Marriage Without The Commitment?

Ok I will admit it, sometimes I don't feel married. But then again, what is feeling married supposed to feel like? I think a huge part of marriage is being able to be emotionally and physically there for your spouse.The thing about getting married in prison, is that it is very anti-climactic. You have this wonderful ceremony and visit afterwards, and then you are torn away from each other. There is no house or apartment, no settling into sharing a space, meals together, cuddling at night, falling  asleep in his arms. There are no dinners out, no walking to the park hand in hand, no family meals. It is prison, and me here alone at home. It is only being able to see my husband for 2 hours a month. No wonder I don't feel married at times! I catch glimpses into my friend's married lives and they seem to be moving forward...making homes together, preparing for children, heck I'm even jealous when they get to go grocery shopping together. You see them working as a team, a unit, but then I think to myself, Isaac and I are a unit, a team. We just deal with different scenarios.But am  secretly ok with not having to deal with all the above mentioned things? Would I worry I would fail at our relationship if it were more of a "real" marriage?

Despite the distance and the limited time together, a type of monitored love, we still make things work though, we still maintain a very strong relationship and we have good communication. No we don't have a sex life. No we don't have endless time to sit and chat. Yes we both are very lonely while ironically being married. I believe the commitment still exists in such a marriage as this. Prison marriages in my eyes take an even higher level of commitment in some sense. So at times, I have left feeling torn. Half the time I feel like I took the cheap way out getting married while he is still in prison, so I could experience marriage essentially without the outward commitment, but then I think that real commitment is the ability to stand by my husband through thick and thin, through this whole ordeal, to get to know his ins and outs in creative ways. To find intimacy in simple things. Yes we get to skip the petty arguments over money and cleaning the house, but there is always an exchange. So what is it? Is it marriage without the commitment or is is marriage with commitment on steroids?

Holding On

I believe that ANY amount of time that a person has to serve is difficult for them and their loved ones. Yes there is a difference between waiting for someone serving a 1 year sentence and a 10 year sentence, but that feeling of standing still while life goes on can seem familiar to many alike. I think questioning whether you are strong enough or able enough, or even WANT to do this journey is a good thing. Sometimes on the prison support websites, you see people fading, growing apart, couples not being who they thought they were too each other anymore. People jumping in head first without giving it much thought. I think this fear of losing grip, of not being able to hold on any longer is huge for prison wives. I believe that time can go as slow or as fast as you want it to. It all depends on how you spend your days, the ways you keep your mind and self busy, the tasks and goals you set out to meet. Everything plays into whether one can "handle" doing the waiting game, whether they can actually hold on.

I have been at this about two years, and I think I have done a fairly good job of making it through thus far, but I could definitely stand to do a better job. I do not structure my time well enough and I often times find myself bored and the days dragging. I am currently not working, so I have huge chunks of time that are not filled with anything. At first I was distraught over not being able to work for this period of time, but then I realized that this is my time, my opportunity to start planning our future, and most importantly work on myself to get my mind, heart, and body ready for Isaac to come home. There are logistics that need to be worked out, etc...All these things can help me have purpose, help keep me busy. The only problem is, I am lacking in motivation. In all honesty, I miss my husband terribly, all I want to do is sleep and eat all day. We can't talk on the phone regularly and their is another week until our next visit. It is in these lagging periods, these reprieves, that I wonder if I am capable of holding on. I think of all the stress that Isaac's incarceration has caused us both. and it tears me up. I feel like I look like I have aged 5 years. I know I have the strength to carry on in this journey, but carrying on has a price attached to it.

Isaac and I want to have children for example. He is a little bit younger than me, so it is always me worrying about whether we will be able to get pregnant when he gets out. My biological clock is ticking and he still has over 3 years left! Then I ask myself, is it still worth holding on for if I possibly give up my desire to have children in order to wait for him to get out of prison? I don't know. The lack of sex and physical intimacy for me at least does not make it that hard to keep on keeping on, but to many it is a huge issue, one that can tear prison relationships apart. There are so many issues at work when considering whether a prison marriage for example will last.

Isaac and I are pretty solid and the time has gone by quite quickly most times. I hold on because holding on is what I have always done in my life, sometimes to my detriment, but it speaks to my perseverance. Living this life of a prison wife really is not for everyone. There has to be a commitment made to one's self, but also a promise, that if this isn't working out for you, that you will decide to let go.

Checking In

I haven't posted for awhile, so I thought I would check in and let people know how things are going. On one hand, nothing really seems new, and on the other hand, many things seem to have changed. Isaac and I keep having these rough patches where we don't see eye to eye and we argue all the time over stupid things. Then there is the fact that I go day to day almost content that I am waiting for him, and that that is just what I have to do in order to one day have my husband home with me.

