I need you today.
Thirteen and a half years ago, I found myself on a cold bathroom floor–shaking from a ten-year hangover–staring at a pregnancy test like it was an eviction notice from my life. It was the end. It was the beginning. I got sober. I created a family I could love and a self I could live with. I stayed sober by crushing shame daily through living out loud with you.
Three and a half years ago, I found myself in a therapy session with my husband, watching his mouth say terrible things about infidelity—things that would destroy my ideas about marriage, myself and God, and send me to my second rock bottom. After that therapy session, Craig packed while I laid with my children in bed until they fell asleep. Then I locked myself in the bathroom again, staring at my shocked, shaking hands once more. How would I survive this?
This wasn’t a story I could live out loud because it belonged to my whole family. My sobriety strategy wouldn’t work this time. I resolved to tell enough to be honest, but keep private enough to be kind. I did what women do: I gritted my teeth, smiled, and held it together for my children. I said to the world: Yes. I’m fine. I’m FINE, thank you.
But in one place, I admitted I wasn’t fine. Every morning, before the kids woke up and my exhausting life as a newly single mom began, I’d go into my cloffice, open a secret file on my computer and write it all out. I wrote in the dark—more like a detective than an artist—desperate to see my life in black and white in front of me. I was hoping to find patterns, clues. I was using my own words like a map to try to figure out where to turn next. I wrote like a prayer. I wrote like a howl.
My beloved friend Amy read every word, because I needed one witness to my life. But other than Amy, the file never saw the light of day. I couldn’t even show it to Sister. It’s hard to tell the people closest to you how heavy it all is, isn’t it?
But as I wrote I started to notice something— this writing was healing me. It was leading me through the darkness. And that still small voice inside me started to whisper that maybe this writing wasn’t just for me.
This terrified me.
I thought: Why AM I so afraid to tell this story? There was only one answer: I’m ashamed of what happened to me. I’m ashamed.
And so I looked hard at myself and said: Precious Self: No No NO. Nope. Shame is a lie and if you’re letting it make decisions for you—you’re following the wrong leader. Your leader is TRUTH. Do you believe that the truth will set you and your family and your readers free, or don’t you?
Craig and I began endless talks. We enlisted experts to help us talk to our kids about this and walk us through every possible outcome of making our story public. Then we decided:
This story is for the world. Let’s use all this pain for good and share what we’ve learned. Let’s do it. Let’s offer it up.
But it’s one thing to decide and another thing to actually follow through. One day, long after I first opened that file and started bleeding into it, I realized I was done. I let the file sit there for a while. I knew I needed to reach out to some fearless writers—women I love and admire, artists who share their lives and their hearts with the world. First I sent my pages to our Liz Gilbert, who I respect madly. She read it and wrote me back:
This is epic, Glennon.
Thank you, I wrote, relieved and grateful. But I’m afraid to publish it. It’s going to freak people out. It’s going to make some people angry.
Liz wrote this back to me — but I believe it’s to you, too:
My brave Glennon, if you sense a storm gathering, don’t fear it — because you ARE it. You are the force of nature here. You are the storm that’s going to sweep through people’s neighborhoods and knock over a bunch of lies and myths and imprisoning structures built out of centuries of women’s silence. Everyone else will just react, but you’re the one who created the powerful thing that people will be reacting TO. Don’t forget this, I beg you. They (the reactors, the critics, the observers) don’t have the power. You have all the power here now, because you claimed your power and you spoke it. So don’t trick yourself into thinking that you are weak or small, or that you can be victimized by anyone. There will be a part of you that says, “But I’m still just the old Glennon — afraid and tiny and overwhelmed”, but that’s not who you are anymore. That’s an old version of you. You might not even quite realize yet how much of that you have left behind — but I can see by this writing what you have left behind, and what you have become.
I began to feel braver. I sent the file to Sarah Bessey, who I trust with my entire heart.
I wrote: My Sarah. You know how hard it will be to publish something like this. I just have to know if it’s beautiful enough to make the brutal worth it.
Two days later Sarah wrote me a letter that included this:
So here is what I think: yes, it’s dark and painful and raw. So the light and the beauty and the love is even more dazzling and beautiful. It’s your best work yet. I feel like God has anointed you, called you, to this work. It will be a hard road to send it out there and many will misunderstand or minimize or explain it away but the pain will be worth it because this writing is a giant battle cry of surrender.
As I read this – I felt like I have was standing on holy ground, Glennon. I don’t say that lightly. It’s a hard read, really hard. I cried and I felt split open by your pain and your suffering, by Craig and his suffering. I felt like I was right there with you in it and I remembered so powerfully my own loneliness and suffering, my own grief and renewal. It reminded me of a scene in the book of Acts when Peter and John are testifying to a court that wants to kill them and they say, “we cannot but speak of what we have seen and what we have heard.” This book is testimony – it’s what you have seen and heard. How can we not speak of it? How could we not testify to the belovedness and the healing and the pain all married together? I encountered God here, G, not in spite of the darkness, but because of it.
I love you, I do. Carry on, warrior.
Love Warrior has been Sistered into the world, as have I.
So here we are. And my sisters and brothers, this is what I want you to know—
Love Warrior is the offering I’ve been working on in the dark every day for the past three and a half years. Love Warrior is about infidelity — to ourselves and to each other. It’s about betrayal and redemption. It’s about how everything the world teaches us about femininity and masculinity can make it impossible for a woman and a man to actually know and love each other. It’s about how to survive rock bottom—how to use crisis as a springboard to a truer identity and a better life. It’s about parenting our kids through pain. It’s about friendship that hurts and friendship that heals. It’s about faith that shackles women and faith that liberates women. It’s about shameless sex and God and food and drugs and porn and tenderness—and how the dirt and the divine are so often inseparable. Love Warrior is about how to finally find peace in your own damn skin and your own damn life.
