If I could go back . . .

Just a little more than three years ago, my life fell apart because I discovered I was married to a sex offender. If I could go back to that day in ghost-like form, like Scrooge with the Ghost of Christmas Past in Dickens' A Christmas Carol, what would I whisper in the ear of my past self?

As a ghost, I would watch myself in the morning, caring for my 3-week-old, Sabrina, and my 2-year-old, Elise. I was happy that morning. It actually hurts to think how happy I was because so much pain was about to follow.

I can see myself making lunch and I know the phone is about to ring. Jake is about to call and tell me that he was sent home from work. He's going to come home. He's going to sit at the table and lie to me. For his sake, I will be calm. For his sake, I will hug and reassure him while he sobs over the injustice of it (as he makes it out to be).

But, no, the phone hasn't rung yet. I still see myself in calm, happy oblivion. I would like to stand close to that past self of mine and say,

 "A storm is coming, but you will be okay. 

Just be the honest and upstanding person you always aim to be. 

You will make it to the other side, I promise."

As the phone rings, as I watch myself reach out to pick up the receiver, I want to give myself permission,

"It is okay to doubt him. It is okay to question him. 

It is okay to be mad at him. 

Trust your gut that he is not innocent. 

You don't have to stand by him."

Mere hours after that phone rings, that past version of me will fear that she will lose her children. I want to reassure her,

"The few who doubt your good motherhood will quickly reverse their opinions. Everyone will agree that your babies belong to you and you to them." 

As she shivers in bed with one arm wrapped around each baby, afraid that if she lets them go or closes her eyes they might disappear, I'd like to say, 

"Sleep, sleep, you are safe, they are safe. Years of happy mothering are still ahead of you." 

As she finally falls into a restless sleep, I would like to send her one last message:

"You fear losing your partner in life, but he never was the man you hoped he was. You will suffer pain and loss, but the hidden blessings will outweigh it all. In return you will gain self-confidence and strength; you will see friends and community more clearly; your connection to your children will be amplified; and you will find second chances for career and for love. 

You will suffer and struggle, but you will also survive and thrive. 

Each year will bring a stronger sense of gratitude for the fruitless life you were rescued from and the amazing life you were gifted with. 

I just wish you could know this now and let it reassure you as the storm passes over."

Please share what you would like to whisper into the ear of your past self.  Comment below or email evie.pruett@gmail.com

The Hidden Blessings

So the guy I've been dating for three months just broke up with me on Sunday. Basically, he thought I was going to break up with him so he decided to preemptively strike out at me by picking on the things I'm most concerned and self-conscious about. He hurt me, he really did. Ironically, I wasn't planning on dumping him, that was just his mistake. Of course, after he made me feel like crap on the bottom of his shoe, I wasn't going to correct his bad assumption. I went right along with his script and I'm quickly recovering.

However, there is a weird sadness that lingers from all of this because he seemed like such a good guy right up until the break up. We had some disagreements before this stuff, but nothing that wasn't livable. He was great with the kids - really freaking great. I find myself sighing over how near-perfect he was . . . and then I remind myself how thankful I should be that he revealed his true colors before we got any more serious. There is a big blessing in finding out who someone really is. I am so glad that my ex-boyfriend volunteered this little scene to expand my awareness of his character.

This brings me to the hidden blessings of Jake's arrest and all the drama I endured because of it. It is a blessing that his true character was revealed. It is a blessing that someone reported him to the police. It is a blessing that I didn't have to figure these things out on my own and make the decision to turn him in. It is a blessing that I didn't get an STD from his extra-marital affairs. It is a blessing that my kids were not abused. In so many ways, I am relieved that everything happened when and how it did.

It is a tough road to find out that your spouse is a sex offender. It breaks your heart and tears up your family. But there is a second chance that is born out of it. The biggest blessing is being given choices. I had several wise people encourage me to start making decisions based on what is best for me and my children. It took a long time for me to grow into that idea, but it has served me well. My life is incredibly flawed right now, but I feel so free compared to the situation I left. I wouldn't go back for all the money in the world. And I won't settle for a flawed relationship, even with a near-perfect man. I like having my choices and I like having a second chance. I hope that every spouse of a sex offender finds this personal freedom. You don't have to choose to leave your spouse - just make sure your choice is really best for you and not just a guilt reflex from that "till death do us part" line. I'm guessing that vow was already broken by the sex offender and it isn't your job to fix it.

