Wandering The Desert

It's one of those days. I miss Isaac terribly. I even talked to him twice on the phone today. I just feel very alone and very disconnected from my relationship at times like this. Our marriage is strong, but it seems like the closer we get to him coming home, the slower the time goes, and the harder things get. We get into petty arguments. We hurt each other's feelings easily. Isaac fears I will leave him. I don't know how to calm his fears. I have been here by his side for 5 years! Why would I go somewhere right when I am about to get the prize I have waited so patiently for? I love Isaac with a love that surpasses my own logic. He is mine and I am his. I love him dearly. I just want him to be home already. I want to be in his arms and him to be in mine. I know I am starting to sound corny, but it is absolutely true and what I fantasize about all the time. Not necessarily the sex, but the intimacy of unlimited touch.

I feel like I am wandering a desert. Isaac is the water I need and I am so thirsty. Don't get me wrong he makes me mad often and I have yelled and pouted and even screamed through the phone a few times. He can frustrate me immensely and me him, but at the end of the day our love, our relationship is strong.

I have been trying to makes some preparations and positive changes lately in my life to get ready for Isaac to return to the free world. I am in the midst of interviews for a higher paying job as much as I love my current position. I am putting little bits of money in savings. I know Isaac will need a lot of things when he gets out and he will also have the cost of home detention when  he gets out. I need to learn to budget better though. I eat out too much, I spend money on unnecessary items all the time, and sometimes I will admit it some bills are paid late. I need to build my credit up so we can eventually buy a house. I need to set concrete goals and stick to them.

At this point I kind of feel like I am just ranting and raving. It has been an off day. I need to busy myself with some cleaning and preparation for my interview on Monday. I'm still not entirely unpacked from moving like 3 months ago. I am all over the place. I need structure for Isaac and now is the time to start working on getting it. I really do feel like I am thirsty and wandering the desert for organization, for planning, for Isaac, for time to pass, for that blessed day to come. I must be patient and I must remind myself of that over and over again.

How Do We keep Our Hope?

Isaac's incarceration is wearing on me I will admit it. I am tired, very tired. I want the life I see in my head, and the reality of the situation is, it just isn't time for that life yet. For some this is temporary, for other's this will always be their life. That is another reality that must be realized. Our loved ones are all serving different sentences some with an end in sight some without. How do we keep our hope?

I used to think if I wrote enough and visited enough and did everything a good prison wife does that I could keep the light of hope burning, but I soon realized that hope is indeed not entirely external, in fact it is very internal. We have to want to hope that things will one day get better or the status quo will even out or we will be satisfied with what we make of our lives. Prison puts a damper on life. It can deaden our loved ones hopes and dreams, even their soul. It can do the same to those of us on the outside. How do we protect ourselves against a loss of hope in the face of incarceration? I had some very dark days in the beginning of my husband's jail time and subsequent prison time. I lost all interest in activities in things around me and I lost hope because in my eyes his sentence was long and I never thought I would survive it. You see that is another point I want to make. Hope is about survival. you survive the pain, the haziness, the unknowing, the disappointments and the loneliness. Our hope lies in our loved ones. Our hope then becomes externally based on a living, breathing being that counts on us to an extent for their own hope. Sometimes we have to hope for them when they cannot see then end in sight. 

So to bring things to a close I am feeling tired, a little hopeless, but not void of hope because when I do not hold my own hope, my husband holds mine for me until I am ready to myself again. Hope can come from our families, our children, our pets, our friends, our work, our activities, but it has to come, it has to be there for this sort of relationship to survive. So hope on, I will try my best, even in the wake of just wanting "normalcy," I will draw my strength and hope from within myself and from Isaac and I will use it to remind myself that whatever the circumstances it's loss would be more detrimental than anything. 

Families Behind Bars in Indiana

Hello everyone! I just wanted to make people aware of a group on Facebook that is helping people with incarcerated loved ones in Indiana. It is called Families Behind Bars. There is a local meeting, but soon an online chat will be started. The chat will be Sunday April 26th at 7:00pm EST. We are not chatting through Facebook, but through slack.com. Anyone from ANYWHERE can join in on the chat! Friends, acquaintances, or family members welcome. I will post the link for it if anyone feels like it would be beneficial to talk with others in a similar situation. Having an incarcerated loved one can be a lonely and scary thing and so support is always needed! It will just be a relaxed chat where anyone can bring up issues related to their lives and their loved ones incarceration. Here is the link to families Behind Bars on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Families-Behind-Bars/563050973826710 and here is the link to the chat event: https://www.facebook.com/events/960418197324544/. If you have any questions please email Families Behind Bars at familiesbehindbarsinfo@gmail.com! I will be on the chat!