Love Warrior is raw and it’s shocking but it’s also beautiful. You will lose and find yourself in it. I did. It’s everything I know about love and resilience and womanhood and freedom and truth and power and peace. It’s the very best I’ve got. I assume that every writer has one book that makes her a writer. This is mine. Besides my sobriety, my three babies, my gritty, divine marriage, and Together Rising, I’ve never been prouder of anything in my life than I am of Love Warrior.
Now, about the COVER and about A SPECIAL GIFT CREATED JUST FOR YOU.
I wanted a symbol for our Love Warrior: A symbol to remind us to enter the fire of our lives and transform it into fuel to light the world. A symbol that would remind us that the pattern of life is: First the pain, then the rising. A symbol we could claim and love as ours and that I could tattoo on my own skin as a mark of my brutiful journey. So I called one of my oldest and dearest friends, Joanna – the Joanna who helped me through college and helped me start this blog—and I said: I need you. I don’t want some corporation to create my Love Warrior. You know me. You know my marriage, and you know Momastery. Can you create her?
A week later Joanna sent me this. And my chest filled with fire and love and hope and recognition.
I told my publisher that I wanted Joanna to create the cover of our book. Not a big New York art firm. I said: We Sister each other. That’s what we do. Only Joanna.
Joanna designed a cover for my book that literally made me, and the folks in the New York publishing office, cry.
It’s bold. It’s beat up. It’s soft and textured and fierce. It’s imperfect and REAL. Human. Like me. Like my marriage. Like you. I love this cover like I love us.
Love Warrior will be born on September 6th. Today is like that day, thirteen and a half years ago, when I announced to my family that I was pregnant with Chase. I believe that when Love Warrior arrives into the world, my life will start again—it will be another new beginning. But for now, I am preparing for the birth. I know it will be a painful and beautiful one. I’m scared. I need my family by my side. I need you with me.
You are always asking me what you can do. Today I have a response.
Those of you who have been doing life with me for a while know that the Momastery community is the great honor of my life. I love you. I asked my publisher what I could do for YOU– what we could make that is extra special, and offer here, to you first. So this is it. We have made an extremely limited special edition first printing of Love Warrior for you.
There is something inside of this special edition that will never be created again.
Joanna created a one-of-a-kind piece of art with our Love Warrior. I wrote a poem to go with the art. To me, this poem and this symbol are the secrets to a life on fire. They remind me to spend my time down here ALIVE instead of just living.
I am going to personally sign each and every one of these special art pages and they will be bound into your first-edition book. I am going to sit and say a prayer of hope and love and gratitude every time I put my signature on one of these gorgeous pieces of art. Then this beautiful gift will be shipped to your door the week of publication (September 6). And because I feel so strongly about supporting independent bricks-and-mortar bookstores, any orders placed through Momastery will be fulfilled by beloved independent bookstores around the country.
Please, right now, click here to order this special signed gift edition of Love Warrior.
Order five copies for Christmas gifts (when the holidays come, it will be too late—these will be gone, and we are not printing more.)- Order 10 for bridal shower gifts (When the head of my publishing house read the book, he wrote my editor this email: Every person on Earth should read this book before marrying. This should be the handbook for relationships).
- Order one for your husband and your therapist and your adult children and your church and your library and your book club and your recovery group and a hospital waiting room.
- Keep several on hand for friends who receive or deliver the News.
- Order one for your friend who was brave enough to stay. Order one for your friend who was brave enough to leave.
I need you to know that if you pre-order this book today, it will mean so much to me. Your love and support matter to me — and matter to our team. Your pre-order of Love Warrior is a vote that says to us and to the publishing world: Yes. We support your work in the world and we want it to continue.
And after you’ve ordered, please consider tweeting one of these messages:
I would say that there are no words to describe my gratitude for your presence and support – but there are. I found some. They’re in the book. You’re in the book.
BECAUSE YOU ARE MY FAVORITE LOVE WARRIORS ON EARTH. Thank you for doing life with me and Craig and our children. You have made me honest and you have made me brave.
Carry on, Love Warriors.
G
Author of the #1 New York Times Bestseller LOVE WARRIOR — ORDER HERE
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223 Comments
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Such an inspiring life story you have! I found your book on the web while just surfing and ordered it. I just finished it and thought of putting a comment on your post. You are really a brave lady, hats off!
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Bless you for bringing this to this surface. It is so deeply personal, so cloaked in shamed, I can only imagine how incredibly hard it was to stand like this, eternally naked, in the light. Lord knows, I feel brave just signing my email address to this comment!
the effects of drugs are never good.my husband was an addict for 10 years. this got him rehabilitated twice and sometimes in trouble.i almost gave up on him until i got help from Dr Mack, who helped in getting him free from addiction.i got to contact him after i saw a testimony of a lady on this blog who also faced similar issue with her son until he got help from Dr Mack. now my husband is free from addiction and is being the best husband and father to our kids and i i’d urge anyone on this blog facing similar or any problem to also contact him via email:dr_mack@Yahoo. com
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Dear Glennon,
This memoir has changed my life, but, even more it has changed my spirit enough for me to reconsider my husband and beautiful children before fleeing in search of the “greener grass.” This book has taught me how green grass is relative to every set of eyes. I’ve come to realize the world’s impositions and how sifting through them requires grit and preserverance. Most of all, I realize the role I play in my marriage and family and how easy (and cowardly) it is I point a finger.
