#44 How A Marriage Ends – A Listener Story

Today on The Bad Girls Bible Podcast we are joined by small-town girl, Jenny, who shares with us about growing up in a poor family with parents who did not always get along, moving around frequently and how she and her husband first met.

Jenny talks about their secret relationship, moving in together, how he convinced her to get married after all and the challenges of raising their kids together. The unexpected death of a loved one caused a massive rift in their relationship, however, and her life started slowly spiraling out of control.

Not being able to openly mourn her loss, Jenny went into a major depression during which she behaved in erratic ways that threatened her life and that brought even greater discord in her marriage. She tells of the regrets she has, how she has learned to cope with her loss and what she advises every listener to hold onto in such difficult circumstances. Don’t miss out on this very moving conversation!

Key Points From This Episode

• More about Jenny’s experience growing up in an unhappy family.
• How she met her husband and their first few months knowing each other.
• What is was like seeing each other in secret while being in relationships with other people.
• Their relationship when they moved in together and having to deal with their exes.
• The difficulty of feeling like she had to do everything herself.
• The challenge of raising their kids together and having different parenting styles.
• Why she never thought of getting married and how he arranged the entire wedding.
• Losing a girlfriend to pneumonia and not being able to mourn her openly.
• Dealing with her husband’s resentment and jealously after her girlfriend passed away.
• Becoming clinically depressed, isolating herself and turning to self-harm.
• The intense moment she realized that she needed help. 
• The up and downside of moving to a new place and being lonely a lot of the time.
• What happened when her husband finally left her.
• Getting her daughter back home and what it meant to her.
• How practicing mindfulness and breathing techniques helps her to deal with her emotions.
• Dealing with the disappointment of her life not turning out how she expected it to.
• And much more!

Tweetables

“I went into a major depression; a clinical depression, anxiety, and I was just locking myself away. I didn’t want to get out of bed. I didn’t want to go to work.” — Jenny [0:17:05]

“He just stopped caring and he said he just started picturing me dead already and that he had thought of what he was going to say at the funeral and stuff. He just kind of wrote me off already.” — Jenny [0:18:55]

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Transcript

[0:01:11.1] Sean Jameson: Today I’m talking to Jenny about a relationship of 16 years. How she fought depression and how she’s recently separated from her husband. Jenny, thanks so much for coming on The Bad Girls Bible Podcast to tell your story.

[0:01:25.4] Jenny: Thank you for having me.

[0:01:26.5] SJ: My pleasure. At the start, maybe we learn a little bit about you, your background and where you grew up?

[0:01:33.1] J: Well, I was farm girl always in small towns, like in Sundre Alberta or Valley View Alberta and then moved to Grand Prairie which was a little bit bigger, and when I started bartending that’s when I met my husband and we worked in the bar for probably six years together.

[0:01:51.4] SJ: Just before we get to that, maybe learn a little bit more about you and I guess you could say your back story if that’s’ okay.

[0:01:59.0] J: Yeah, for sure. I was the oldest of three kids, we were pretty poor so we home studied actually in Valley View, picked rocks and no running water and no heat, no power, we did it old school for quite a while. The brother and sister were a little bit younger and we hauled wood and horses and chickens and gardens and everything to get food.

I was always a quiet girl, I was very shy, didn’t really know how tough I was to be in a farm girl and all so I was always very timid and very quiet.

[0:02:33.3] SJ: would you say you had a happy childhood?

[0:02:35.8] J: It was okay, it wasn’t great, you know, there was a few issues there. My dad was kind of a mean guy sometimes and him and my mom kind of had problems, so we kind of moved around quite a bit when I was younger. You know, two years here, two years there, kind of thing.

Until we moved to Valley View and then we stayed a little longer but –

[0:02:57.8] SJ: You said you met your husband when you were bartending? Can you describe the first day when you met him?

[0:03:05.7] J: Yeah, he was actually – he was the DJ there and we did not get along, he’s very – thought he was kind of better, didn’t have to clean up, you know? When everybody else is working their butt of and he’s kind of just sitting there being lazy and I don’t like that stuff.

You know, I’d start picking on him or doing mean things, you know? Give them all the shooters he didn’t like or you know, had my ways of getting back at him. We’ve spent quite a few months not liking each other at all, it was pretty bad actually.

He would tell me to watch, stay at my end of the bar and he’d stay on his end of the bars so we cross paths or –

[0:03:46.7] SJ: Not an ideal start to the relationship?