Is change possible?

Dear Anonymous who wrote the following:

"I don't want to be deceived and betrayed again. But is change possible for some? And even if it is, how does this color the rest of our lives? Will it ever be truly behind us?"

Change is possible. I'm not sure if you're wondering about change for yourself or for the sex offender in your life, but the answer is yes either way.

For a one-time offender, the chances of them re-offending is very low (that's with legal intervention, court-ordered therapy, and terribly restrictive probation).

For someone more damaged, like a sex addict, like my husband, I'm not sure what the chances of change are. I thought that being arrested and losing everything he's worked for would push Jake to change, but he continued to lie about his crimes and affairs. Through his demeanor, Jake has made it clear that he doesn't care how much he has damaged the lives of his victims, let alone his family. I'm not sure he will change. I believe it will take decades, if at all.

Don't let Jake bring you down because we've all heard come-back stories of alcoholics and other addicts. Sex addicts can choose to change. They can take control of their lives and their addictions. They can learn appropriate behavior, empathy, and other needed qualities for healthy sexual choices. There is always hope.

I think the more important question is whether you are going to change. I'm not suggesting a drastic change, like leaving . . . unless you want to, of course. I'm suggesting a change in how you perceive yourself and how you make your choices. Since my personal nightmare began, so many people who care about me repeated the same wish: that I start making choices based on what is best for me and the children. He has made selfish choices that have hurt and broken the family, so it is fair to set his desires as less priority than those of the other family members. If he is really interested in changing, then he will accept - perhaps even embrace - this new decision making process. Once I started operating in this manner I could see that Jake was not on board. He was not willing to accept the needs of his wife and children as priorities over himself. It was incredibly telling . . .

So ponder this: Are you making choices with your own best interest in mind? Or are you ignoring what you need because it will hurt the sex offender in your life? When you love someone and have practiced for many years to make mutually beneficial choices, it is hard to make this change. I suggest reading something healing and inspiring. I read Eat, Pray, Love.

I also wrote a lot of letters to my daughters. It helped me to imagine how I will explain this all to them some day. If I felt like I was making excuses and apologizing, then I knew I needed to review our circumstances again. My letters to them are much happier and less apologetic now. If you don't have children, write yourself a letter to open in 10-years. Will it be an empowering letter? Loving letter? Apologizing letter?

I think it impossible to avoid being deceived again by someone, somewhere. But now that you know there is a liar in your life, you are much less likely to be deceived by him again. About the time I realized that Jake had been truly unfaithful, I finally decided that he no longer would receive the respect for privacy and trust that I give all other loved ones in my life. This is actually an important decision for a person who is sharing part of their life with an addict. Addicts NEED other people to call their bluff and check their story. Again, if he doesn't like it then he isn't ready to change . . . probably because he is still hiding something.

Yes, this will color the rest of your life. I think about this daily. I hope that it will color me more sensible and careful with relationships and money. I hope that it has sharpened my ability to protect my children. It has injured my trust - and even my interest - in the opposite sex, but that will likely fade.

We'll heal, if we're making good choices for ourselves. I think I'm getting a lot better about that and I hope you are, too.

The Sunny State

The last time I posted was in June. I made a big decision around that time: to leave. I decided to get out of Colorado and return to my hometown in California. The move happened the first week of August. I would have left sooner than that, but arrangements took a while. Right before the move, I had become really scared. I wasn't sleeping out of fear. My in-laws could sense something happening and they started sneaking around behind my back. I believe they thought I was going to sell my husband's possessions, so they were taking them. Whatever they were thinking, they just ramped up my paranoia. The move itself took a big toll on me, the kids, and my immediate family members, but the shear happiness of knowing I was out - wow! I had reclaimed my life! I slept like a log for almost 12 hours the first night in California. I have had some emotional days since then - regrets, ideas on how I could have done things differently, fear of the future - but the happiness and relief have always won out. I'm really truncating this story to get back to my point . . . 

I could say that I stopped posting in June because I was spending all my time and energy planning a move, which was true . . . But really, I stopped posting because I thought this story was over. However, I just got a few reminders that this story never ends.

