  The funny thing is, to the outside observer, the motion looks exactly the same.  Totally different muscle groups are used but it looks the same.

Hmm.

So now I spin fast during sprints and share my tiny bits of indoor cycling knowledge with others if they ask.

Who was it who said that the definition of stupidity or insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting the same results? That’s what I’d been doing those first few classes.

I sat in a cycle class yesterday morning and I wondered what else I was pushing in my life.

The styles of disciplining my children I’ve settled into: is that a push?  Are there better ways to accomplish the same (or better) things?  What about the communication with my husband? We seem to fall into the same three arguments over and over again.  Should I be looking at us with fresher eyes? And to be really really honest here (because you all pretty much know all of my stuff) I’ve been trying to lose the same ten fifteen pounds for about 2 years.  And I know it’s because I am too lazy to give up certain foods I love.  I am doing the same thing over and over again and wondering why I’m not losing the weight.

I need a new perspective. I need to get up, grab my new cycle shoes and take charge of those situations in my life that seem to present the same (unhappy) results over and over again.

I need to learn to PULL.

What about you?  Have you been PUSHING when you should be PULLING?

I drive the speed limit.

And I don’t like opening a package of crackers in the supermarket to feed my kids.  There is something in me that needs to pay for them first.

I’m a rule follower. I think it was bred into me.  Which is why my three years of breaking all the rules were so out of character for me.  At least for my personality.

I’d begun to press against the rules that I’d been raised with and in my blindness, seeing no immediate consequences, I questioned the validity of the rules.

Don’t drink.

Don’t flirt with men who aren’t my husband.

Don’t lie.

Don’t…

Nothing horrible was happening (yet) so what was the big deal?

The rule follower in me didn’t become a rule-breaker; she became a rule-questioner.  I wasn’t breaking anything if there wasn’t anything real to break because the rule only seemed real if their was a consequence.  My Evangelical upbringing had taught me that doing things like drugs or having sex before I was married would land me somewhere between hell and a really crappy life.  Here I was married and having an adulterous affair and nothing really bad was happening.  The consequences I thought would fall like an executioner’s axe weren’t falling.

What I’d failed to realize was that I shouldn’t do those things NOT because of the consequences (because in all truth, much of our life is lived without physical consequences) but because doing what was wrong would break relationship with God, and then eventually others.

It was about relationship.  Not about the rules. Because in the right relationship a person doesn’t really need rules.

Let’s just call it the rule of Love.  Jesus called it the Greatest Commandment.

If I love God and if I’m concerned about my intimacy with Him, then the more I want to please Him.  The more my life will look like a person who is in Love with their Creator.  And the more I will live in ways that are righteous and are in line with what we consider “rules”.  I’ll need the rules less as a rigid law because I’m focused on pleasing Him (and running everything through that filter). I will begin to do those things naturally that bring me closer to Him.

The same goes with my husband.  The more I love him, the more I want to be the right kind of wife and all the rules of submission and boundaries we’ve put in place (although important) begin to fade in light of my love for him. They aren’t nearly as important as how much I want to show him how much I love him today.

Rules? All of the other rules hang like a hat on a hook of the rule of Love.

What do you think? Are you a rule follower or a rule breaker?

I used to be afraid of healing.

What it would cost.

What it would mean.

What it would require of me.

Years ago, trying to function in my marriage while having an affair was like trying to run a marathon on a broken leg.  It just wasn’t working and there was something really, really wrong.

I knew things had to change and part of that included my healing, but I was worried about what that mending would cost.

What would it take to stitch up my heart, to make it pliable again when it had become so hard?  As if the pain from the healing would be worse than the pain in my current state.

Healing takes time I wasn’t wiling to give and energy I didn’t have.  It also takes a submission to the Healer that I was reluctant to begin.

And the worst of it, mending requires introspection. Looking at myself, at a blackened heart, is ugly.  I didn’t want to see it and I didn’t want anyone else to see it either.

Wounds need time for the air to purify and clean them.  Tendons and relationships need to grow back together where they have been severed.  Bones and trust need time to form new bonds and new connections.