Fighting The Good Fight

Hey folks! I am doing pretty well! That last post was one I started quite a while ago and decided to publish. We are considering a modification for Isaac currently. He is now under 2 years left on his sentence and that is not even counting his upcoming time cut. I never thought I would see these days. It just comes to show that if you are able to be patient and wait, the clock has to inevitably wind down. I consulted a lawyer last week concerning the modification. I would have to retain him and then we would send out for information regarding his case. He said not to retain him until after Isaac has completed his program which he is only a couple months from doing.

Isaac and I are doing well. We still are struggling with writing snail mail, but we continue to send emails and videograms on the daily. I visit every weekend and pray every time that my car makes it! It has such high mileage now after years of driving to visit him. We talk about the future and I am getting ready to ask my landlord how she feels about him coming to live with me. I'm nervous as hell about that!

Work is going well for me. It is super busy, but I fight through the anxiety and the chaos and continue to be happy for myself that I am back to work. I am not perfect, but I try my hardest for my clients. I am still struggling to make more friends, and conjure up the energy to do more social activities. I volunteered to table at a event regarding the prison system on Saturday, visit Sunday morning hopefully, and a walk to help fight to end homelessness Sunday afternoon. A busy weekend right? Well I am off to get ready for work. I know I need to update this blog more often. As I always say, life gets in the way! Keep on fighting the fight!

When The Clock Stopped

Sometimes I feel like I have fallen asleep in my life, that I'm constantly waiting for something. Waiting to lose weight, waiting to feel more attractive, waiting to make more money, and of course waiting for my husband to be released from prison. There are times in my life, things from my past, unpleasant memories that I want to forget. I realize that most often that is what I want..to forget, to sleep in the presence of pain. To pretend like Isaac never went to prison, that are life is as we want it to be now.

I write sometimes to express some things that I will never verbalize to a soul in my daily life. I write to release and I write so people know that they are not alone. Incarceration, loneliness, depression, life stressors exist for so many. I feel rather lost right now because I exist always in the space of absence. Part of me has kept myself that way to protect myself from unpleasant things in my life, but it keeps me from living life as well.

One of the biggest concerns from prison wives is that they feel as though their lives have been put on hold while their loved one is away. That life had to stop at a specific date...his arrest or maybe his sentencing. That is when the clock stopped. When did the clock stop for you?

In some ways I live my life, I live for every day and I do not let my husband's imprisonment stop me from living. I go to work. I socialize, I do activities. On the other hand, there are definitely things that I refrain from doing. There are parts of my routine that are tailored around my husband's incarceration. Sometimes that has to be the way things are. You have to schedule time in for visits and phone calls, etc...Right now at 6am I am trying to figure out if I have enough money for his commissary order this time. It is rather large! I hate feeling stuck, but there is nowhere to go but up. We have to be dedicated in this life, if we are half-assed prison wives for lack of a better word, we are missing our hearts. We have left the whole thing with him. That is not a way to live.

Sick and Tired

Hi everyone! I hope you are all doing better than I am. I have a bad cold and had to do a half day at work today. I have been sick for almost 10 days and have just had it with feeling crappy. I probably should have stayed home from visiting my husband this past weekend, but I am glad I got to see him. I just hope I didn't get him sick.

I'm feeling down on myself because all I can really do is rest up and chores and housework and errands are piling up at home. I just don't have the energy physically. I am so completely spent. I emailed my husband today asking him to call me even though we had planned on tomorrow to talk, but he called today and I was glad we got to speak. We both expressed the sentiment that we wish he was home with me. All he wants to do is be able to be there for me and to take care of me when I need a helping hand. I could really use a helping hand about now.

It seems the closer we get to his out date, the more intense the longing for him to be home gets. I never thought I would see his time under 4 years, but now here we are under 2 not even counting his time cut! That is amazing. It is amazing, but still a ways away. I love my husband so much. I just want this leg of our life journey to begin! I am chomping at the bit!