First, I had a visitor to my blog. It was woman who I believe recently became aware that her husband is a sex offender. She left some sympathetic and passionate statements that reminded me of comments I left on some other blogs when I first entered this arena. I remember searching the internet for other women like me. Were other women feeling the same emotions? Were they struggling with love in the midst of betrayal? How did they make decisions about their marriage? How did they face their community? How did they raise their children? What did they see when they looked in the mirror? A "co-dependent"? A "co-addict"? A victim?

Her presence, reminding me of myself about a year ago, made me want to stay active on this blog for the sake of other women.We have a lot in common and a lot to learn from each other. I hope other women will start their own blogs or volunteer or share their stories in whatever way they are inspired. Keeping the conversation going is important.

The second thing that brought me back was a mild panic attack over the safety of some children that I suddenly feared were being left in the company of a sex offender. I was relieved to learn later that they were with someone safe and measures are being taken to keep them that way. There is more to that story and maybe I'll tell it someday, but my point tonight is that there is an ongoing problem beyond my family and my marriage and my children.

 I think many wives (and other non-victim family members) of sex offenders hide themselves out of shame, and yet we have some valuable insight that could help others. My story is mine, but it echoes so many . . . if the many would connect, share, and learn from each other than we would feel less shame and start having the courage to say, "Hey, I know something about this problem. I know the warning signs. I know how to prevent this." Or, "I know how to help a family that is broken by this." If the presence of my blog helps a woman step away from her shame (undeserved shame, by the way), inspire her to reclaim her life (whether or not it includes the offender), and spread a little awareness then I'm here to stay.

California, by the way, is perfectly sunny. Colorado meanwhile is having a cold snap. I am very happy to be here despite my unemployment, impending divorce, and financial dependency on my parents. You'll hear about those stories another day, I'm sure! Anyhow, I'm thinking that I'll be a sporadic blogger, but I hope that anyone who comes across this blog will feel free to comment. All comments end up in my inbox, so you aren't talking to yourself!

Con Man

Have you ever been conned?

I remember being conned by a guy in San Francisco when I was 12. I was with my mom. We wanted to ride the cable car, so we were reading the instructions on the ticket machine. A guy came up, offered to help, and sold us two tickets - one was valid and the other was expired. On the cable car, the ticket collector made us pay for another ticket. It was embarrassing. It made us feel stupid and sad. We had lost money, comfort, pride, and self esteem. It ruined the whole day. Still, as much as I enjoy San Francisco, it makes me think of that day and causes me pain.

My husband's actions have recreated those feelings of being conned. Only take the feelings of one instance on one day and multiply them times every day of every year of our four years of marriage. Add to that the pain that is attached to every memory of him as a husband and father - every memory that I used to cherish. I can't even look at our children without feeling such deep sorrow. They deserved a father, not a felon. We were conned.

Grief is the other part of what I'm feeling. I shouldn't say "other" since my emotions are all intertwined. I should say that sometimes my ever-shifting array of emotions resembles grief. The husband I thought I had has died in my mind and heart, over and over. The worst part is that it never stops because he is actually still alive. It's like having a ghost haunting you in the image of someone once dear to you. It keeps the pain fresh.

In a moment of anger, a week or so after Jake was arrested, I said to my friend J, "It would have been easier if he had died." I regretted those words almost immediately because, well, they just aren't nice. I believe death is a serious thing, not to be wished on our worst enemies. But those words still ring true. If he had died, the grief would have an end. If he had died, I wouldn't be embarrassed to talk about him. If he had died, I wouldn't worry about the other kids at school shunning my children because of what their father is. And (most shameful thought of all) if he had died, his life insurance would keep us afloat instead of this financial hole he has left us in.

Death would have been easier. That's just a fact. But if he were to die, I'd probably regret ever thinking it.

But then, maybe this is part of the con - making me a victim of my own angry thoughts.

The three types of sex offender wives

PLEASE NOTE: This is a popular post for some reason. I have a theory that it pops up high in the google search for "sex offender wife". Well, if this is your first time on this blog, I want you to know that this is not my best post. Please peruse the blog for some of my more current and thoughtful posts. Also, there are many stories in the comments of this post from others like us, which you are welcome to read and reply to (we all need support). But when you are ready to share your own story, please do it on this post: Wives of Sex Offenders - A Place to Share. 

When I read about other women in my situation I tend to categorize them. There are the women who practically wear a shirt that says "He's not the man you think he is." I would call them the "denial" group, except that I hate that word myself. Also, I feel that you shouldn't label someone as being in denial simply because they love and support a person, no matter how much wrong that person has done. They are the love group.