I can go on and on. Coincidentally, I read this book in Naples while in search of self. Thank you for giving me such sight.
Amazing.
Lovely Glennon,
Once I am at office and in boredom i googled “best Readings” and found your book, ordered and completed it in a week even during office hours. I loved it, i loved all those parallels even being male. I kept shouting to myself who gave you all these truths about me.
Simply I LOVE YOU and i wish more power to your pen.
I’ve always believed that when I felt “bad”, angry, upset, depressed, afraid, it was because I was doing it wrong. Even my program tells me that whenever I am upset, no matter what the cause, there is something wrong with me. That acceptance is the answer to never feeling bad.
What I am realizing tonight, well into my seventieth year, is that feelings are feelings, and not the result of doing, thinking, being wrong. Acceptance is a tool for coming to peace. It is not the eraser that pretends everything is okay.
Look at the world. Clearly everything is not okay. If you’re not angry, you’re not paying attention. If you are not heartbroken, you are blind and deaf.
This tenderness, vulnerability I am feeling, I’m always checking to see if it is depression. It’s reality. Tender and vulnerable is the true reaction to what I am experiencing. It is what I am, who I am, and – who I want to be. This is the human person fully alive.
Thank you, Glennon, for embracing the pain and the love and being willing to be fully alive. \
Dear Glennon,
Thank you for your honesty and authenticity and for opening up your rich inner life to the world. You are a gifted writer and storyteller with a nuanced and intensely perceptive view of life. It is no wonder that you were tempted to numb your experience with various things. The volume is turned up very loud in your mind. No one should ever judge you for trying to turn it down before you figured out how to channel it into a beautiful symphony of words.
Your readers are indebted to you for sharing your “mind palace” (a la Sherlock Holmes) with us! Not everyone has a mind palace. Some people just have mind cabins or studio apartments – or even mind McMansions that are vast but not particularly original or interesting – but you have a true mind palace. Don’t let anyone tell you that it is a defect. It’s a gift, a heavy gift.
That level of intelligent sensitivity can be excruciating for the person living it, but your willingness to do the hard work of putting your experience into words and onto paper is a sacred sharing with everyone who opens your books. Your spiritual gifts of sensitivity, intensity, and articulateness allow God to speak through you to so many of us.
I wish you and your children joy!
Glennon,
My tender self thanks you for your courage in sharing your truth. Your words have empowered me in a time when I have needed it most. There were so many parallels to your story and mine that I kept saying out loud “she’s in my head!” I’m not as far along on my journey, but you have given me hope in finding my true self. The hours I spent reading your book brought me great joy and strength….two things I haven’t seen in awhile.
Thank-you!
Katy
I just wanted to say thank you, thank you, thank you for writing Love Warrior. It is life changing. I cannot believe I feel this
way about a book, but it is not just a book, its truth. Will you be coming to Canada? Please let us neighbours know!!
I forgot to mention, I am recommending this book to all the Warriors in my life, even some I don’t know!
I couldn’t put the book down and now that I finished it I want to read it again. Thank you so much for letting us into your world.
Just finished the book and loved it! This was a very brave thing to do and I thank you for it. I believe every woman who reads it will find a bit of herself reflected in the pages. My favorite, bookmarked, passages are near the end when you rise once again like a phoenix from the ashes of your past. Your thoughts on sexy, beautiful, and pretty were right on target. I read them to my girls because I wanted to share your wisdom. Keep on doing your thing. You are an inspiration!
I am anxious to read this piece of reality and part of you. People do not talk about affairs and betrayals, and it only furthers isolates those of us who are suffering. When we tell the truth, no matter what that truth is, it only brings us closer. Thank you for putting yourself out there.
God’s timing is perfect, G. As I’m drowning in the wake of my own News and the horrible, ugly aftermath (including lifelong physical consequences), I get the God whisper to see what you’ve been up to (I’m embarrassed to admit it had been a while). And this is what I find. I need your brutiful wisdom now, as I struggle through this mess. I’ve clung to my faith and held onto my marriage because I’ve felt God telling me, “Just wait.” I’m not sure what I’m waiting for, but I’m trying to surrender and let Him show me. This is the hardest, ugliest work I’ve ever done. Trying to restore this marriage is messy and complicated and dirty. And oh, how I look forward to reading your words as my husband and I both try to repair our broken hearts.
Your post struck a chord with me as I am drowning in my own recent news as well. I feel like I’m suffocating. Just said a prayer for you, Stephanie. May God restore your marriage beyond any expectation.
I am a 69 year old woman. Back in 1973 , I hit this same wall of betrayal. It lead to divorce as I was not secure enough within to be bigger than IT. I allowed IT to scar me and drive me from the bright and sunny disposition of my trusting youth. I became cynical and distrustful of EVERYONE, male and female. I withdrew. I took others’ criticisms to heart and washed my soul in them. 3 decades passed this way ..while I worked and worried and shut out the extraneous. I replaced reason and creativity with drinking. I lost more ..and then more again. And my children still do not understand the complexities that caused us all such pain. It was ALL my fault! At least, that’s the narrative I sold to myself! So much damage, so many pieces that lost their glue or fit. I strive each day now to honour the very things I denied inside for far too long. I did mostly heal ..I did get sober..I did learn to love again..I do love my children wildly and my granddaughter purely and with a humour that got lost along the way. I am fortunate. My own mother died without healing .
I wish the same for you ..but much much SOONER! Be stronger than IT ! IT is so unimportant.
Just placed my order!! So excited to dive into it! Thank you for being you!! XOXO
I want to order this book, but I am afraid to…I feel like I might see my own life, and I don’t think I could survive knowing for sure.
