The Rebel Within

So I was pregnant for the third time during the time I was training to be an antenatal teacher. As I have already said I was desperate for a boy, only partly because I had two girls already but largely to almost make up for gap the death of my nephew had left. We all needed a healthy boy in the family. I went to the 20 week scan with an older friend who was (is) almost a mother figure to me. With no husband at the scan (surprise surprise) I was free to ask the sex of the baby. It was a boy! I swore my friend to secrecy and we vowed to tell no one else. I secretly collected little boy clothes - blue socks, babygros and so on. To say I was elated is an understatement!

When I was 30 weeks pregnant I started to get very painful contractions. I was taken into hospital and monitored. One night they were so strong that the doctors decided to give me a steroid injection in my bottom to increase the function of the baby’s lungs in case he was born that night. Thankfully the contractions did fade away eventually, but after what my sister had been through it was a very scary time.

He was actually born five days late and a whopping 10lbs 7oz! I felt an instant love for him that surpassed anything I had ever ever known. And this love continued to be strong and emotional because as it turned out he was incredibly unwell for his first few years with allergies, eczema and asthma. I will tell you about that in my next posting.

Despite my happiness with my three lovely children I was becoming more and more unhappy with my marriage. I remember going round to a friend one evening with my young baby in the car. He slept while we talked, moaned and drank wine. Her husband had just recently left her and she was sharing her feelings about that and I was telling her how miserable I was with my husband – who she knew of course as our vicar. I said I would love him to have an affair because then I would be free. I felt envious that she was in the position to start again. I knew that one day I would get out of my marriage as I couldn’t see anything worth hanging on to. That was 12 years ago. Very stupidly that evening I drove home, baby in car seat really quite drunk. My mind was already a mess.

Just before our second daughter turned two I brought up the subject of another child. I loved being mum to my two girls and thought it was time for a third child as I'd always wanted three. I desperately wanted a boy so tried to get the timing right. I'd heard that boy sperm swim faster but girl sperm live longer so the timing for a boy had to be on the dot of ovulation. I've no idea if that is true but it did work! Our original pre-marriage sex madness had long since gone and it was a rare event for us by this time. I just didn't want it to be honest. He was in his study until all hours and I had got disheartened trying to convince him to come to bed earlier than midnight to the point that when he did come to bed early I just couldn't be bothered.

We had a very good looking 27 year old sporty American staying with us for a week and me being 25 year old lonely girl fell head over heels in lust with him. I spent several evenings in his company chatting and laughing whilst my husband was in the study or at church meetings. I probably showed myself up and said too much but I found myself telling him how lonely I was and how miserable my marriage was and that I didn't even like my husband anymore. That was 13 years ago! He was either a perfect gentleman or he just wasn't interested in me at all so nothing ever happened between us. I was gagging for it though and the night I conceived my son it was him I imagined in the place of my husband. That sounds a bit silly now but I have to remember that actually I was 25 and at that age I should have been doing all that flirting as a free and single career woman not a vicars wife with two children. So I don't have any feelings of guilt at all, just a bit of stupidity!

I lived for our holidays. It was the only time I even vaguely got the man I married back. Unlike a lot of other Christians we never went to church on our holiday. My in-laws just assumed we did and would never have understood why we wouldn't. I was grateful for that break on a Sunday morning but avoided the conversation with his parents or sisters. I never questioned the church thing but what I was confused by was the fact that he was happy to buy lottery tickets on holiday but not at home. I bought them sometimes anyway because I had no problem with it. A lot of Christians don't like the lottery as it is a form of gambling and so my husband didn't usually get them. It was the two-faced stuff that confused me - why was it ok on holiday but not in our home town where he'd be seen?! I much preferred the husband I had on those early holidays to the husband at home, he relaxed and was much less stuffy.

My next knock-back was when the local NCT group were advertising for somebody to train as an antenatal teacher. I was really keen as it was something I could do whilst still being a full-time mum. I could get my brain working again, gain another interest, meet more people and earn a bit of money. Having given up my teaching degree I thought it was ideal for me. I told my husband I'd really love to go for it and his response? - "You'll never do it. You won't stick with it." If I'd had more confidence and he hadn't trained me so well not to swear at him I'd have told him then and there exactly what I thought of him. But actually I was so shocked he could damn me so hard without even talking it through I was speechless. As it happens I went for it anyway, and I did well at it and I absolutely loved it.

During the training, which consisted of one day a month at the tutor's house and about 4 study days a year, I constantly heard from the other trainees how fantastic their husbands were in supporting them and how they couldn't have done it without them. Most husbands took time off work to look after the children to help their wives fulfill their training. And my husband who worked from home anyway? Nope. I could only go to the training days if I'd organised childcare - either my mum coming across or a friend. I felt sick and disappointed to the core really. I felt he didn't take anything I wanted to do seriously at all. But damn him I was good at it.

Was I lonely? You bet.

When our second daughter was 6 months old my sister needed an emergency caesarian as her 30 week baby had stopped growing. There was only myself and my sister in my family and I had two girls as well, so when she had a boy we were all elated. He was only 2lbs but we had no reason to think he wouldn't grow once he was born and in safe hands. But we were wrong. He had a rare liver disease. He didn't grow. He turned an awful brown colour and despite excellent care and treatment at Kings he died aged only 15 weeks. That was just a nightmare for us all. My husband and I became closer again for a while - I think you do when you have an emotional trauma to talk about. But I began to realise that my husband actually liked it when I was sad; he liked me crying! He always said I looked beautiful after I'd had a big crying session, when actually I looked like a sunburnt prune! I know what it was - he liked being stronger than me and comforting me, he actually got a kick out of me sobbing in his arms. They were the arms I wanted to be in at the time but I did start to think it was a bit weird just how enthusiastic he was about me being sad.

We're a close family and we were all knocked sideways by Samuel's death. I couldn't even begin to understand why this God who was supposed to be loving and caring could allow it, what had we done wrong? I was very cross with God but was told by vicar husband that "we cannot understand everything now but God does have a plan that explains all things and when we get to heaven all will be revealed." Well I'm sorry but whatever plan God has the price was just way too high. Haven't you noticed how Christians have a marvellous knack of explaining any situation, good or bad, by calling it 'God's plan'?!!

My sister was pregnant again soon after and we were convinced the same thing couldn't happen again - that it had been a freak one-off chance. So when she was taken into hospital at 33 weeks with the same problem (the baby had stopped growing due to reduced flow through the umbilical cord) it was just too much to believe. She had a 3lb 10oz girl this time, again by emergency caesarian, but thankfully, despite some scares along the way, she did grow and begin to thrive. She is now a very healthy beautiful teenager.

I was at this time becoming even less happy in my marriage. I felt a long way from my family and real friends and was incredibly lonely. Husband worked nearly every evening, every weekend (vicar's do need to I do realise!) but when he wasn't working he seemed to do anything except enjoy time with me. The computer era had arrived - BIG BIG trouble for us. The church bought him a computer and that was it, the slippery slide to our downfall. It began immediately - if I asked him to come out of the study and spend some time with me he would say he had to learn the computer. It was the way forward he said, he could store all the church records on this marvellous machine and that would save time in the long run but in the meantime it would take a bit of effort to put all the details onto it. And so I would walk away, dismissed yet again.