When the pain in me became to great to  bear and the current state of me was uglier than I knew I could repair on my own, I broke in half.

Bones shattering, tendons ripping, ribs cracking, muscles tearing: the ugliness of breaking was almost as great as the carrying of the sin itself.

This is why healing is scary.  This is why people stay where they are — filled up with the hurt and the loss and the wrong — because it feels so much safer.  The pain we know is easier to medicate the pain we don’t know.  And I won’t lie; the tearing hurts.

But this pain was different.  It had a purpose.  Break in order to mend.

Because it doesn’t end there:  in the breaking.  The breaking is only the beginning. The Healer breaks, and then He mends.

Now I know that mending, even though it costs energy and time, even though it requires me to be silent and wait, even though it means looking closely at my broken places and ugly scars, is the only way to peace.

Peace with God.

Peace with myself.

And there is no fear in that.

Why do YOU think healing is so difficult and scary?

Believe it or not, once upon a time I used to be really in shape.

I’d spend hours (you read that correctly) in the gym not trying to lose weight (I’d already done that) but trying to build muscle and tone my body.  One hour of cardio and then one or more hours of weight lifting EVERY day.  I’d usually take one day off a week.  Let’s just say I was overtraining. But for a very short amount of time, I had great muscle definition and a low body fat percentage.

The amount of time and energy I poured into this was deafening. I’d arrange my day and my life around my gym time.   If I took time off or my schedule was interrupted for something (vacations, illness, etc) within the first week I’d notice a distinct difference in my fitness.  Mainly, my muscle tone.  I know it sounds silly, but it’s true.

And then when I got pregnant with my first daughter taking months off of the gym, was when I really began to notice the atrophy.

Atrophy: the degeneration of something from disuse.

A few months’ vacation from calf raises and squats and all of a sudden my legs felt like jello.  Some time off from curls and I couldn’t see my biceps any longer.  Triceps?  They were the first to go.  To keep it up, I would have had to spend nearly the same amount of time devoted to exercise and weight lifting for the rest of my life.

Now, I’ve settled into a routine of working out when I can, jogging a few miles a few mornings a week and squeezing in squats and lunges at the kitchen sink.  I no longer have triceps that I can see or definable quads.  I simply don’t have the time (or the motivation) to spend 14 hours a week in the gym.

Anything atrophies if we stop using it.  Including relationships.  Especially relationships.

Marriages and friendships are either getting better or getting worse.  There is no hover posture for relationships.

We are either taking steps to repair, restore and increase closeness and intimacy, or we are not.  And when we do not, it begins to atrophy. The relationship loses effectiveness and impact.

Of course there are natural times for relationships to cycle in and out of uber-excitement and crazy joy (read: my time off from the gym for pregnancy).  That’s just life.

But, I don’t want to get flabby in my friendships or my relationships with my daughters.  I don’t want to lose my intimacy with my husband.  I want to fight this. It seems like a lot of work, right? It is.  I can’t lie.  There isn’t any one-word fix for it, or “Eight Steps to Intimacy” e-book I can send you.

I can’t ignore the needs of my husband for months and expect our relationship to be at the same place it was.  I can’t.  I can’t put off my daughter’s requests for time spent with her just one-on-one and hope that our relationship will be better for it.  I need to pour time and energy, at a deafening intensity maybe, into the relationships I deem important if I want them to flourish.

Unless you don’t want them to flourish.  Unless you want to be flabby.  In which case you will be.

You won’t get fit by sitting on the couch.

How do you fight relationship atrophy?

Because you will be tempted.

Someone will look at you in that way the same morning your husband didn’t thank you for getting up in the middle of the night with the kids.

Somebody will share their heart in a way that tugs at you and you’ll want to respond in kind.

You won’t always be in love with your husband.

You will get distracted with good things like kids and church and blogging.

You will be tempted.

And this title is a little misleading because I don’t really think you can affair-proof your marriage.  Not really.  By now, I hope you all know that we are fallible and vulnerable at times. It’s not like baby-proofing (because we all know babies who can climb over the gate at the bottom of the stairs) or fire-proofing (at a high enough temperature, something will burn or melt).