[0:03:50.4] J: No, not at all. We did quite a bit of arguing and fighting for sure and then our boss told us to smarten up and then kind of started getting along and yeah, went from there kind of thing.

[0:04:02.0] SJ: Did he ask you out on a date or did you ask him out on a date?

[0:04:07.1] J: No, he asked me, he bugged me for a while and I kept like no, you know, not going to happen and then finally, okay, fine and then yeah, we just kind of ended up really clicking after that, I’m not sure. He was actually with a girlfriend at the time and I actually had a boyfriend at the time but my – they were both really bad.

We ended up kind of seeing each other a year before we ended up actually, being together, moving in together so yeah, we both had others and kind of led that secret life for a little while and then moved in together.

[0:04:42.4] SJ: Was that kind of fun, that secret life?

[0:04:44.8] J: It was and it wasn’t. I don’t like hiding things, you know, that’s kind of hard, I hate having to tip toe and lie and things like that because his girlfriend would come in to the bar and talk to me or, it was kind of you know, it just didn’t feel that good sometimes.

[0:05:01.6] SJ: I hear you.

[0:05:01.3] J: Yeah. Other than that, it was definitely, it was always you know, couldn’t take too long because he always had to get back home or you know, get back to work or something, it was never like quality times, spending time or anything. I ran short after a while.

[0:05:17.3] SJ: What was it like then when you moved in together? Was it all bliss or was it a little bit of fighting or how was it?

[0:05:24.4] J: There was a little bit of fighting because I had two kids, my son and my daughter and his ex would bring over his son so she would show up at like weird hours in the morning, obviously trying to bust him or something. Then she would just come in my house or you know, let him say like really rude things, that he didn’t have to listen to anybody, like it just created like a little bit of tension for sure.

He’s a city boy, he came from like Vancouver and Victoria and stuff. He was never good for like a handy work or cleaning, you know? He was – we called him a button pusher so what he did. He was a DJ, didn’t do any physical labor or anything. Took a lot of pushing on my end to get him actually to do things where I was a farm girl so I did those things, you know?

I didn’t watch, I got in there and did it, right? He was the exact opposite, he’d sit back just watching everybody else do the work and so yeah, that was definitely some head banging for sure.

[0:06:33.2] SJ: Did you ever then have an argument with his ex or vice versa, him on your ex?

[0:06:39.6] J: Well mine actually, he just went to jail and then he came and I was trying to let him watch the kids and he stole a bunch of my money and then he took off, I haven’t seen him since. That was 15 and a half years ago probably.

[0:06:53.5] SJ: Sorry to hear that.

[0:06:54.8] J: No, that’s okay, probably for the better. Then, his ex, she cheated, caused problems quite a bit, she’s like you know, come to pick up her son and then like turn around in the drive way and not come up at all or you know, she’d show up like four hours later than the time she was supposed to be there, if at all.

You know, things like that, she kind of go out of her way to kind of –

[0:07:16.9] SJ: Cause tension.

[0:07:18.3] J: Yeah. She did that a lot. She’s like trying to kiss an old friend inside the trailer and everything and everyone home and yeah. She definitely did some poking for sure.

[0:07:28.6] SJ: What was it like having kids together? Was it easy to raise them?

[0:07:33.7] J: It was a little hard just because we had very different parenting skills, you know, I was a little bit of a disciplinarian, kids behave and not running around screaming where as he was so laid back and didn’t care what kids did and so that was kind of hard because I was like, we can’t let yours do this and mine aren’t allowed to do this.

It has to be the same, it was very hard getting – I don’t think we ever did get them on equal grounds as to how my kids were just like treated and were expected to behave and his just kind of did whatever, right? As long as dad was there, he could get away with anything. That made it very hard for sure.

[0:08:12.5] SJ: Yeah, for sure. I think when you’re not on the same page, there’s no consistency maybe in that if people are seeing different kind of standards being applied, it can be tough.

[0:08:24.4] J: Yeah, it’s hard on the kids for sure, you know? They want to know why they’re getting in trouble and the other one’s allowed to do all these stuff, you know? It’s quite unfair and you know, they don’t feel as loved, you know? That he’s meaner to them kind of thing. That was really hard as well.

[0:08:42.3] SJ: At some stage, you guys got married, can you talk a little bit about the proposal?

[0:08:48.1] J: Yeah, my mom always raised me as don’t ever get married because marriage always ends in divorce. I’ve had no plans on getting married, I pushed it for I think just over six years, I kept saying no, maybe next year, and then he came in one day and I was like lying in bed because you know, we slept in some days kind of thing, update in the bars. He come in and he sat on the bed and he stuck the box on my head and he’s like, all right, you want to?