Sometimes I feel so detached from Isaac. It is like on one hand we are married and I feel that so intensely inside myself, but then sometimes it seems like such a foreign concept since he is not here with me and we barely get to talk on the phone and have such short visits. I don't know how to balance my feelings. I miss him so much, but it just sucks that every time we talk we argue. I mean we are doing somewhat better and manage to end the convos on a good note, but I feel let down when he calls and I get all excited to answer and then he comes at me with stupid stuff. IDK. I am trying to keep busy, and am just frustrated with life in general. Money is always an issue and there is never enough of it. I worry about it all the time and I feel bad I can't give Isaac all that he needs in there as his wife. He says it doesn't matter, but I still feel bad. UGH I want my husband laying here next to me as it storms outside. I want to feel his love and his safety and I want to be able to breathe.

My car has been acting up which is a big worry for me because I rely on it to make the trip for visits, and to get me around in general. I don't have money for a new car. That's just a fact. I'm struggling with my weight and eating habits, my health, and just sheer laziness. For some reason I have become obsessed with appearance. I have started fearing getting older, even though I am far from old. I don't know I just feel like I try and switch my focus from Isaac and all the stress related to his situation to myself, and I don't know if it necessarily helps. I should be focusing my energy on cleaning my apartment and getting out of the house. Instead I eat food that is bad for me and stay on Tumblr all day. Isaac thinks I should get a job, and believe me if that were something I could do at the moment I would, but he doesn't understand that there are a lot of things at play in terms of that area of my life at the moment. He keeps telling me to explain, but how do I explain the fact that I get panic attacks just thinking about going back to work and how they do not seem to be triggered by something and how they are very hard to stop? I guess I just need to stay positive and pray and hope for the best. Isaac always says hope for the best and prepare for the worst. A very good motto indeed.

Worries

I know my husband is a big boy. I know he can take care of himself. I know he knows how to survive in prison, but sometimes I just think of him in there and it absolutely breaks my heart. I feel scared. He always has to appear hard at any given moment. Emotion can be mistaken for weakness. He sits in a tiny cell alone for 23 hours a day. They don’t even let him go to church. He doesn’t buy extra food off of commissary so he can buy stamps to write me. We are not able to talk on the phone every day because I can’t afford it. He has no one that he feels he can really share his feelings with in there. He holds everything inside.

I know prison is not rehab or summer camp. I know this is where he must face punishment to hopefully get a chance at redemption. I worry about him everyday because I honestly have no concept of what he faces every day in there. Do they not say a sin is a sin? Who are we to judge the quality, the make up of a sin? Who are we to place a man in a cage like a beast until in punishing him, we strip him of the very humanity we accused him of lacking to begin with? 

Babe I know your fragile heart and I pray for your protection each and every day. I am confident you will find redemption along this journey, but until you do, know that I have not forgotten your kindness and your goodness, and your love, and your massive heart. I have not forgotten that you are a person, a human being, a man whose heart beats, who feels pain, and who seeks forgiveness in life just like the rest of us.

Finding a Routine

With Isaac in prison, one thing I really struggle with is finding some sort of routine in my life. Often times people's lives are defined and mandated by their career or job. It even sometimes fuels and defines their self-worth. Many prison wives say that working helps them take their minds off of their loved one being away, and makes the time go faster. I think this is part of my problem. I am not currently working. I am talking time to re-evaluate my life and what I want to do as a career. So here I am with ALL this free time on my hands, and I feel completely lost all day every day. I need to find ways to keep myself entertained and busy.

Isaac is always telling me that I need to get out of the house and I need to keep myself busy. "How?" I ask. I live in a relatively small area, there is basically very few activities available, and I find myself stuck in a constant state of boredom. The ironic thing is that because of my depression, I don't want to do anything, but I find myself going insane from boredom. I stare at the dishes that need to be done, but I never do them. I think about going to some sort of support group, but the nearest one is an hour away. Sometimes I feel like I am making excuses for not living my life while Isaac is away. Maybe I am and maybe I'm not. Truth be told I had trouble living my life even when Isaac was not in prison. Sometimes the every day challenges are just too much to handle and I find myself isolating and trying to escape life.

So, I am really trying to get rid of the self-pity and create some sort of routine for myself. I need to start with the basics. It is very hard to make changes when you want to do everything now and quickly. That is the hardest thing for me. You would think I would have great amounts of patience in my life because of being a prison wife, but in fact I can be quite impatient. One thing at a time. Hey today I should feel triumphant because I got a letter out to Isaac and I am doing a months worth of laundry. I even took my mom's dog for a walk. If I could get some exercise in, I would feel a million times better. Soooo today if it is simply doing a few dishes and washing my face, then that is what it will be. If I can do a few things that turn into a routine, then I will feel accomplished. It truly does begin with baby steps.