I am so eternally grateful to you for being so incredibly brave. Truly there are no words. When God created you, he had big plans. Watching you fulfill them is truly awe inspiring. I just pre-ordered one of the special signed copies of your book. It will arrive a few days after my 11th wedding anniversary. My marriage is messy and I continue to warrior on because my heart tells me that I’ll learn more about love and grace by staying than by leaving. So I stay. Because I believe my job here, above all else, is to learn to love. And you, my dear, have probably taught me more about love than anyone else. Thank you for living out loud. And please thank your precious husband and children for me as well… I know you are not the only one that has had to be brave to publish this book. Blessings to you and your family~
Megan
Wow, just reading how you see your marriage has helped me make a bit more sense of mine.
Thanks Megan!
Three years ago I found out that my husband had been unfaithful for all of our then-9-year marriage. We separated, and planned to divorce. We went to therapy to figure out how to co-parent our one year old son. The pain was like nothing I have ever experienced. Somehow, slowly, we came back together, and are stronger for it. I am hoping that Love Warrior will put in words everything I felt going thought that time, and since. August 30 will be my 40th birthday, and I am preordering a copy as a gift to myself.
I am pre-ordering right now,….with a pit in my stomach. It’s that feeling I get when the Holy Spirit says; “this is for you Amy”. And yet I know as I know I must read it, that somehow it will make sense of the past several years, that somehow it will touch some deeply buried shame. And as much as I know this I also know it will be a hard read. I am at once terrified and excited for this book to be in my hands. Thank you G for sharing.
Just read Carry on Warrior as it was recommended by a friend who knew I am going through a lot lately. It has been two months since I got “The News” from my husband of almost 25 years. It has been hell ever since….we are both fighting for our marriage and our love. It has been the hardest thing ever, my best friend in the world broke his vows to me. I can’t wait for August and to read how you found peace.
G- I only wish I could have this book in my hands now, like right now as it is desperately needed. Thank you for sharing and I will be eagerly awaiting the arrival.
I would like to be angry with you. I have spent my life being angry at my father and not feeling much better toward my mother. I have stopped telling people. My parents are both dead now and I sometimes want to stop living. Why do people think that women corner the market on sensitivity and pain? I am so unhappy with life and this single life sucks. I was married for 27 years. Why me, Lord? Because I deserve it I guess. Then I run into you. This isn’t right. I come and go, I fade in and out, I am saved and lost at the same time and it’s killing me. I am ashamed and I hate and love myself alternately. I don’t like my friends very much. Apparently they don’t care much for me. When people find out that I am divorced they begin to avoid me. It wasn’t my fault. She left me. I wish she had killed me in my sleep. I have fits of depression and it drives me nuts. People see me at my desk at work crying. No one tries to talk to me about it. Does God care? I suppose He does. I have not ended my life. When I was a little kid, my father told me I was an idiot and that I would never amount to anything.
I am so sorry that you feel so alone. I know if I saw someone crying, I would see if they were ok. Perhaps everyone is so wrapped up in their own selfishness that they can’t see someone else’s misery. I will keep you in my prayers.
I’m sorry to hear you are having such a difficult time. I can hear in your writing that you need someone to talk to, if you don’t have any close friends you should look for local meetings in your area that can help you talk through it or even seeking the local pastor or priest, you don’t have to be very religious to see help when you need it that’s what they are their for. If neither of these are options, write it down. Write how you feel. It could help some. Good Luck.
I have read your blog sporadically (two small ones prohibit much reading) and have absolutely loved it, but may have missed this if not for a dear friend who knows my story and sent me the link. I received the apocalyptic “news” from my soulmate nine months ago, and, like you, it obliterated my very loftily romantic ideas of what love is and what marriage is and made the question of “Why God Lets Bad Things Happen to Good People” seem absolutely dire – faith-threateningly dire. I railed and raged against God and some really putrid things came out of my mouth and my heart, curses against both Him and my husband and “her”. Unlike you, I didn’t function very well for my children during that inital two-month hell spiral period (all the substance ingestion of my youth hadn’t prepared me for this bad of a trip). I drank a lot. And so much long-buried pain sprouted from the infidelity crisis itself like invasive weeds. Memories of finding my dad’s porn stash as a 5-year-old, as that same child watching his leering at women in public and not even hearing what I said as I tried to talk to him, remembering how he pretended to be taking pictures of us on our Mexican beach vacation but after developing the pictures realizing he’d just zoomed in on the topless European women yards behind us (not joking)… Now I see that based on those memories I still had a underlying hatred for men, a belief that they were callous and ready to betray without compunction. I thought in my husband I had finally found an anomaly, and I made an idol out of my marriage. With my foundation of sand washed away, there was finally no one left but Jesus. I decided to give that guy a try, at long last, after paying some halfhearted lip service to the idea for the past few years. Whaddya know, he’s pretty amazing. Now my husband doesn’t have to be Jesus to me anymore and so I can let him be human – incredibly fallible, broken, messing up and failing in MAJOR WAYS human, but also worthy of love, mercy and forgiveness and not just a one-dimensional piggish lust-hound human (which is, to be honest, how deep down I still thought of mankind). To be sure, the valley of the shadow of death is deep and it is dark. The pain is unfathomable and feels unbearable. It SUCKS. But there is nowhere that Jesus has not been. When, during those initial void-infused (sounds like an oxymoron, but I don’t know how else to describe it… everything was saturated with nothingness, nihilism, hopelessness… I remembered once he uttered those words “I was unfaithful to you” it seemed like even the dimensions of the room changed) weeks, I read something or someone told me they’d heard somewhere that “marriage can be even better after infidelity!” I really wanted to scream at them and puke. But somehow… it’s true. Not to say there aren’t days where I still cry and give him hell, but there’s a nascent glimmer of realness that is realer than anything that existed in our marriage before. Talk about profound mystery! Resurrection power. K, I’ll stop now. Maybe I should write a book, too! Thank you, Glennon, for your kingdom work and being so 4 real always and 4 ev!