And there are those who lean heavily on Jesus. I wouldn't have guessed that this would be such a theme among betrayed wives. But then, it makes sense because we have had our lives turned upside-down and inside out. Who do you turn to when that happens? This is the faith group.

The women of love and faith are the ones that populate the internet. But I would like to conjecture that there is a third group: the angry group. You will hardly ever find this type in any chat room or forum or blog because they feel the betrayal so acutely that they would rather walk away and not look back. They will divorce quickly and move far away from the scene of the crime and tell their children that daddy is dead.

These are just my ideas based on very little evidence, so don't take them too seriously.

So which am I? I'm all of them, of course. I still love Jake, which is why I'm still here. I found God in the horror of last year and He kept me afloat. And I'm so burning mad that I can't stand it some days. All wives of sex offenders are really a mix of these women, even the wives who walk away and never look back. I guess we just pick a direction to lean and some lean more strongly in one direction than others. I started with the love group, joined the faith group, and made a big jump into the angry group right before I started this blog. I think I sit squarely in the middle now . . . but there's always a chance it could change.

In case you missed it, I finally posted the second half of the story I was dragging my feet on. It is just the beginning of my story from last year, which I plan to relate in time. In this moment, though, I just want to get back to blogging regularly now that I'm not shamefully avoiding unfulfilled promises!

Is that you, God?

If you've been wondering where I've been, I've been avoiding all of you because I can't seem to write the second part of my story and I'm ashamed.

But I came running back to tell you about my weird day yesterday.

Despite all my recent dreams about moving on in the world of relationships, I spent the last week anxiously awaiting a letter from Jake. In my last letter, I told him how scared I was about the mortgage. I told him I wouldn't stay here and let the mortgage suck me dry, no matter how much I love the house. I told him he should think about selling it and that I was packing.

Around the time I sent the letter, I told his parents something similar. Kay seems to get it and supported the idea of selling the house, but Big Rev is classically in denial. He said, "Well, I think your moving too fast on this," and "We should wait to see what happens," and even "Are you going to leave the house to go into foreclosure?" And I, in my own classic form, get riled up, snap at him that this is not my fault, and then feel guilty about it for days.

Big Rev really did work on me and made me feel guilty. I was anxious about the letter  because I thought I had started a fight with Jake, like I always do with Big Rev. After all, Jake is the one that I really want to yell at.

But when I got the letter yesterday, it was so nice! It was full of suggestions for items among his belongings that I could sell. He even managed to get through the whole letter without any self-pity or excuses - unheard of! It was actually a pleasure to read and I my daydreams of a new man were quickly replaced with daydreams of a pleasant pen-pal marriage. (Yes, I'm so weird, I know.) I was almost giddy!

But there was one thing wrong with the letter. He said he didn't want to sell the house. I was totally expecting that, but it ate at me. It didn't make me feel guilty for thinking about moving. Somehow, it actually firmed my resolve not to go down with the ship. I was just thinking that I would put that in my next letter when my phone rang. A friend of mine invited me out to coffee.

This friend recently moved back to this area, where she grew up, because her husband was having an affair. We have a lot in common because we both were betrayed and suffered from our husbands' bad choices. We both showed up happy to the coffee shop, though. She told me she had just received a phone call from her husband the night before. He was crying (Crying! she emphasized) and asking her to come back. She said "maybe". I told her about my almost perfect letter. Then we started sounding off each other. I asked her if she could really trust him. I shared my doubts that a cheating man will ever change. She listened to all my options about leaving or staying and she said, "Evie, you could really be happy somewhere else. You could find love again." I wish I had said it back to her because it is true for both of us. Instead we started joking about how to properly screen a potential mate (more on that later). In the end, I think we left the coffee shop a little sobered by each other. I wonder if that's why she called me. Did she think I would understand her excitement over the phone call from her cheating husband more than her mother or sisters who are in good relationships? Did she know I would reflect my own pain back on her, reminding her why she really shouldn't go back? I wonder.

Oh yeah, when I told her about my current job search and how I was hoping I would hear from the job I'm really interested in before the job I just applied to as a back-up, she said, "I think the job you get first is the job God wants you to have." I don't usually think that way, but it sure would be nice if God would put up some big road signs.

