Chapter 13. More amok

I did more than run and walk amok: I emailed and phoned amok, with a man other than my spouse.

In mid-February 1997 the friendship with Pete (name changed) starts innocently enough. Pete is an out-of-state business contact of the company for which I work. He is the representative assigned to our area, so when I call with questions on a claim, I am consistently referred to him. After a few phone contacts – one of which he gives our company a favorable outcome and I call him “my hero” – he suggests that it might be fun to email. I agree. 

We exchange some words of a kind nature, and share some events happening in our lives.  We exchange a few more words of a more affirming tone, and share our thoughts about what is happening in our lives.

It doesn’t take long – maybe a couple of weeks – before I am checking email every day, and sometimes doing it on the sly in the wee morning hours, as I suspect that Gregg won’t be too keen on the frequency of the contacts. Not too much longer and there is email talk between Pete and me of hearts beating faster, and of excited anticipation of the response of the other.

Phone calls start and quickly become daily, sometimes twice a day. It is spring: I enjoy the outdoors and the attention while we talk; while I dig dandelions in the yard I dig myself deeper into relationship. The more contact we have, the more things heat up. Sexual innuendos are tossed from him to me and back again. Next come more blatant statements of wishing for face-to-face, or body-to-body contact.  After all, this man tells me I am one in a billion! He tells me that he loves my personality, that he’s never known anyone like me. 

Heady stuff, and hindsight certainly informs of how dangerous such comments are when coming from anyone other than a husband. Hidden from my conscious reasoning in the heat of the moment, my entering into that relationship is tit for tat. The flattering contact is enticing, especially when I know that my husband is enjoying the attention of another woman. I am fishing for affection, the kind of affection that Gregg has with Allure. Through the years, I felt I had been exemplary in behavior towards other men. Sometimes I even avoided eye contact when I thought it would make Gregg uncomfortable: Gregg had a mild jealous streak.

After a year and a half of Gregg avoiding my expressed “red flags” in his relationship with Allure, maybe down deep is a desire for revenge. Subconsciously, I wonder if I decide that I want just a little bit of what he has. No “inappropriate” behavior, just some harmless words of affirmation from another man.

Additionally, somewhere in the recesses of my mind I think I conclude that I don’t like the way God has let things happen. He let my husband have eyes for another. He let my child be sexually molested. He gave me an awful depressed brain. Late in 1997 I think God is "mean" and that He doesn't really know how to take care of me. He gave me this wretched brain that seems to be defective, that craves for alcohol, and that tends toward such negativity that I can hardly enjoy all the good things I have.

He took away my reliable status of the "apple" of Gregg's eye. I realize that I may have sought Gregg out 'cause he was such a nice guy. That possibly I had deep feelings of “could I really trust men?” which fed a goal of doing whatever I could to avoid being hurt by choosing the nicest guy I could find to marry. 

For a few months I felt too raw to trust God for hardly anything - I didn't believe He would be good to me, I didn't believe God would let me do anything that was "fun," I didn’t believe that God would satisfy.

On a subconscious level, I think: if God is in control of all things and what I’m experiencing is what I get for all my efforts, I don’t want to trust God. I’ll do it my way for awhile. This feels good. I’m going there.

I have a hyperactive conscience though, and in those first months of illicit relationship I know that I won’t last too long in blatant rebellion. In fact I tell Pete that I am going to give him his birthday present early, before God convinces me to stop the relationship with him, as that could happen by the time of his early April birthday. So in March 1997, I borrow a Polaroid and take some pictures of myself, au natural, and send them to him with a few other small things and a card. 

We never have any physical contact, but that’s little consolation. Jesus clarifies, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery,’ but I say to you, that everyone who looks on a woman to lust for her has committed adultery with her already in his heart.” -Matthew 5:27-28. I grieve over my sin against God, the other man, my husband, and myself. Turning away from Sacred is an awful thing. When the door is cracked opened to harm (I name it evil and Satan a decade ago), a stinky foot is quickly thrust forward.

April and May sees us continue in contact, but gradually decrease the sexual talk and intensity of feelings. By the end of May, God has so convicted me of the wrong in our relationship that I make Pete promise to burn the pictures that I sent. He says he will; he said he does.

I am attached enough though to the relationship and Pete’s affirming words that we stay in touch. The frequency of calls lessens, but the sexual innuendos continue. It is inappropriate and unwise, and I know it. I don’t want my spouse doing the same with another woman. And I know I am doing a wrong to Pete’s wife.

DREAM. May 26, 1997. I am in a tornado.  No one is hurt, but I am on my own.

DREAM. June 3, 1997: In my dream, I see some 'stupid' types slide into my parked car.  No one had called the police yet when I got to the car, so I have to do that, and in general take care of the details.

   
Note: a recurring theme of my dreams is that I'm alone or left to fend for myself through the trouble.

It isn’t until things later implode with Gregg that I am finally ready and willing to sever the tie I have with Pete. Maybe I feel convinced that somehow God will fill my need for affirmation; more likely I know that if Gregg and I have any chance of surviving together, we need to NOT have any other relational distractions.

I got lost looking for love. 

Batter my heart, / three personed God…

Take me to You, imprison me, / for I, except You enthrall me, / never shall be free,

Nor ever chaste, / except You ravish me. 

– John Donne, Sonnet #14