I recognize myself in you. Thank you for writing all this, it made a difference to me.
I so get what you wrote here. I too had made my marriage my idol. When you suddenly find that your idol has betrayed your love and trust in every sense….it truly does strip down everything that you thought to be true. I’m trying everyday to realize that my husband is a broken, messed up human being. We all are. Everyday I wake up and choose to forgive. How can I not when I know I’ve been forgiven? Thank you for sharing your story. It really rescinated with me. And I agree…marriage can be better after infidelity. Even though, like you, I never would have believed it. It sucks to get there through all this pain, but there is something real in our marriage now that wasn’t there before.
I am so encouraged and somewhat hopeful from reading your message in regard to the new book Love Warrior. I got the first part of “The News” on August 1, 2015 after I accidentally discovered a Facebook IM message. After weeks of begging, pleading, pulling the truth out from my husband, I thought I had the whole story. So I agreed to work on things for six months and see if we could put things back together somehow. On February 7, 2016, I received the second part of “The News”, which knocked me completely down to square one again, I felt like I had just crawl back to August 1. But the entire time I have been suffering and struggling through this process, I’ve been adamant about only coming from a place of love, rather than anger, fear, manipulation, etc. And the most confusing part of this whole process is that I’m still here, still trying, and hoping that we can salvage this marriage. It blows my mind that through the worst pain and devastation I have ever experienced, there are also the best emotionally connected moments with my husband and me than we’ve ever had in our 16 year relationship. I keep saying it’s like a dichotomy, and I don’t know which way to go. The part of me that has been brought up with infidelity being The overall end-all of marriage, only major deal breaker, feels almost betrayed because I’m still here trying to make it work. I’m so thankful for those of you who can stand up and talk about staying with a spouse who’s cheated and broken your world. And I too have heard that marriages who survive infidelity are some of the most amazing relationships on this earth. I’m just really trying to search out those who have survived because the ones who don’t seem to be the ones we hear the most about. Thank you Glennon for your amazing love, faith, belief and transparency. I have been journaling so much since February 7 to try to make sense out of what is going on in my life right now. My hope is to help others someday through God’s grace, to find some good out of this tragedy.
So, I changed my mind and pre-ordered a copy, G! I didn’t realize that there was a signed pre-order available and somehow the idea of your signature on that book is a way to connect us together through time and space. I can’t wait to read and cry and all the rest with you.
I received the first installment of “The News” in April, 2015, but didn’t get the whole story until October. Many days I thought the pain might kill me, or that I might kill myself in order to escape the pain. Neither has happened. I practiced the discipline of sitting with the pain and trusting God to somehow see me through. Nothing I endured previously prepared me for the depth of agony I experienced as a result of my husband’s betrayal. Even the pain of childhood abuse and date rape paled in comparison to the realization that the man I chose, the man I trusted, the man I allowed to see me as I am, could commit such unloving acts. We are working hard every day to uproot the old destructive patterns while planting and nurturing new healthier ones. It’s exhausting, but infinitely worthwhile work. This has been a lonely season, too, as infidelity and the awful reality of its consequences is rarely addressed honestly. Thank you, Glennon for bringing this out into the light where we can see it, talk about it, learn from it, and help one another through it. Can’t wait for my copy of the book to arrive. I think I’ll block off that week on my calendar for reading, grieving, and rising again.
I’m sitting here, wishing I had your book. Thank you G! Thank you for your honesty. I carry your first book in my car. Admittedly, I had planned on sharing it with a friend, however I kept reading chapters over and over and over, while waiting on my kids. I do a lot of waiting. So I’ve read it ..maybe 115 times?? i can’t wait for LOVE WARRIOR. My marriage is strong, but I think the universal theme is pain. We suffer. I’m suffering. No one knows I’m suffering, except my husband. My relationship with my mother is strained and my relationship with women seems challenging, at best. I’m embarrassed and ashamed to say I feel alone…even in a rock solid marriage with 2 healthy (ish) children. I didn’t see….for so long…that (I TOO) was one of your monkees. I read you…. I heard you…but I didn’t listen. I thought…I WANT WHAT THEY HAVE. And now I see it, I can’t say I feel it (YET), but I hope to. I hope. I pray. I love. Thank you G and all of your people. Thank you for making a difference and for getting up everyday and sharing your story. LOVE WINS!
G- This post you wrote about this book alone has grabbed me and shook me…I am not struggling with infidelity in our marriage, but we still have our own huge storms and pain and gaping wounds that feel like they could consume us if we let them. I know the gritting the teeth and repeating I’m FINE….. and I also know the release vulnerability can give us! I just want to reach all the way to you on the other side of our country and embrace you and whisper to you over and over that your truth, our truth is meant to be lived, shared and released….and I am with you! I will be careful with your heart, your truth, your pain, and your soul. I will read this and love you without you knowing…and nod along, and wipe away the tears on my own cheeks and be grateful to you for following the Holy Spirit’s call to your heart and for loving all of us as much as we all love you. Thank you for sharing your heart… I wish I could share mine back with you over brownies, tears and giggles. _ Jen
When I saw that heart, I could barely breath. Tears streamed down my covered face.
I am so scared to read this book, honestly. We worked through our struggles in my husband’s infidelity, but I still have moments where the process feels that raw, stinging way. We’re nearly 10 years out and I know that there are parts of me that still feel different.
