Prayer Warriors Needed - FReeper desperate

myself | 11/12/02 | Genesis defender

[Genesis defender]

This is my first article posting, so I hope I do this right.

I am desperate. My world as I know it is falling apart. Last Thursday morning my wife told me I have until January 1st to move out. She is kicking me out because of many things, but I will list as many as I can recall.

She has good reason to give me the boot. We have been married for five and a half years, and before we were married I promised her that I would take care of her and support the family so she could stay home. Unfortunately, I have a huge problem with following through on my promises.

For five years I have made similar promises of getting a job, looking for a job, and just doing chores around the house. I tried for a time, but eventually slid back to my typical behavior of procrastinating. I have held various jobs throughout this time, but none were well-paying enough to support a family.

To make things worse, I had an addiction that prevented me from doing constructive things with my time. Please don't laugh when I tell you what I was addicted to. It was video games. I would play at times six to eight hours a day during periods of unemployment.

Two Saturdays ago, my wife first told me she had been thinking of kicking me out, and at that point I did something I should have done years ago. I asked her to come into our computer room, collected all of my computer game CDs (close to 30 in all), and I broke all of them.

I thought that had been enough for the time to prevent me getting kicked out. But I was wrong.

Complicating things is the fact that we have a two and a half year-old son together. I love that little boy a whole bunch, but I haven't provided properly for either him or his mommy like a husband and man should.

I have been an awful human being towards my wife. I have had her hopes up, then dashed so many times. She has told me she likes me as a friend and our son's father, but she says she no longer loves me as a husband.

She has also told me she doesn't know what she wants me to do that would make her love me again.

We are separating, not divorcing (for now). She told me the ONLY reason she has not divorced me is because she is a Christian.

So I am asking for two prayer requests:
First, that the Lord will heal my crumbling marriage by fundamentally changing my habits and healing my wife's broken heart. I have frantically been trying to change, but I want this time to be permanent.
Second, that God would help me find a job to support myself by Jan 1st. I so desperately want to prove to my wife that I can support myself and be a Godly man for once in my life.

[Registered]

Open a few more IE Windows with the most recent articles...you can make it...you can.

[Cagey]

why do you need us to tell you this?

Did I just get fired, or something? I take it your post was meant for the originator of this thread.

[Burn24]

Yes, sorry!

[John Jamieson]

Everything I know about this man came from his own mouth. I just agreed with his own judgement and used some different words. Do you think he's a better man than he says he is?

[Kevin Curry]

John, you're getting skewered here, but I understand where you're coming from. I wouldn't have called him "pond scum" though. He has a problem (as we all do) and he's admitting and facing it. He has my applause and respect for that. God is working in him. That's great!

He needs help--real roll-up-your-sleeve-and-get-to-work-help--not endless pity and buckets of tears that some are giving him. Ugh!

[billbears]

My prayers added for you, for strength, and for a heart that our Heavenly Father can touch and guide. Prayers also for your wife to see a change in your heart and that you may find a job. Added to the Daily Prayer Thread

[Palladin]

I will pray for you. But, remember, God helps those who help themselves. Your behavior as a husband and father has been abhorrent. You do, however, have the courage to confess, which means you have the courage to change.

Have you seen your local pastor about getting a job and straightening out the rest of your life?

[Gracey]

You're right on buddy. You figured it out rather swiftly.

[austingirl]

Prayers for you and your family.

[PoisedWoman]

Just sitting there waiting to be zapped by God is defeat for you, my friend because God can't change your habits while you are passive. Have you ever tried to steer a parked car?

Wonderfully wise remark that bears repeating. I'll pray for you, too, G defender.

Pray for the willingness to change permanently. Once that prayer is established in your heart, you will succeed in overcoming your addictions and rotten habits.

Besides praying, looking for jobs and working at anything until A (not THE) right one shows up, you might consider getting some sort of help for depression, up to and including anti-depressants for no longer than a year and in smallest dose that works.

Also, if you have any chance of fitting into a Twelve Step group, find one and go. No better support anywhere....do you need to stop drinking or doing drugs or overeating or anything they have 12-Step meetings about? I don't want to know, but those groups are terrific and would probably be better for you than turning on your computer and coming here for help. Give us up!

[Burn24]

I TOTALLY agree with you. No one's even asked the question, who pays the bills, buys the food? What's wrong with being realistic and practical? Sometimes it's the best thing when you're depressed.

[John Jamieson]

He isn't going to solve his problem wasting time looking for pity here on FR.

[Alberta's Child]

I'm not addicted to FreeRepublic at all. I can stop whenever I want . . .

. . . so I can go and look at all of Registered's latest parody pictures and other hilarious things.

LOL.

[Senator Pardek]

Years ago, I was once down to 39 cents. I mean it - all I had was 39 cents, and no $$$ for rent. I came back, and I'm still coming back. It can be done. I've met many roadblocks and setbacks (Sept. 11 included), but the fighting back is the most pleasurable part of the experience.

Never give up.

[John Jamieson]

"who pays the bills, buys the food?"

There's a pretty good chance it's you and me.

[Scully]

Perhaps you should take the following story to heart:

But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with His finger. When they kept questioning Him, He straightened up and said to them, "If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her." At this, those who had heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman standing there. Jesus straightened up and asked her, "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?"

"No one, Sir," she said.

"Then neither do I condemn you," Jesus declared. "Go now and leave your life of sin." (John 8:6-11 NIV)

[lsee]

Addiction is usually a symptom that something is not working in your life. People want to say, "the addiction IS the problem or the thing that isn't working" but that's not right. People turn to alcohol, sex, drugs, and obsessive behaviors because they have problems...then they commonly point to the behaviors themselves as the problem!

If you are "addicted" to a coping behavior, you will naturally turn to that behavior in times of stress, unless you learn different coping skills. Getting a job is not enough if you do not work on coping with your problems in non-addicted ways. If you don't learn to replace the destructive way of coping, you remain "addicted" to it.

So, by all means get counseling. You will learn what triggers your addictive behavior and learn to short-circuit it, redirecting yourself into more productive behavior.

Until now, believe it or not, you have wanted your addictive behavior more than you want your wife and child. Now that you may lose your wife and child, your survival instinct is kicking in (at last)...Problem is, just like binge eaters turn to food in times of stress (often related to the binging itself), "addictions" of all kinds allure us most when we are stressing out.

The good news is, you are a strong-willed person. Obviously, meeting your needs has been important to you because you've been trying so hard to meet them all this time in the wrong way, even when doing so became very painful for you. You need to accept that trying to meet your needs with your addictive behavior is just too painful and not worth what it's costing you...It's time to learn a better way and save your family.

[CindyDawg]

I'll assume you are for real and pray with you but why don't you get off of FR and go tell your wife the things you are telling us. Someone is always here if you need to talk later.

John, you sound angry. Want to stay and talk to us about it? CD

[BraveMan]

Proverbs 28:23