Cracked the box and that was my proposal. Yeah.

[0:09:24.9] SJ: Was a complete surprise?

[0:09:27.8] J: Yeah, it was a surprise because I kept – nope, we’re just going to do it, it’s going to happen. He planned the whole wedding like because I was like very nervous, you know, scared of it, he did everything, he planned like where we got married, the reception hall, put everything together like all I had to do was show up.

[0:09:48.6] SJ: Awesome. That must have been really nice or was it really nice?

[0:09:54.4] J: It was a little hard because you know, having cold feet the whole time and then I was two hours late so he thought that I really did not pull. They were kind of sweating it at the wedding party.

[0:10:09.2] SJ: Why were you late?

[0:10:10.5] J: My dress, the lady that made my dress actually forgot part of it, she was like trying to find it and then she couldn’t find it and couldn’t get the girls all over there, it was just all this big – everything kind of fell apart. It wasn’t bad, I was happy, I wasn’t mad at anything. I just knew he’d be panicking, right?

[0:10:30.6] SJ: I think anyone would be.

[0:10:32.9] J: Yeah, after two hours, that’s a little bit late.

[0:10:36.4] SJ: But it worked out I guess. How was the early marriage? Did anything change from when you were living together to when you were married and living together?

[0:10:45.3] J: Not too much, it was always like you know, an argument about getting him to do anything because he was always just so in front of the TV or on the computer, not helping out around the house and stuff like that. That was a lot of arguments on my part because I just didn’t want to be the only one doing this and working.

You know, two jobs usually. It was definitely frustrating that way but in that aspect, no, it didn’t change until after, yeah.

[0:11:13.6] SJ: What two jobs were they? I went through a bunch of few different ones there after the bar. Because I was at the bar for eight and a half years and then I did a Vending machines for five years I think it was and then I was managing that Boston Pizza and I was managing at Tony Roma’s. Yeah, it was pretty good.

[0:11:34.9] J: Short little jobs. You know, I could do a couple of days here, a couple of days there. It was a nice change all the time.

[0:11:42.0] SJ: Yeah, I kind of find that like doing the same job over and over again just kills me like –

[0:11:47.3] J: Yeah, for sure. I totally suggest that to anybody, you know? Find two part times because even just having that little bit of variety is just, you just don’t get like so sick of it, you know? It’s kind of enough of a change, it’s great. Absolutely is great. I love it.

[0:12:03.0] SJ: You mentioned in your email Jenny that you lost a girlfriend. Can you talk about that ta little bit?

[0:12:10.4] J: Yeah, her name was Roxy and I had worked with her at one of the hotels, I was a banquet manager there. We had gotten really close for a long time. We actually had like you know, physical relationship for quite a while and then she ended up passing in the night, they said she got pneumonia and passed away but we had been talking on Facebook messaging and stuff all the time.

One of her last messages is saying how she wish she had pushed him away, that she wanted to be with me and she should have just done it if she knew how things were going to turn out. I told her, I said, you know, my biggest fear in life is that I’ll never see your face again and then she like died like a week later. I never did get to see her again, right?

Was actually photo shooting a wedding when I found out about it. Then I had to go to the rest of the night to try to do this wedding. Then once we got through the wedding, I don’t know after that, it felt really kind of hard for me but I think he was mad that I was mourning her for so long or how I mourned her.

He just started getting really mean about it, couldn’t express how sad I was to talk about her or anything after that.

[0:13:28.6] SJ: Did he know about your relationship with her?

[0:13:31.6] J: Yes, he was kind of part of it, right? We’re kind of open like that sometimes. Yeah, he did know and he knew that you know, how we were, me and her like how much we loved each other like had been him, it was going to be her you know? If I would have met her first, it probably wouldn’t have been him. He knew that, yes.

[0:13:54.2] SJ: Did he have any sort of resentment before she passed away?

[0:13:58.6] J: I think he got a little jealous a couple of times just because you know, we were so close and she would kind of like pick on him about it, you know, say things and you know, I think that kind of bothered him a little bit but it didn’t seem to get bad until after.

[0:14:15.1] SJ: What do you mean like what would she say to him?

[0:14:17.1] J: She’d be like, you know, just go sit over there on the other couch, you don’t need to be sitting beside my girl or something or you know, don’t be touching her or holding her hand or you know, things like that kind of –

[0:14:28.1] SJ: Get a reaction.