That night, another one of my friends called totally out of the blue to tell me her man troubles. I explained my day to her and that all I would give her is negative opinions about the opposite sex. Then we moved on to financial stuff. She happens to be in the foreclosure business, so she has some ideas about houses and bankruptcy. I told her that my dad keeps suggesting bankruptcy for me and I keep ignoring him. She gave me the 411 on bankruptcy and told me that I'm a "good candidate" for it. As she talked, I thought, Is this a road sign, God? Is bankruptcy really my future? And then she also reiterated the idea that I deserve better, that I should move on, like everyone who cares about me says - except my husband.

So that brings me to the final thing. At 2:30am I wrote several pages to Jake about my anger over the massive credit card debt that I took onto my credit cards to save him from default on his own two years ago. I pointed out that he hasn't once thanked me or apologized for that gesture, as if that was just a normal task of a wife. I told him that I was considering bankruptcy and how unfair that it is me and not him since it is his debt. I told him that my credit score went from the mid-700s to the low-500s because of that, but he never asked or cared, although he was plenty concerned about his own credit score. It is all just so unfair and I feel so foolish for ever falling into it. And then I asked God to relieve me of my anger so I could sleep.

It was a weird day with so many abnormal occurrences that I feel there must have been meaning to it all. The letter, coffee, the phone call. What is the theme? What are the road signs? Leave now? File for bankruptcy? Or was it just another day in a meaningless, chaotic world?

The Game Changes Again

Change. How many sayings are there about change being inevitable? Change is the only thing you can really count on in life. The only person who likes change is a baby with a dirty diaper (that was one of Jake's sayings, sigh). I think there are a few songs about change, too. 

I like to step back from myself and try to look at the big picture. It's really impossible because everything I look at is tainted with my woes and wishes. But still, I try to be objective every once in a while. What I see from my mountaintop view is that I'm not that unusual. First, there are many other people wrapped up in the pain of my own situation. Stepping back again, though, there are many women in this world who are married to sex offenders. But go back one more big step and I see that everyone has pain in their lives - duh. Is there a person on earth who has made it through life without one big painful, family splitting, finance ruining, heart breaking drama? At this point, I actually start to wonder why I'm so shocked at my own circumstance.

I mean, I could have never guessed that the source of my pain would be a sex offending, sex addicted husband, but, hey, it had to be something. Sometimes, I role through my mind all the other terrible situations the Universe could have handed me. Frankly, I'm thankful that I'm not dealing with sickness or death (even though some days I have wished him dead). Strangely enough, after my exercise in objectivity, I always come to the conclusion that I am actually well-suited for this particular painful experience. It stops my whining and crying and helps me breathe.

In calm moments, I start developing new ways to frame my life perspective. Ironically, this last week I was playing with a new goal: embrace change. This week, I think that motto is a little insane, like embracing a feral skunk. But if I could figure it out, maybe I would live my life more peacefully no matter what the Universe throws at me.

And then the screw turns again. Jake's arrest has me suffering, although not nearly as badly as last year. I still intend to tell you all about last year, but right now I'm supposed to be getting ready for church. It's funny, I've been praying more in the last two days, but I really don't feel like going to church. People will ask, "How are you doing?" without knowing what has happened and I will answer, "Not so hot. How are you?" I don't mean to be rude, but I don't do fake smiles and I definitely don't lie. 

Hold Your Head Up

So I have a few minutes before I head out to see my therapist and I'm contemplating myself, which is what you do before you go tell a therapist all about your life.

Something Big Rev said about my mother-in-law has me thinking. He thinks she refuses to go to church because she feels like other people are looking down their noses at her. I don't think they are, but that is a perfectly natural way to feel, right?

Another wife of a sex offender has mentioned in her blog that she feels discriminated against because of her husband's past crimes (for which he's completed his sentence for). A scary, yet believable idea.

I worry about the future. If I allow Jake back into our lives in any form, that will be hard for other people to understand. I worry that other kids will someday tell my daughters that their daddy is a pervert. What will I do when the local newspaper prints his mug shot on the front page once a year?

Well, I've learned to set aside some of those concerns. I drink lots of Yogi Stress Relief tea. I practice compartmentalizing all my anxieties. It's been a tough road, but I've learned a lot of good things about myself.
 I can hold my head high because I know I'm a good person who speaks honestly and attempts to make the world a better place.

