For those have stumbled upon this post and don't feel like reading through all the posts...here's a recap of me deconstruction journey: I grew up in an Evangelical Pentecostal Charismatic church. My entire childhood was spent in the church and I was a firm believer in the things my parents taught. From ages 17-32, I slowly began distancing myself from the crazier Evangelical teachings, but was still firmly a believer. I went on missions trips, volunteered regularly, prayed daily, read the Bible, and was part of a small group. And then, around the age of 33, as I was reading a book on ancient history, it occurred to me that the Bible just wasn't lining up with historical record. I decided to re-read the Bible for a fourth time, but this time I was open an honest about what didn't make sense and sought answers that extended beyond church teachings. I was an atheist by Judges. When I told my husband, he did not handle things well. At all. He accused me of tricking him into marrying him, claiming I lied about being a Christian to get him to marry me. You name the logical fallacy that religious people use to demoralize and demonize non-religious people, and he used it. It was so extremely hurtful and it took us years to reach a point where I could even bring up something about religion without him getting super defensive. This time last year he told me that he would never forgive me for hurting him and that I deeply wounded him. Since I did nothing wrong, I informed him I didn't need his forgiveness and the wound was unintentional. Nevermind, I had apologized for not telling him when I was beginning to have doubts.
All of this is important backstory for the newest revelations. This fall, my husband kept talking about love. How our modern idea of love and monogamy is unrealistic. That the reason people cheat is because we didn't evolve to be monogamous. None of this is a new conversation in our home and I agree that humans have a bad habit of putting rules on sexuality and marriage, to the detriment of everyone. We also agree that there is no such thing as soul mates and that we could make a marriage work with a lot of people. Not everyone obviously, but if I didn't have my husband...I'm sure I would have found someone else eventually. My husband takes this a bit further by telling me that he can't quit loving people. That he still loves his first wife and all his ex-girlfriends. He cares deeply for them and only wants good things for them and would have no problem going back to them if they wanted to. This talk began to get a bit weird though. It came up more frequently. He would rant about it when no one was talking about it. At the same time, he also announced that he didn't want to be a grumpy old man (something he had been turning into) and he was going to make more of an effort to visit and make friends, to be more affectionate with me, and leave the house more often. These two things definitely felt related at the time and I began to seriously wonder if he was cheating or planning on cheating on me. I felt like I was being set up to agree with him so that he felt justified in cheating. So I finally asked him flat out if that was what was happening. And that's when he opened up and admitted that he was..... polyamorous. Not cheating. He wasn't even thinking of cheating. He's not even considering a poly relationship. But he knew he was this way and had already read some literature about polyamory as a sexual orientation. And he was angry. He was angry at me because he felt like I got to change the parameters of our relationship (become an atheist) and he was certain that he couldn't even say out loud this thing that he was. So for eight years now he has carried around this bitterness and resentment towards me because he firmly believed I wouldn't be okay with it. And so his reaction to my coming out as an atheist, was directly related to that resentment as he felt like I got to change and he couldn't. I don't know if I would have been okay with this eight years ago. What I do know is that I actually don't have a problem with it now. Polyamory is not promiscuity. It literally means many loves. And I would rather my husband be open and honest about his love for others than to go behind my back and cheat on me. I accept that this is how he is because he has been telling me in so many ways that this is how he is from the beginning. Several things have come out of this now: 1. He has apologized profusely for not accepting me when I told him I didn't believe anymore. He said he knew he was wrong, but felt so resentful that he couldn't bring himself to forgive me. 2. He said that me accepting him for who he is has lifted an incredible weight from him. I have seen become a happier and healthier person. He is more present and more affectionate. 3. He also told me flat out that my reaction to him made him realize that he was not as good of a person as he thought he was. That I truly am the better spouse here, because not only did I stick with him when he was treating me badly for my revelation....but I also accepted his revelation with kindness, love, and grace. 4. We started going to couples counseling to walk through this minefield. 5. He has signed up for a meet-up group that is specifically a support group and made it clear the group is not a dating group. He's already making new friends. 6. Our relationship feels more solid than ever. I feel secure in his love for me. I don't know what the next steps are for us. But I am glad that I finally asked the question and glad that he felt comfortable enough to finally speak up. Religious me would never have been okay with this. I know that. Our religious families would not be okay with it. That's something we are choosing not to tell them currently. If we do need to address this, we'll do so carefully and with a lot of solid boundaries. After all, it's our relationship, not theirs. We're still not sure if we should tell our kids. I think one out of four would be okay with it. The only people that matter in this relationship is us...and any other paramores and metamores.
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AuthorThis is a personal, but secret, blog archiving my deconversion from a Christian to a non-believer. Archives
December 2020
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