[0:14:29.5] J: Get him away from me kind of thing and yeah, get a reaction, yeah.

[0:14:32.9] SJ: Was he close to her also at the same time?

[0:14:35.7] J: Not really, no. They did get along but not close, no. They just got along as friends or whichever but –

[0:14:44.7] SJ: Then, can you talk a little bit more about his resentment and kind of how that affected your relationship after Roxy passed?

[0:14:53.5] J: Yeah, I just remember one time that really resonated and stuck in my head was, I was crying in the living room and he just kept yelling, he was so mad and he was saying how that she was f–ing dead he was still there and so just like, the way he said it, it cut so deep, you know? Just wanted him to feel a little bit a same kind of sadness, you know?

That we lost her, you know, not just me and then after that, I just – he didn’t want to hear any of it, you know? I couldn’t talk to him about her or say anything to him about her because he’d be mad. You know, he wouldn’t talk to me or just get up and walk away or you start yelling, you know, it was sort of just try to not show it as much as I could.

I was more crying at work all the time or you know, away from him and like, I did so much more away from him because I couldn’t do any near him. It just seemed to not be able to do the actual mourning because I was like hiding it all the time.

Yeah. I think I just finally actually mourned her about let’s say, three months ago and it’s been five years.

[0:16:09.0] SJ: Jeepers.

[0:16:10.4] J: Yeah, I have never made it to her grave for – I never made it to the funeral or anything, I couldn’t do it so you know, kind of hard.

[0:16:18.0] SJ: Yeah, certainly sounds like a really tough situation to be in.

[0:16:21.9] J: Yeah, it wasn’t fun and we always grew up with you know, we’re tough, you know? Tough girls or farm girls, you don’t cry, you’re strong. After that, it really knocked me down and I was crying all the time except for around him, you know, I’d try not to as much as I could but that was definitely.

I didn’t take it very well at all, I kind of lost control for a little while. Drowned it.

[0:16:50.1] SJ: Lost control in what sense?

[0:16:52.8] J: Just like my emotions. I didn’t want to keep going, you know? If it wasn’t for probably for him and my kids, I wouldn’t. I didn’t want to be here. You know I was done. There was nothing, I went into a major depression; a clinical depression, anxiety and I was just locking myself away. I didn’t want to get out of bed. I didn’t want to go to work. It was just so bad and then when I got mad. I was driving so erratically like it was just when I think about it now and it is scary how bad I got, where my thoughts were, I am surprised I am still here actually.

[0:17:32.3] SJ: So can you talk about how bad it got?

[0:17:35.7] J: Yeah, I started self-harming a couple of times. So I have some really nasty scars that is borderline personality traits which I found these from a lot of the emotional abuse and mental like the calling names and putting down and things like that over the years. Near the end, it was really bad but yeah like the driving I was doing a 100 on a 40. You know going around the corners, like my tires are skittling all over and another one is when I went to New York.

And I was always scared of heights my whole life and then I don’t know what I did, I went up this fire escape all the way to the top of this building. It was so big, so high and I was literary on the side, like the end of the building, standing like I was thinking about jumping. It was a little erratic, definitely erratic for sure.

[0:18:32.9] SJ: Yeah.

[0:18:33.0] J: Yeah, I pushed it a lot of times. I don’t know how I was still here.

[0:18:38.6] SJ: Well I am glad you are still here.

[0:18:40.0] J: Well thank you.

[0:18:42.0] SJ: But I am just wondering where is your husband in all of this, was it where you expertly concealing all of this or could he may have picked up the signs?

[0:18:50.8] J: He just turned his back, after a while he just turned his back. He just stopped caring and he said he just started picturing me dead already and they had the thought of what he was going to say at the funeral and stuff. He just wrote me off already.

[0:19:07.1] SJ: In a sort of a morbidly joking sort of way or in a serious way?

[0:19:11.5] J: First, yeah seriously. So then it was harder on me because I lost the both of them and just kept trying to reach to him all the time to try to keep going like I thought we could make it work. So yeah, it was a hard cycle for sure.

[0:19:28.2] SJ: So I am guessing at some point, you reached out for help or you helped yourself.

[0:19:34.7] J: Yeah, actually this is going to sound so bad but when I was in my depression really bad and I just wanted to end it. It was in such a bad place and I kept thinking of ways I could do it, and my daughter, I picked her up from school and we’re driving home and we were fighting. She had gotten in so much trouble and then I rationally thought of why it would be better for the both of us so that I could help her to not go through to any of this.

