You Can’t Say No without Confidence
In 2014, I started a blog called Sex After Marriage. I was going through the transformation one does after coming out of an 18-year marriage with a man that I met at 17 years old. I was finding out who I was. I started this blog to chronicle my journey. I figured that if I was inspiring myself, I would surely inspire others.
In 2024, it’s now been 10 years. I thought it might be time to republish the blog with my “10-Year Take”. I’m looking forward to seeing what’s changed and what has stayed the same. This is a gift to myself as I come into my 50th year on this planet, the same age my mom lost her 2-year battle with Inflammatory Breast Cancer. In some ways, it feels like I’m on borrowed time. In other ways, I feel like I’m completing her incomplete journey. Mom, you are missed and I’m not sure I would have gotten here if I hadn’t had to feel the loss of you. Thank you for reading.
Dated December 29, 2014
I was 17. I was strong, independent, and a goody-two-shoes. I did well in sports and school. I was straight-laced. I didn’t smoke or drink. I always had a boyfriend. I actually got a kick out of telling boys no. I had confidence!
On “court” for Ms. (Insert hometown here)
My future husband was 19. He was shy and very attractive. He was the kind of boy who, when he didn’t know which red licorice to buy, would buy every type of red licorice he could find in order to impress me. (I only liked one kind of red licorice.) Both of us were very young and virgins, so we didn’t have the experience needed to navigate a healthy relationship, let alone a healthy sexual relationship. This should have been a practice relationship. We just kept practicing with each other over the course of 22 years.
Last week I wrote about body confidence. I shared how, in high school, I was this fit, trim, athletic girl. What changed? Yes, I made poor food choices. No, I didn’t exercise. But why? Why did I make poor choices? Why didn’t I stop and say, “Wait! What is going on here? Why are you doing this? Why did you stop caring for yourself?”
I can answer that. I lost the confidence to say no. Our young love turned into an unhealthy relationship. I can’t lay any of the blame on my ex-husband. We were both very young and inexperienced. I didn’t have healthy relationship role models let alone sexual role models. I remember my mother dressing for bed in multiple layers of clothing in hopes of deterring my father from touching her. I happened to do it with extra weight. Rather than be taught about consent, I was taught to hide or deter. Rather than confronting the issues in our relationship, I tried, unconsciously, to become undesirable. I guess I wanted him to say no.
“I don’t have to be afraid of people I am not interested in finding me attractive. I don’t have to say yes to them just because they are interested in me.” These are the words that rolled out of my mouth last weekend. Yes, I said that! Out loud! This was actually a revelation to me. This 39-year-old woman is finding the 17-year-old girl who had the confidence to say no.
10-Year Take:
“I can’t lay any of the blame on my ex-husband”
Correction! Yes, I can lay some of the blame on him. Absolutely! And I can still take so much of my own. But he does NOT get to be let off scot-free. No way! He gets some blame; my parents get some blame, society gets some blame, and Christian values get some blame. Let’s pass this shit around.
I stopped caring for myself because I was completely dissociated. I could not care about myself and stay in the marriage that I didn’t know how to leave. I was not anywhere in my body because my body was experiencing the equivalent of assault on a daily basis, thanks to me giving up my no. Thanks to him not wanting my no. Thanks to my parents not showing me the respect of a no. Thanks to society and Christian values making me believe I wasn’t able to have a no. Fuck all that!