I believe others see your true character despite the situations, if you let them. They'll never see it if you hide away. So I hope all the other people who are caught in this type of situation will assess themselves honestly and then step out into the public view and trust that others will see their true nature. Don't be paranoid, just be you.

And maybe lean on someone, like a therapist, until you feel confidant again.

The Balance

It is hard for me to reconcile the Jake I love with the one who did all those things. A list of crimes and character flaws is deceptive. There is a good man, a valuable man attached to that man in the mug-shot.

Jake puts on this front in public. He jokes and seems infinitely confidant. But then, in a quiet moment with me, he's emotional, sensitive, full of indecision and doubt. Soft-hearted. It was easy to be emotionally intimate with him. We shared so much of our inner workings with each other that I couldn't imagine he was hiding anything from me.

I had my complaints about him as a spouse, but very normal ones. He forgot important dates and gave tasteless gifts, like a typical man does. But then he'd do subtle things in our everyday life that made me thankful I had someone who knew me so well. He'd record a show I liked, or email me a news story he knew I'd be interested in, or cook something I liked even though he didn't like it.

He knew my talents and encouraged me in them. He was proud of me and would brag about me because he knew I never would.

He gave me the opportunity to stay home with my daughters - possibly the most valuable experience of my life to date.

He wasn't a bad father. He loves both his girls very much. He just wasn't always there when you needed him. Even when he was there, his mind was elsewhere.

Life was getting confusing in the year before he was arrested. He had a lot on his plate, so it seemed to make sense that he was stressed out and distant. He did a lot of traveling. He confessed to me once that he went to a massage parlor (the kind with happy endings). I forgave him, it didn't seem that serious. It became a kind of joke. But then he told me about another one and then a trip to a bath house. I was dazed and unsure what was happening. I tried to talk to him about how this affected our marriage, but he seemed to just not get what I was saying. I kept thinking that things would improve after we had the baby, after he settled into his new job, after we payed down some of our debt . . . Then we wouldn't be so stressed. Then we'd have the time to figure our marriage out.

We never made it there. And now I see that we never would have. He was a sex addict. I just couldn't see it at the time. Some days I'm thankful he was arrested because I was just seeing the tip of the iceberg. I'm glad things didn't spin more out of control.

And some days I wish I could go back and fix things so we wouldn't be here. What would I have done? Would I have gotten mad at him about the massage parlor? Would I have made him get counseling? Would I have refused to marry him and miss having our precious children? That wouldn't really stop the problem. I would have to go back further. I would have to go all the way back to when Jake was three-years-old and stop the man who raped him. That's where all this started. But then I'd need to stop whoever victimized that man as a child and back and back and back. There is no end to it.

But I hope you have seen the other side of the coin.

A Lot of Maybes

I was looking through blogs by other women who are married to sex offenders. One common thing I noticed was that they avoid describing what their husband's crimes were. There is likely a reason for that.

Maybe they don't feel like it's relevant to their blog. That's a reason I can understand. Some days I feel like people look at me and their first thought is of what my husband did. I don't want to be defined by my husband's problems. On the other hand, I ended up on these women's blogs because they have chosen to focus on that part of their life . . . and yet they aren't talking about it.

Maybe it is uncomfortable. Duh. Sex is an uncomfortable topic. Thus, illegal sexual acts are REALLY not fun to talk about.

Maybe they don't want to scare or disgust the reader. If the reader is of a healthy sexual mind then they should have a bad reaction to reading about sex crimes. Our husbands did something really wrong in a category of "wrong" that is repulsive and possibly even scary..

Maybe they're still in denial about it. I hate to use the "d" word. That word has been used to describe me this past year, but I would argue that I was ignorant. Or, when I had damning evidence in front of me, I was trying to stay open-minded. Or, when the evidence was so horrendous that it rocked me to the core, I was coping. I think a lot of women "cope" by only facing a little at a time. Processing too much would overload us. I think true cases of denial are few and far between, so I'm not going to pin that label on my fellow bloggers. But even if I don't think they are in denial, that won't stop their readers from thinking it.

But back to where I started . . . I think women who are blogging because their husbands are sex offenders should share what those offenses were. If we are going to talk about it then let's TALK ABOUT IT. Let's talk about who these men are that we love/d and share/d a life with. Let's talk about whether we think they can or will or have recovered from whatever delusion they were in at the time of the offense/s.

In the spirit of this message, I plan to give you more detail soon about my husband's character. Stay tuned.