Never Good Enough

I spent 15 years of my life being told I wasn't enough.

I remember in the very first year of marriage being told that the only reason he married me was because I was pregnant. Otherwise he never would have lasted through out college with me. This was year one.

This set the stage for the rest of our marriage.

Our arguments revolved around him and his needs. I never measured up. I did not love him enough. I did not "do" the things that made him feel loved.

So I would try and try and try.

Remold myself into this elusive wife that would be enough.

I tried for 13 years. And reassured him in every way I could think of that I DID love him.

I begged him to just give me the benefit of the doubt.

To look at my actions and words through the lens of love instead of twisted rejection.

13 years.

And I did not do everything right. I would screw up all the time. I would get so frustrated with the never ending cycle of never being enough.

And I would apologize and try and try and try again.

Only to be told, nope. Not good enough. You don't love me.

What can I do? I would ask. Give me a list to follow. Something that will help me figure this out because I do love you. And I really am trying.

But even with a list of things to do - they weren't enough. I did not do them good enough or I did not really mean them...there was always something.

I got to the point when I had no me left at all. It was all about him all of the time.

And then I said enough.

I need to find me. I need to get to know myself and learn to love myself. Because the voices in my head are always telling me I am not good enough.

I went to counseling and learned important lessons about who I was. And embraced myself and loved myself.

And told him that I could not be the person he wanted me to be.

Not WOULD not. COULD not.

It was impossible for me to keep trying. But I assured him I loved him and that we could work together to show love to each other. To learn to rewrite the past abuse - and let each other be who we are. To love each other for our differences.

The past 2 years were me loving out of who I was. How God created me to be. And sometimes he could see it. I know he could see me trying. But instead of working with me - he pushed me away as hard as he could.

He refused to see that I loved him. He kept telling himself that I did not and threw every little thing in my face of how I did not love him. Even when he had given me freedom to do those things.

So now he says maybe someday I will see my part in this. In 3 years maybe I will look back and see how I rejected him and how he put up with me all those years despite constant rejection.

And that is so sad.

So sad that the marriage he looks back on is so ugly. That the reality that he lived in for 15 years was so tainted. That there is no redeemable good in his world. That there was no love. That I was never enough.

Because the more counseling I get and the more people I have speaking into me - people who really know me and have for years. People who allow me to be myself and embrace me for it. They only affirm the abuse I lived under. The abuse of constantly living in an unsafe world where nothing I did was enough.

I was prayed over by the prayer team the other day. People who did not know me or my story. People with the gift of prophecy and intercession. And only knowing my name the first thing they said to me was "It is not your fault". "You have been wounded for so long and now is time for healing".

So he can say it is my fault. He can say I did not love him. He can say words to hurt me. But they don't . They only reaffirm that I can never convince him of my love. He will never see it. Maybe he can't receive love at all.

This next season will be learning how to be enough. And to shut out his voice in my head. And walking with my head held high in truth and trust in my father's love for me.

And I think I am grateful. I think God has rescued me.