But I know that we learn from each other and heal with each other. So I’m anxiously awaiting its arrival.
My position is interesting: I’m in the middle of two beautiful women, both of whom I hold so dearly to my heart in which one committed the adulterous act with the other’s husband. I hear both sides and I support each in their pain and their journey to try to move forward and grow with their respective spouses. I concur with Mary Bamburg about her premature birth comment: I’m bummed I have to wait until August! I want to buy copies now and ship to my friends because I believe that it will help them to persevere through their bad days and I hope my dear friends are brave enough to read your book even when they are having good days; either way, I will be their to hold their hands.
I’m a reader, not a commenter but I’m commenting because I want you to know there are those of us that are in the thick of the battle and NEED this book – I’m about 6 months from receiving my own NEWS from my husband and it’s dark and real and scary and I look forward to reading another journey. So, well in advance, THANK YOU!
I’m about five months behind you on receiving “The News” – not sure if I’ve processed it nearly enough to be writing about it already, but definitely ready to read how you’ve warriored through! We also chose the path of healing, although it has resulted in having to also wade through and heal dozens of past betrayals (on both our parts). Has made for a craptastic couple of years, but well on our way to being better, happier people in the end.
Maybe one day I’ll join the chorus, because I thoroughly agree that telling our stories not only helps to heal ourselves, but supports our sisters and brothers along the path. And this is one of those paths that rarely gets spoken about. Thanks for lighting the way. (Oh, and I’m totally pre-ordering and tweeting the bejeezus about it. 🙂 )
Hi! I have two questions:
1. I filled out the gift card info for a single mom friend (I believe I was about the 30th person who commented) and I think it went through. As of today she hadn’t received an email about it. What do I do now?
2. For the artwork in the pre-ordered books, is this something we can display or frame or is it bound in the book?
Also – thank you Glennon for your words. I’m always crying but am ok with that because it means I’m feeling for someone else instead of focusing on my own sadness.
Thanks!
Amy
Dear Glennon, relax 🙂
I bet your book is going to touch so many souls! THANK YOU FOR BEING BRAVE!!!
I love you!
Big hug, Alina
I don’t tweet so I’ll say it here. I just pre-ordered. If you sold a t-shirt that said “I pre-ordered” I would buy it. So excited to get this book.
Love your writing, your style, and am wishing you a beautiful today and every day! lovelove
So, so proud. I am sitting here crying because I am SO PROUD of you. This must have cost you. Truly, Glennon, I have no doubt that you are like C.S. Lewis’ Sarah Smith at Golders Green: “one of the great ones”. (Google it.) Ok maybe minus the cats and dogs, but the size of your family will be utterly ridiculous. Already is, as a matter of fact.
What you do and who you are encourages, empowers, challenges and inspires me. Not ‘merely’ while I read what you write, but way, WAY beyond. It transforms. It’s like these little nudges, tiny course corrections, that all together help shape (among many other influences) who I am, who I want to be, how I live my life, how I treat myself and how I treat others.
“It is like when you throw a stone into a pool, and the concentric waves spread out further and further. Who knows where it will end?”
Ordered with awe and gratitude!
You are BRAVE BRAVE BRAVE. And so is your Craig. The kids will be FINE FINE FINE.
Because it’s the TRUTH TRUTH TRUTH!
We are grateful for your big hearts and generosity in sharing.
I can’t wait for you to blow the lid off of the SHAME on all this for all of our sakes. For all of our marriages – struggling, healed, broken, intact. For our messed-up identities as men and women in impossible situations called marriage.
I have been waiting for this – ever since the Easter Story and the postscript.
Same(ish) here, same(ish) timeline. 18 years and 5 products of our passion. Many mistakes and still much love.
I cried for you and me and all marriages off and on all day. You and your family were held up in prayer along with all struggling families. I shared your blog with my husband and whispered I wasn’t sure…even though I’ve waited for this…it is a hard thing to read and re-experience and re-examine.
He said “You will read it. I will read this. We will read this together.”
Bravo and Brava Mr. & Mrs.!!! We think y’all are magnificent!
XO, C & J
So proud to have pre-ordered a special edition. With everything I am going through right now, August seems like a lifetime away, it truly does but it is also my birth month and so this will be my birthday gift to myself. One to treasure.
As always, I am grateful not only to Mamma G but to all of the truly wonderful women in this community.
xo
My heart has not been in my marriage since my hubby’s 15 year old daughter landed on our doorstop in 2011. It wasn’t her fault that she was manipulative and passive-aggressive. It’s what she had been taught. I could see her innocence. I could see the little girl that ached for her father’s love. My husband struggled to be emotionally close to his daughter. But, as an outsider looking in, I didn’t see any effort on his part. He didn’t attempt to remember her friends’ names’ or her schedule. He escaped to the garage, leaving me to parent his daughter.
Finally, I moved out. I told my hubby I was doing it so that he might build his relationship with his daughter; that they might get to know one another before she graduated high school. It didn’t work.
They are estranged. I moved back “home” to see if our marriage could work without the toxic influences of a bitter ex wife and a resentful teenager. and an affair I started while living outside of the family home that my hubby remains unaware of.
During this time of marital recovery, I’ve lost the three closest people to me and he’s taken a job that requires no less than 70 hours of work weekly. I gave him one year to make good on the promises that he made to get me to return. It’s now been two and things haven’t changed. I took a vacation with girlfriends last year because I was tired of waiting for him. I’m preparing to do the same this year.
