Day 1

Well, that was kind of ironic.

Same day I post about how I need to go back to Step 1, my husband ends up back at day 1. 

79 days of sobriety, back to day 1.

And you know what, we're both doing good.  In fact, I'm feeling more peace than I have all week.  Really.  What a blessing that I was already focusing on getting back to Step 1, today of all days. 

And I'm so proud of him.  He called me as soon as he left work, I could tell by his shaking voice that it was gonna 'be bad'.  He told me that he'd been working on this project in Excel all day, it was frustrating and he wasn't making the progress he wanted to, so he hopped online.  This always ends well, right?  Well, he got into an inappropriate web comic he's read in the past.  After a couple minutes realized, 'Holy crap, what am I doing!?', got up and walked away for a bit, came back to his desk, finished work and called me as soon as he was out of the building in the afternoon. 

Was I disappointed?  Yeah, but for him, not in him.  I was moved by his honesty and disappointment.  He couldn't believe he'd done something 'so stupid', as he kept putting it.  He wasn't minimizing in the least, and given the circumstances, he easily could have. 

Here's the thing -- it wasn't nudity.  Not even cartoon nudity.  ('Just' scantily clad drawings of women).  He could've handled it a number of ways -- I left the door for him to handle it however he felt best, and I was quite ready to accept any number of possible decisions from him.  Sobriety date reset to zero, or move on to day 80 tomorrow after a 'close call'?  Either way, I was supportive.  But he looked at his actions -- getting online specifically to go to a 'dangerous' site for him, as it's something he's looked at before while 'easing in' to a porn session, and the intent -- that he knew he was looking for something titillating.  (Even if he didn't really realize he was doing it until he was a couple minutes in.)  And the danger of looking at it at work. He decided it was 'bad enough', and he chose to treat this exactly like any other time he was looking for porn. 

He's downstairs in the spare bedroom right now.  I really could've gone either way on that too, I wasn't mad, I wasn't hurt, I didn't need my space -- but he said for him it had to be 'all in'.  So, one night downstairs. 

J loves to work with wood, and has turned himself a beautiful wood ring for his recovery.  The plan has always been to smash the ring if he acted out and build a new one and start over.  He just put the pieces in the little ceramic bowl by our TV, next to his 30 day and 60 day sobriety tokens that he's planning to return at his next SA meeting, and he'll get to work on a new ring tomorrow.

A fresh start.

And today was a manifestation of what we've been working on -- I loved how we handled it.

Him with complete honesty and humility, trying his very best not to minimize and coming to his own conclusions about his actions and their consequences.  

Me with a real sense of peace.  I didn't take it personally.  I was proud of how he was addressing it so openly, and touched by his disappointment and resolve to do better.  I detached -- go me! :-)

At first he asked, "I don't know what to do about sobriety dates -- does this count, or not?" 
"I don't know hon, that's up to you.  Why don't you think about it for awhile, and we can talk about it later."

Later he said, "What does this mean for our 'weeks'?"  (We've been doing 7 weeks of sensate focus, as outlined in And They Were Not Ashamed, as we're working our way back to full physical intimacy, and he was concerned with what kind wrench he'd just thrown in to things.) 
"Why don't you think about it, tell me what you come up with, and we'll discuss it from there."

"Should I sleep downstairs tonight, what about the ring?"
"You decide what you think makes sense."

Later he thanked me for putting it all back in his lap, and for letting him handle it.  I told him again how much I appreciated his honesty, and what it meant that he'd take this seriously (possibly even more serious than I would've, but I didn't tell him that), and so humbly 'start over' with everything -- and that I was amazed by his progress and the transformation I'm watching right before my eyes.  He told me how much it meant to him that he could come to me and that he could talk to me, that he could feel loved and accepted despite anything going on, and that I trusted him to make the right decisions.

Dang, I think we're making progress.  :-)