We all are capable.

All the boundaries are good things. They are what keep you from walking down a path toward someone else or another kind of life you think you want.  But boundaries are merely safeguards, not free rides to fidelity.  It is the heart is that truly matters.

So forgive me if any of you have given sermons or written books about 10 ways to affair-proof your marriage or the 5 things to keep your husband faithful to you. I’m sure there are some beneficial pieces of advice there.  But in all honesty I think it all boils down to one thing.

Follow close to Christ daily.

That’s it.  That’s the mystery.

Both of you. If you both are walking in close relationship to God, you will be in close relationship to each other.  If you are closely following Christ, attempting to allow Him to transform you on a day by day basis, you won’t want to be unfaithful to each other. There will be no need for it because Christ will be filling the needs you have and your spouse will be right there with you.  Daily dying to self and becoming alive in Christ is what does it.

Your desires become God’s desires. And you won’t commit adultery.

You can live your whole life trying to safeguard your marriage. You can do all the good and right things, but there will be someone someday (if it hasn’t already happened) who will think you are attractive and tell you so.  There will be someone who seems to know you better and listen in a different way.  There will be a need that your husband cannot fulfill in you and it will seem like someone else can.

When the boundaries that you’ve carefully placed become habits and the fences you’ve built become the necessary routine of your life, these temptations become easier and easier to combat.

But nothing takes the place of a living, breathing daily relationship with Christ. This relationship, this following hard after Him under girds all the boundaries you’ve put into practice. The boundaries are tools to a healthy marriage; they aren’t the heart of a healthy marriage.  Truly living for Christ is the only way to “affair-proof” your relationship.

All the boundaries, all the rules, are important. But love (for the two biggies: God and others) is the real rule.  Love God and you will do what is right for your marriage.

What do you think?  Do you agree?  Do you disagree? Why?

Let’s have a discussion today.

He wants me to tell you that he isn’t perfect.  He does.  I’m not just saying that because I can and it’s my blog.

Maybe he isn’t perfect, but he’s the guy who gets up to answer a nightmare-cry from our three-year-old at midnight.  He checks on her when I don’t ask.  He walks from her room to the one next door to cover up our older daughter, kiss her cheek and pull up her quilt over her shoulders.

He might have ADD, but he remembers to bring back coffee for me when he visits Starbucks without me on Sunday mornings.  He knows what I get and sweeps in the door with a skinny vanilla latte in one hand and his keys and wallet in the other.  He puts them all down on the counter and tells me good-morning in the middle of me making a weekend breakfast for the girls. He’s left us to sleep in a little.  But now we’re up, pajamas still warm from bed, and he hugs the three of us in one motion.

Sometimes I tell him he can forgive me for the hugest of transgressions but not the tiniest. I’m really sorry I leave the AC on when I leave the house. And I’m sorry I forgot to close the upstairs window in the 100 degree heat.  I know it faces the hot side of the house (actually every side is the hot side right now).

He really isn’t perfect, but he’s walked with me in the big things:

The lawsuit that almost destroyed us but didn’t.

The births of babies, the nights with newborns who wake the neighbors, the afternoons spent waiting for naptime to come.

The death of one marriage and the rebirth of the same marriage with new energy, new love and new eyes.

And he works a lot.  Not because he wants to but because he has to.  The difference between him and some men is that he actually wants to come home at the end of the day.  I don’t take that for granted.  I am blessed because, even when he does come home and explodes his gear and papers all over my clean table, he is home.  And he loves being here.   Even in the chaos and the kids with grimy hands and faces, with unfolded laundry and an occasional three-year-old tantrum during dinner.  He still wants to be here.

He isn’t perfect.  Not at all.

Even then he wasn’t.

[But then neither was I.  I never have been.]

But he loves us.  And he belongs to us.

He’s as perfect as he needs to be.

He’s writing today about confession and changed lives over on his blog.  Go visit him and tell him “hi” for me, and then tell him HAPPY BIRTHDAY because he’s 35 today.

[You can also follow him on twitter and you can follow me on twitter too if you haven't already.]