He’s a good person that would do anything for me, if available. However, he’s very dependent and we have no social life. One of my dear friends who passed last year said I’d changed in the thirteen years I’d been with him. She said I’d lost my sense of adventure , my smile and my carefree attitude. It seemed, she said, that I was afraid to go out with the girls for drinks on occasion because it might hurt his feelings and, since when am I responsible for his feelings? Good observation.
She was broken-hearted when I returned home.
Eat Pray Love really resonated with me as I see myself having some of the same struggles as Liz.
Just who am I? Is it my obligation to stay in a marriage because I don’t want to hurt his feelings? Am I here because I fear living alone the rest of my life?? How will I feel when I see him with another woman (because he can’t bear the thought of being alone)?
Oh, so many questions……..perhaps Love Warriors will provide food for thought and the clarity I seek.
I read your post with tears…tears that I share…your story sounds like mine…a few very minor differences…but the same. Here is what I did, I vacationed alone with friends, I asked for changes, I made friends my comfort because I had none at home….and when nothing changed, and I had done all I could to make things right on my end….I left.
I left and I stay gone….it’s not easy, I’m always worried about his feelings, is he lonely, is he sad … and then I have to remember, I have to be happy, I need to be elated to be alive every day. I have to remember that his happiness always trumped mine. I have to stand firm for my happiness, my self worth and my sanity…. I had to LOVE me more than I did making others happy… it’s a struggle, but every day, every hour, every minute whatever it takes, I stand up for ME!
Carry on Love warrior…Love yourself…whatever that takes!
I started reading your blog right after I got The News. I caught whiffs of what was going on with you and Craig through your writing and I scoured your blog for more answers on how you handled it, what did you do, etc. Now I know why I couldn’t find anything. I’ve ordered the book and honestly I don’t know how I will wait until August to read it. We’ve been separated for a year, not divorced yet. There is a small part of my heart and my faith that just can’t let my marriage of 24 years go. THANK YOU for your brutiful honesty and writing. You carried me through the darkest time I have ever witnessed. Love you!
I feel blessed to see this community share their stories and their pain. After 20 years of marriage, I got The News three months ago. I can’t describe the level of shock and heartbreak this caused. We are working on it. It’s hard. I don’t yet know how my story will end. That’s yet another hard part of infidelity, it reminds you that we aren’t in control of anything. That we really don’t know how things will go. It has helped to remind me to live in the moment and find joy where you can. I have grown and gotten stronger and weaker at the same time. This is definitely not a topic that is talked about. ..and I look forward to reading how another sister dealt it. Thank you G for opening up the darkest parts of your life to help illuminate ours. Sending love
I too found out prior to Christmas that my husband had a sex addiction. After 20 years together and four beautiful children, I never thought I would be in this place. You wrote exactly how I feel.. Some days I feel so strong yet others so very very weak. I now have to “be brave” and carry on for my family…
This is so incredibly close to my story. I found out in October that my wife of 26 years has an addiction to sex. She has been with around 20 different men in the past 5 years, and is currently in a relationship with one now. We also have 4 children, and I too never ever thought that I would be in this place. I kicked her out and am now a struggling single dad, trying to cope with the overwhelming pain of this betrayal and grief over the loss of my best friend and soulmate. And yet I simply can’t let go yet. I know exactly what you mean about feeling strong, and then also unbelievably weak and broken. You are not alone.
G-
Thank you for your courageous gift. The timing of me reading this blog is definitely a God thing. My family just moved to a new home. I have felt so much anxiety about this move even though it is my dream house and right down the street from my sister, my best friend. I have been sick to my stomach for two weeks and couldn’t put my finger on why. We lived in the house we just moved from for 3 1/2 years and those were the worst and best 3 1/2 years of my life. The first year there was our marriage on life support from a similar situation to yours. It was the rock bottom and honestly we pulled ourselves from the pits of hell and the last 2 1/2 years grew into a marriage I never dreamed possible. After reading this tonight, I realized that I was so scared of moving away from the house where we fixed our lives and found out what real love is. I was afraid that we would leave this love behind in the house where we found it. Now that I know why I was scared I realize how silly it was to think that “house” was the healer of our marriage. We found love and it will always be where we are as long as we keep searching for it. Thank you, thank you, thank you! I can’t wait to read your new gift!
I SO need this book! I’m on my journey of healing from infidelity. The pain is unlike anything I even knew was possible. I’m 10 months from finding out that my husband broke our marriage vows after he was away in Iraq for a year in the military. Within a few months of returning he started a relationship that lasted a year. We are healing together, and I am filled with hope! But the journey is rough…I do look forward to reading this book! Thank you for sharing your pain to help us all know we are not alone in ours.
Dear Glennon,
I preordered my copy this morning and I can’t wait to read your beautiful words. I don’t know if you’ll ever read this, but I’ve wanted to put this out to you for quite some time, and since I’m here and I’m excited and I’m grateful, I figured, why not?!
I just want you to know how instrumental and what a blessing you’ve been in my life. I am a recovering alcoholic/drug addict. My first day sober was April 2nd, 2013. My sister had been raving about your blog and was so excited for your book “Carry On, Warrior” to come out and being the most amazing sister that she is, she bought me a copy and sent it to my kindle that day. I woke up that morning and I was terrified and shaking and sick to my stomach. I went to a meeting and I got home and started to read your book. I don’t think I can accurately express to you how grateful I am for your letter to ME on MY first day sober. I must have read that chapter about 50 times that day, and when things get overwhelming, it’s one of my go to God sends.
This may seem quite unrelated to the topic of your new book, but I just wanted you to know that I cherish women like you. We’ve never met, and might not ever, but I feel like I know you personally, and I feel like you know me just as well. So, as I’ve said, I ordered my copy of your new book, because I wouldn’t dare miss out on another piece of beautiful honesty that could quite possibly save another piece of me. I want to tell you that your writing matters. Your ability to be honest in your writing is a gift straight from God so please, please, PLEASE, continue.