I need to realize though that I have to prioritize some things in my life, such as my current health situation, work, my sister's wedding, my own emotional health. I should take time to focus on these things instead of sitting around longing for him to be home and for things to be different. Yes right now I am sick and tired, but perhaps with the will tomorrow I will be productive and engaged in life. That might be helped along by me going to bed early tonight lol! I need my rest. I know I worry my husband, so why not focus less on his time and more on ways I can lesson his stress in relation to worrying about me? I think that is a fabulous idea! We have also kind of fell out of writing snail mail. We email and do videograms, but we have just stopped writing letters. I miss those! I used to wait eagerly to check the mailbox. I have hundreds upon hundreds of letters in shoe boxes. I think writing more should be a goal as well. Mail call is everything to them and I want my husband to feel loved...well I am headed to bed. I think I will end my sick ramblings now :-)

Awake

I'm laying awake at 3:30am the morning of visitation. I can't get back to sleep. Strangely enough, my husband's brother messaged me while I was lying here. He asked how Isaac is doing. How is Issac doing? Good on the surface, but I'm worried about his state of mind. He's so all over the place. 

I'm sick as a dog, but driving the many hours to visitation and I think about sacrifices. Have the last 5 years been a sacrifice? Yes definitely in a way. I just want to go to sleep for another hour and stop rambling, but I'm wide awake. I'm exhausted, but can't sleep. 

Husband Knows Best?

Isaac has a lot of strong opinions on life, especially on our life. One of these surrounds my health and habits. I am diabetic and have had some subsequent health issues in relation to that. I spent last night in the ER with chest pain. The doctors were worried I might have a blood clot from recent traveling. I could hear in his voice he was scared to death about my health and I hated that. I don't want my husband to constantly worry.

Long story short, I did not have a blood clot, but my health remains risky. We always talk about wanting to have children, but I would really need to get my health in order for that to happen. Sometimes I wonder if I am self-sabotaging. Then I think what reason would I have to do this? Essentially I am cutting down the years I have to spend with my husband and we have a lot of catch up to play. Why can't I just eat healthier? Why can't I exercise regularly? Why can't I value my life because it seems like my husband values it more?

I could say that his incarceration has brought a lot of stress, because it has. But that is no excuse to eat whatever and to become a sloth. I was sick with no symptoms before he got locked up, so to say it is stress, could maybe be a half truth. I have definitely learned to handle the stress of having an incarcerated loved one better, yet my health remains poor. Incarceration takes a toll on loved ones I think that is very often unseen. We grieve silently, we feel shame and guilt hidden behind happy masks. It is taken out on our body, lashing us, beating us into submission and perhaps the only thing to do is to fight back.

Doing things that take up time is always recommended when your loved one is away. Why not rebuild your mind and body? Why not create a different perspective on life? There is always this theory that life has to stop when your husband goes away, but in fact Isaac has been trying to shoe me forward this whole time. Maybe he does know best in this case? I mean yes my health is important, but I also want to look my best for when he comes home as well. I also know I am going to need some stress relief habits for when I am dealing with him with parole fees and appointments, etc...

Anyway I think I have fought Isaac knowing best because I wanted to be right and because quite frankly I am in denial of my health being bad. NOW is the time to act. We lose so much time to incarceration. Why lose time to poor health or any other habit that is holding us back?

Directions

Hello everyone! It has been quite a while since I posted last. Since I began full-time work, a lot of the things I did in my free time have gone by the wayside. I have been thinking about directions lately. The direction life takes you in, the direction of future plans, the direction of this blog. I have been toying around with maybe changing up the style of it. Now I basically rely on more of a narrative format, but maybe it is time to mix in a little more practicality surrounding being a prison wife or the loved one of someone incarcerated. I know there are a lot of people out there living this life alone and surrounded by guilt, shame, and secrecy. My first goal has always been to support and I recently got an email from an individual saying my blog reminded her that she is in fact not alone on this journey. I welcome questions, ideas for posts, advice, etc..and would love to gear my blog in a direction that will be helpful to as many people as possible.

I do believe just narrating my experience does help people, but I think I want to add some other elements. Obviously being a prison wife is not the only thing I am. I am just throwing some ideas around, but I definitely want to take more time to update my blog. I enjoy it thoroughly.

Just to let everyone know a little update, my husband and I are doing really great! We just celebrated two years of marriage and are going strong. He know has under two years left on his sentence and we are gearing a lot more towards the logistics of him coming home. He is so sweet and showered me with presents and cards for Valentine's Day. We got a 3 hour visit that day, which was amazing and we just kind of take things a day at a time. We are struggling using too much money for the phone, but we all know that is a common struggle for most couples. He is doing great in his program and is in the next to last phase to completing it. I am very proud of him!

I would love to connect with anyone who needs support or just to chat about shared experience so feel free to comment or email me!