There is no easy way to continue to the next part of this story, which is the reason for my delay.

On January 22nd I discovered that my husband had been living a secret life that I was not aware of and life as I knew it ceased to exist in that moment.

I will never forget walking into our bedroom, his cellphone in my hand, and thinking “My marriage is over”. The despair I felt in that moment cannot adequately be described with words. It was gut-wrenching, life-stopping physical, emotional and spiritual pain all wrapped up in one, big, ugly mess that, at the time, seemed utterly hopeless and doomed to death - the death of our marriage.

I had to leave my house. It was the middle of the night but I could not be there. I got in my car and drove to my best friend’s house. I had walked a similar journey with her 5 years prior. I couldn’t bring myself to knock on her door so I sat on her front porch, sobbing. It was mid-January around 2am so it was very cold outside that night. I was not dressed for cold weather yet I wasn’t cold in the least bit. I am the type of person that wears a sweater and thinks it is “cold” when it is 70 degrees but on this night I was numb even to the weather.

I was numb physically, emotionally and barely hanging on spiritually. As I am thinking back to that night (which I obviously don’t like to do) I can remember now that in the midst of sitting in the cold, and crying, I sang a song. I do not remember what song it was but I know now that was my way of reminding myself that God was going to show me through this raging storm that I found myself in.

My best friend heard what she thought was a dying cat outside and she came to the door to investigate and found me. I fell into her arms after briefly telling her what had happened and she held me up and began praying over me.

Even though she had to get up and go to work the next day she sat up with me all night. I kept telling her “I don’t know what to do.” It felt like an out of body experience. My heart broke for my girls. A broken family was the last thing I wanted for them. I kept thinking about how all of this was going to change their lives forever too. They were so young, just 4.5 and 2.5 at the time.

Around 6am I left her house and drove the 3 minutes to my parent’s house. I knew I was about to shatter their world too. Me knocking on their door at 6am was enough to tell them that something bad, something very bad, had happened. We talked for a while and then I knew I needed to leave and go home and get my girls.

I arrived home around 8am. I didn’t think my heart could break any more but I knew I needed to tell my husband that he needed to be out of the house by the time I returned with the girls that evening. It all felt so bizarre.

The girls and I spent the day at my parent’s house. January 23rd, 2014 – the longest day of my life. The first day of my new normal. Life had changed in an instant. I felt dead inside. I wanted to crawl into a ball and go to sleep and pray the nightmare was gone when I woke up. But I had my girls to think about and I had to pretend like life was normal for their sake.

My mother got in touch with our pastor’s wife who is a counselor by profession and she made me an appointment with her for later that afternoon. Honestly I don’t remember much at all about that first meeting with her except this.

I turned to my mother in the car and I told her that I knew God was going to somehow get me through this and no matter what happened between Dave and me, I would one day stand before our church and proclaim His faithfulness through this situation.

That’s all I had! Every thing else was blown away in one moment of discovery. My faith was the only glimmer of hope I had. Everything else around me was dark and bleak, hopeless, broken and crushed to a million pieces that seemed unable to be repaired in those first desperate moments.

My memories are foggy after the initial moment of discovery and the hours after that because I was in survival mode. I couldn’t eat, I couldn’t sleep. I felt dead; yet I was pretty sure I was still alive and living every woman’s worst nightmare.

At some point, maybe a day or two after January 22nd, I remember my pastor called me. I was standing in the foyer of my home looking out the window talking to him. The only thing I said was “Pastor, I just don’t know what to do.” I clearly remember hearing him say, “Elaine, you have to do what the Lord tells you to do.”

To read the next part of this story, click here.

- Elaine