Because the feeling when you get in that state is sick in your stomach and it’s gut wrenching and it hurts and I just thought about driving into a semi with her in the car and then that was the moment I was like, “Okay, I need help”, so I went down to the hospital or the walk-in clinic and I talked to a doctor and they put me on some antidepressants and stuff. So back when I was rationalizing something like that, like I would never physically hurt her, and just thinking that thought I knew I needed to get some help.

[0:20:39.3] SJ: I’m glad you did get help and you just kept recovering from that point?

[0:20:43.8] J: Yeah, I have been trying. You know that so many things keep happening, have happened since but I keep trying to pick up and go again so yeah. I had a lot of traumatic things happen and then I am not good with dealing or showing emotions and then it gets to the point where I cannot not show them and I am crying all over the place.

[0:21:08.5] SJ: You kind of bottle it up until you explode almost?

[0:21:12.6] J: Yeah, I don’t like people seeing me weak. You know I have never been weak like that you know? So it is to cry just to – I always hid it and then got to the point where I could not hide it anymore. It was happening all of the time, like everything I did I was walking around crying. It was so bad.

[0:21:31.1] SJ: During all of this time, how is your relationship with your husband?

[0:21:35.9] J: He would talk to me and that would be about it. Like I said he turned his back. He wrote us off a little bit but he was there. He didn’t really engage in conversations very well which is very frustrating for me because I kept trying to get us closer and better and he wanted nothing to do with it. So it was quite a few years of that and then after we moved, it just got worse from there. Where we were at, I was there like 26 years, so when we moved to a different city it was I thought a fresh start would be really good.

[0:22:12.2] SJ: And was it?

[0:22:13.4] J: It was, but I didn’t know anybody so I was alone a lot, like a lot. I still don’t really have any friends here. I have been here almost three years now and I know a couple of people here and there but I don’t have anybody that I could call up and tell my problems to or anything. So it is still really lonely sometimes, that is probably the worst part, but I don’t think about all the things that I used to, her all the time, and that kind of stuff. I don’t think about that anymore so much; I still think about her but not the way I used to.

[0:22:46.3] SJ: Yeah, I think you make a great point there. A lot of people, it’s exciting, especially I can say this as an Irish person living in a small island, that is exciting to go away to explore, to move to somewhere new, but then people forget that actually you have all of these social bonds, all these people you know this kind of support network in that kind “boring place” you spent a good deal of time. You could say I am talking about maybe Ireland here or any small town anywhere potentially.

And then you just forget that like you go to this new city, bright lights, lots of interesting stuff to do but actually having a deep real connection with someone can be a lot tougher.

[0:23:30.6] J: It takes a lot. You know I have built a lot of friendships when I was there, you know and my family, my sister is all up there. So now I have none of that here and I am not great at making new friends. I am quiet and hide away so that doesn’t help either but it is really hard. The loneliness is probably the worst thing I have experienced for sure.

[0:23:54.6] SJ: So Jenny at some point you decided to separate from your husband. Can you talk about that?

[0:24:01.5] J: Well unfortunately, he decided and he told me I had to get out of the condo and that was a while ago and then I had nowhere to go. So I ended up staying with him after he got another place. We started staying in separate rooms. I moved out of the bedroom and then we were in separate rooms for probably six months at least and then he kept screaming at me to get out. Get out of his life and so I moved out so yeah that is how that went and–

It was really hard a lot because I wake up in the middle of the night and I am looking for him and I am reaching for him or when I am sitting there watching TV and there is jokes we would laugh at or laugh with him or like certain time of the day waiting for them to get home and all of that stuff that is still there but it is getting better now but it is still really hard because he was around all the time for so long. It’s hard like losing that friend as well. That was very hard.

[0:25:05.8] SJ: I could imagine, but I haven’t lived through it so I don’t want to pretend that I know what you have been through, you know?

[0:25:12.9] J: Yeah, I thought we were going to be still be friends and hopefully work it out eventually and then he told me he was seeing somebody else and we were still being sexual together and everything and then he decided he was seeing a girl that he was seeing before we got together. It was like an old girlfriend kind of thing. So that was not – I didn’t take that very well because we hadn’t even talked about the divorce or we were over.

And then he’s telling me he’s got another girlfriend so I had asked him to please show some respect. “We have been together 16 years. Can you just wait a little bit and then go ahead” but he didn’t want to do that. So yeah, that wasn’t a good one at all either.

[0:25:59.8] SJ: So how are you doing now then?