I love you, and I thank you for helping me through that first day, and I can’t wait to read more.
Love,
Kelli
❤️
I love all that you do.
And so I really hope this isn’t all “I had to face my part in this” type stuff, and that it doesn’t let anyone off the hook. I think there is NO excuse for infedility so I cringe when I sense any whiff of the cheatee sharing any blame.
Yes, please, and thank you. I ordered my copy and will cherish it, I know it. My story is hard also, and it gets more beautiful every time I tell it. If I were brave enough (some day, maybe), I’d write a book. For now, maybe I’ll give away yours (but not this copy. This one I will keep forever).xoxo
Like Elaine and Jen, I have never commented on a blog before. But Glennon, your courage and shameless truth telling inspire me so much, I just couldn’t do my usual thing and just sit back on the sidelines. Not this time.
The truth is that I typically read the comments from others, and I play the comparison game. I feel that others can express their love and gratitude to you as you courageously share your story so much better than I can. So why bother?
But as I have watched you and this amazing community of women, I’m slowly starting to unlearn pride, cynicism, and especially Perfectionism!
Thanks for showing us the way, brave love warrior!
Many blessings to you, and to Craig, & to your family.
Gratefully,
Shirley
G – you and I are not far apart on our healing journey. My news came a few months before yours but I remember so very clearly when I read your blog post about The News and I recognized the agony you were writing. I want you to know that your bravery in writing even that much, as limited as you kept it at the time, was soothing to me. It let me know I wasn’t alone. I wasn’t the only one who was willing to work alongside my remorseful husband to heal my marriage and build something entirely new. To pick through the rubble of what was left, painstakingly turned over every piece of debris, searching for the bits worth keeping. And I remember the post where you wrote about watching him from the corner of your eye as he did the hard work of facing and healing himself and brutally earning back your respect. I was right there with you but you didn’t know it. You were right there with me and I loved you for it. We’re nearing the 4 year mark of discovery and it’s a different marriage. We’re different people. I both want to read your new book and turn away from it for fear of going back into the abyss. But I think I will read it… maybe read it together with my husband as one other commenter suggested.
Ditto, Leslie. I want to read this but just reading the post brought tears and that feeling of being pulled back down into the “abyss”. Receiving the news nine months ago from my husband opened the gates of hell. I know the reason I’m scared is because I’m not fully healed, but most days I can function and not think about it and stay clear of the abyss. I’m scared of that gaping void that lingers below the surface. I believe that Jesus can heal anything, but allowing the healing hurts! But thank you, Glennon, for your courage. I know I will read it eventually. I have to. Good thing I’ve got six months to steel myself!
I have walked through this journey too and I am crying along with you. Who am I kidding? There is no walking through this journey. It’s more like crawling, trudging, scratching, clawing your way through all of the hurt, sadness and endless pain. May God be with you, and all of us! Xoxo
G,
It is not unusual for me to feel tons of joy, sorrow, and hope spilling out from every pore of my body over any number of things on a daily basis. It’s my gift 🙂
And it’s true that you blow my mind on a regular basis. But today, I have spent my day with my mind completely blown by your husband’s generosity of spirit. Craig’s willingness to share your collective story through this book for the benefit of your sisters has completely overwhelmed me. I am speechless. He is truly a generous man and I thank him sincerely . My mind is blown by this profound gesture.
And for the benefit of our brothers! 🙂
Oh, so true Leslie! Thank you!
You had me at infidelity and porn
so you know when it will ship? I am going to be moving soon. Will there be a way to change my address after I order?
Dear Glennon,
I don’t read blogs..but i read yours. I don’t comment but here I am. I truly have no words for what you have done. I cried so hard while reading your blog today I cannot imagine how I will get through your book. I only wish I had been as brave and strong as you .I wish I had written in black and white my life 5 years ago. The pain is still so raw sometimes I can’t breathe. My News was different but the same. Much love to you for all you do. E.
Well, I’ve never written a comment on a blog before. But how can I NOT tell you how much your courageous vulnerability means to me? I obviously haven’t read a word (the book, of course, is ordered), yet you’ve already touched me deeply. As I type this first-ever-blog-comment, tears rolling down my cheeks, my mom’s recent words to me are running through my mind, “your sister and I just don’t understand how you and (my husband) got through it. You’re both so resilient.”
We, too, have walked this journey. I remember reading a description of the pain of infidelity being so excruciating, the author stood up at one point and literally looked back at her chair, half expecting to see blood there. And, as you and I both know, it IS that awful.
But my husband and I are working through all this. At first I felt so weak for working to forgive him, for not walking out. A quote printed and pasted at the bottom of my desk drawer kept me going, “The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is an attribute of the strong. – Ghandi”
So the day this all unfolded was five years ago, and the raw brutality of the pain has worn off, but some of the hurt, suspicion, and defensiveness are still under there, slithering out and grabbing our thoughts at times. We continue to work. I read your blog to my husband today, and our plan is to read Love Warrior together each night after the kids are in bed. It will be a way to re-connect, and to dig deeper into the work we still have yet to do. Do you think it lends itself to that?
Bless you for bringing this to this surface. It is so deeply personal, so cloaked in shamed, I can only imagine how incredibly hard it was to stand like this, eternally naked, in the light. Lord knows, I feel brave just signing my email address to this comment!
Please know I’m lighting my candle next to yours, and all the other Love Warriors in this sacred space. May we warm and illuminate paths for others.
With deepest gratitude and sista love,
Jen