Like A Thing Unseen

Prison doesn't always get to me, financial strains don't always bother me, even traveling and stigma, but it is more the continuous loneliness that I feel as a prison wife. I am not saying I am ALWAYS lonely, because I do definitely feel emotionally and even physically close to my husband, but there are those nights you lie awake and alone in your bed, wishing, wishing so hard that he was lying there next to you, that if magic existed, he would appear there with his warm skin to cuddle you. Maybe to me loneliness equals the lack of physical intimacy, the lack of contact. I always wonder why prisons are so strict about letting inmates and their loved ones have physical contact. Yes there are the obvious reason such as trafficking, but really to not let a hug last more than 10 seconds? To slip a little tongue into you "brief kiss"? Isaac and I kind of do that anyway and no one usually seems to care. I love it when I step into his arms and he squeezes me so hard as I stand on my tiptoes. I love the smell of him, the way my head fits into the curve of his neck, the strength I sense in him.

The simple hand holding at visits brings me joy. I always stare at my little hands cupped inside his big ass tattooed hands, my name staring back at me in bold black letters on the space between his forefinger and thumb. Sometimes I have to stop myself from reaching out and touching his hair or his face. Sometimes when I am daring I will stroke his forearm. I love that man so much and all I want to do is wrap him up in my arms and sit that way for hours. He talks of this often. His face is wistful when he mentions holding me at night, talking into the early hours of the morning. This longing, this loneliness is pervasive, it grabs you and chokes you, shakes you and gives you doubts. It does not seem natural to be separated from the one that is most important to you.

There are also the everyday activities of life that give me pause since he is not here. I mean realistically it would be great to have a second income in the household. I would love him to help with tasks around the apartment and be able to have the little moments that only two people can share in person, such as a laugh over something trivial or a hug that results in some steamy sex in the kitchen lol. Walking hand in hand in the park, swimming, eating out. I don't even care about sex though so to speak. It seems the longer you go without it, the less you care about it. I just miss being touched, being loved by someone's skin, looking into my husbands eyes. This loneliness often goes unseen. Us prison wives put on a solid front for our children, our families, our friends. We don't want them to say 'I told you so!" or " This is too hard for you." Waiting for a loved one in prison is not an impossible task. Going without physical intimacy, missing out on the ins and outs of an "in person" relationship, those things are difficult, but doable. I mean we hear about women and men doing it all the time for YEARS. It comes down to weighing the pros and cons, and when I do this, I always come back to one thing that I know is true: I love Isaac more than life itself and to be without him is far worse than to be without him only temporarily.

Keeping Sane

It really is becoming difficult for me not to be talking to my husband. I know that he is hurting and probably going a little crazy. I know how his mind works and he is in a 23 hour lockdown unit, so he is stuck in that little cell all day. It makes me cringe just to think about it. I don't always know how to make him feel better and I just don't have the money to put on the phone. I just feel horrible rejecting his calls, but there is nothing I can do. I guess I just need to suck it up and know that he will be ok. It just makes me so mad that they keep them locked up in those cells so much. It can drive a person mad and I'm pretty sure it is well documented throughout the country that it does indeed do that to many inmates.

Soooooo I have been trying to keep myself busy and not thinking about this all day long. I am doing ok with it, but definitely need to find more things to distract myself. I exercised today, went to a thrift store, cooked dinner, wrote my babe a letter, showered, and um was on Tumblr for quite a bit.Why don't I have any hobbies?? Seriously? I used to do stuff all of the time, but it seems like since Isaac went to prison, I have slowly but surely lost any sort of semblance of a life. I am not working currently, and I feel like a recluse. I am in the apartment most of the time unless I have to run errands or go to Dr.'s appts. I don't even know what I would do if I started looking for hobbies. I don't even know what makes me happy anymore honestly. I try not to be consumed by prison and my husbands situation, but it is so hard. I constantly worry and stress and sit around thinking about him. I guess I need to find ways to stay busy. I need to keep myself sane. I already am prone to serious depression. The weather brightening up is helping, but I am always on the verge of driving myself crazy out of loneliness and despair. I have lost the majority of my friends due to both my husband's incarceration and because I chose to isolate myself.My family is supportive of us, but are busy people like most.

I try and focus on diet and exercise since I have some health problems, but it is so hard without much direct encouragement. My husband does definitely try to motivate me from a distance. Often times I will tell myself that I am doing this for both of us, so that we can live a long healthy life together, and hell I want to walk into visits looking good for my man too. My therapist suggested maybe trying out some self-help groups. Could be worth a try. All I know is that I can't sit here bored and going crazy for much longer.