[0:26:01.4] J: I am getting better. I found a couple of supports around here, a couple of friends like every now and then and I can reach out if I get really bad or depressed. I also have a couple of social workers that stop by to make sure that I am okay because I was so bad and my daughter, I just got her back home. She was on the street for two years. He wouldn’t let her come home so it was really hard, but now that I have her back you know that makes me happiest.

That she’s back with me off the streets and she has a home to go to anyway, anytime. That makes me feel better if anything. Not less lonely because she’s never home. She’s 17, always running around but yeah, at least she has a home.

[0:26:50.7] SJ: As we all were.

[0:26:51.5] J: Yeah that is right never went home, yeah. So I am getting there just one day at a time. I try to do the mindfulness and the breathing techniques and all of those things to help me try to not to what do we call it?

[0:27:07.7] SJ: Focus on the past so much?

[0:27:09.1] J: Obsess over it. I was obsessing over it. All I could think about it was like over consuming me so bad, yeah.

[0:27:18.5] SJ: Well I think it is great that you recognize those things you know?

[0:27:22.6] J: Yeah, it wasn’t great at the time because I couldn’t really control my anger or my feelings but I can now a lot more because I can recognize it, “Okay, you are just getting a little excited there Jenny, just mellow out” but yeah practicing the mindfulness and the techniques and stuff really do help a lot. You can start to use it before it gets over the top.

[0:27:47.7] SJ: I have talked to a lot of people about mindfulness. A lot of people have mentioned how beneficial it can be for so many different aspects, whether that’s a few podcast back. I talked to a woman called Lorie Mid, no, Lori Brotto. I think that podcast hasn’t been released yet, but the whole podcast I going to be about – that podcast will be released by the time this one is released, but it is all about how to have more and better and more enjoyable sex and using mindfulness.

But it has so many applications and I think a lot of people seem to think of mindfulness, meditation that you are some sort of hippy. I just don’t think it can have that slant if that is what you are searching for, some spiritual kind of thing, but I think it can actually be incredibly beneficial as well.

[0:28:39.8] J: Well it is not only just the meditation. It’s being in the moment to try to focus on the now is the best part for me, like instead of getting it outside of my head. To focus on things that are in the room what is going on now like not all the whole big picture I find works the best for me is that brings me back to myself and it is not meditating. I am not big on meditation so you know things like that really do, there is so many different ways and techniques and things that you can do for mindfulness right? It is not mediation so.

[0:29:18.2] SJ: Before I let you go I have a few questions I love you to answer and you can just skip them as well if you don’t want to answer them but the first is how is your life turned out differently than what you expect it?

[0:29:30.3] J: I thought we were going to be together forever, you know and I never expected him to actually turn me out, turn his back on me and cut me out of his life. I never thought that would ever happen so that wasn’t – this is a really hard one to. Well I still don’t think I have accepted it but to deal with, yeah I still all the time think of ways to try to fix it and hope that it would be okay and something will happen and I will be okay but I guess I know, I think I know in there somewhere that it is not going to be okay so I have to start getting over this and stop trying to think that it is going to be okay.

[0:30:10.5] SJ: Is there anything you look back on and regret about that relationship?

[0:30:15.4] J: I do. I wish that I could have dealt with her loss a little better and not, you know, paid more attention. I know it sounds some people are like, “No, you needed to mourn” but I just wish I wouldn’t have taken so long to realize what I had done to us, me and him, you know? I wish I had stepped up sooner and been able to try harder sooner instead of waiting until it was way too late to do anything.

[0:30:40.0] SJ: And then lastly, do you have any advice for listeners that find themselves in a similar situation?

[0:30:47.5] J: I guess just try to find that one thing that you are going to keep going for. You know for me it was my daughter. I refused to leave her here by herself. She’s hasn’t had a very lucky life herself and I am the one, I am the only one that is going to take care of her and love her for the rest – well, probably not. Eventually she will find somebody else but you know, I am the only mom and dad that she has. She has nobody else in her life.

So I knew that I wasn’t going to leave her here so it kept me going. It was a struggle but I somehow made it most of the way out. You know we will come out the other side. I will just keep getting better and stronger as time goes on and time does heal believe it or not. It makes it a little bit easier, a little bit.

[0:31:31.9] SJ: Jenny thanks so much for coming on the podcast to tell your story. Yeah, thank you so much.

[0:31:36.8] J: No, thanks for having me. It was a pleasure, I love listening to your things all the time. So it was great actually talking to you.