As y'all know, I love to host dinner parties. Food is edible art, and I love creating a meal that is beautiful, nourishing, and makes my guests feel special. And when we talk on the phone to give directions or set the time for the occasion, I tell my guests, "I'm cookin' with love! Come hungry!"

Cause I want them to really enjoy what I have to offer them.

Life has been a real boogerbear lately. My soul has been stretched to the breaking point and has moved into a new shape. 2009 has seen me experience the loss of a marriage, loss of a home, loss of an income, loss of a church, loss of friendships after the divorce, loss of neighborhood community, new apartment, new community, new church, new church community, new relationships. I could go on, but this list is sufficient to paint the picture. My life is transformed. I am weary.

Seems like there's a new conference every week. I don't always feel the tug. Usually I don't. But the moment I heard about Christianity 21, I felt the tug in my heart to attend. From the get-go, I wanted to be there. By faith, I saved the dates on my calendar when I had no means to get there. And God provided. So off to Minneapolis I go. Because I believe I am called to be there. I am willing to share my story. And I am so eager to connect with the women I have met through Twitter and blogdom. I'm so eager to see Maria Anderson, Makeesha Fisher, Jules, Julie Clawson, @livingsexuality, The Wild Man and Farm Girl, @tkpleslie, and many other dear ones that I haven't even met yet.

I'm expecting to receive great things from God and his people. God has set me a place at the table. And I'm coming hungry.

You know how kids go thorugh growth spurts? They eat and sleep a lot and then next thing you know their jeans don't fit. Well I've been going through a growth spurt, in a different way. Emotionally, spiritually, relationally. And my jeans don't fit either, but it's because they're too big.
I am amazed at how emotional eating is just so much less a part of my life, and how my appetite has decreased overall. In the midst of tremendous transition and sometimes painful growth, I'm feeling more accepted and loved than ever.
How do you experience acceptance and love?
Who pours acceptance and love into your emotional cup?
If you feel accepted and loved, how does that affect the other areas of your life?
Is it easier to care for your body and heart when you accept and love yourself?
Then how does this self care, self acceptance, self love affect your relationships with God and other humans?
If sex is giving your self, then what kind of self do you think you're giving?

I'm looking forward to sharing with you some of the good changes that are taking place in my heart. Some posts will come sooner than others. Good art percolates in the heart. Love, Shula

The one thing I prized above all else-my bond with my husband-was broken. In the aftermath, I found a love that would not let me go. The love of God and myself was still there. My husband's adultery broke my heart. I was his wholly and passionately. The idea that he would have sex with someone else cut me to the core.
I am being healed. The healing isn't over, but it's well underway.
Love, Shula

PS Thank you for praying for me.

I miss you all. There are so many things I can't talk about. Just wanted you to know that I'm still here. I am currently going through what may be the most devastating time of suffering and refining I've ever had to walk through. I will be okay. You know me, I will do whatever it takes to push through to healing. And you know me, after I receive a measure of healing, I'll be so eager to share that story with you. In the meantime, I'll share other stories. If God never does another thing for me, His generosity is unquestioned. I am blessed. And I will be loved. And so will you.

Held,
Shula

Thank you Sue, for giving me this song.

Something I've learned recently is that comparing myself with another woman or worse yet someone else comparing me to another woman is a shortcut ticket to misery. I want to share some thoughts that have helped me find my way out of the comparison trap.

I must live in the light of God's sovereignty.
Trusting His good heart toward me.
Trusting God did a good job when he made me.
Trusting God and I and I together are doing a good job of continuing to make me.
I must accept God's grace toward me as sufficient,
and not fall into either ditch of pride or envy.
Pride says I'm better than someone else.
Envy says I think someone else's possessions or traits or qualities are better than mine and I therefore find my own possessions or traits or qualities not good enough, less-than, unsatisfactory.
God created me.
God did a great job and took great joy in making me.
And I can take great joy in making me too, because I am made by, shaped by, changed by the choices that I make day after day after day.
Making the choice to grow and change is a good thing.
But healthy change MUST be secondary to the foundation of truth that says:
God is sovereign, God is good, God is loving, and this good God shaped me with tender care.
It is in this warm solid foundation, that change is good and welcomed for I know I was delightful already before the change.

And being humble and vulnerable and tender and strong,
giving God plenty of elbow room to work,
that can only yield good things.

Feeling this, knowing this , believing this
feels
SO VERY GOOD.

and I'm delighted to share it with you.

With love,
Shula

PS Thinking about God creating me led me to this video of creation. I belong smack-dab amongst all this other created beauty cause the very same artist made me. Ooooh! Love that!

I'm a real glass is half full kinda gal. It's my nature. I know that gratitude and focusing on the good is a good habit to be in. However, Delighted Husband had an interesting point the other night when he told me he thought perhaps I created a false sense of expectation for you dear readers and us by thinking that DH and I are smokin' the sheets every single time. I was very impressed by Delighted Husband's insight-he's a smart guy and a deep thinker. I've always been very candid about my own story, my own feelings but I've always been very private when it comes to Delighted Husband. I want to respect his privacy. So it's beautiful and interesting and new when he says he wants to give me more freedom to speak more openly about some of our intimate times together that don't quite feel like the 4th of July. Every good beautiful moment that I've blogged about is true and really happened. (boy oh boy did they ever!) but we have our off nights and our misfires and our mixed signals like everyone else. And Delighted Husband tells me he will be wanting me to share about that from time to time. We're shooting for the sweet spot that's good and not perfect, accessible not unattainable.

I'll never blog like Debbie Downer. I don't think I could if I tried. Sex is too beautiful. But there's something to be said for balance, and grace and flexibility. We are human after all. Like all humans, stress affects us. We can learn good coping skills for stress, frankly I think lovemaking is a wonderful coping skill for stress. Whether it's tender or aggressive, lovemaking the bonding the connecting, the endorphins the pleasure the release can all add up to TREMENDOUS stress relief.

But what if the lovemaking doesn't work? What if you're "us" doesn't work? Oh My God the stress that can cause. Somewhere in month two of our house being in dissarray and in various stages of repair and construction, the stress of Delighted Husband's demanding job and long commute, the stress of my long working hours building the store, wanting to offer my best for the sensuouswife.com team, talking to vendors for the store, managing the reconstruction project for our home, giving good effort to self-care at the gym, continuing to eat sober and not use food to stuff my feelings which means there are these emotions to deal with and mannnn are they damned inconvenient! and next thing you know, I'm a grouchypants and everything Delighted Husband does in the simple foibles of life gets on my last nerve, and everything I do in my simple human foibles gets on his last nerve and there are kids who need us and their life is topsy turvy too with the house all under construction and next thing you know, we've got two people who love each other and desperately need to get laid and who unfortunately are very pissed off with each other in the present moment. Lord have mercy Jesus!

So what did we do? We hauled our angry asses off to counseling and we duked it out with kleenex and talking. And we made love every chance we got. And it did not always go so well. When the emotional climate between Delighted Husband and me is good, it is very easy for me to get aroused. When the emotional climate between us is "off", he can touch me in the usual favorite ways and I don't feel the same feelings..the same emotions or sensations. If I feel awkward in my heart, I feel awkward in my body. And I think he does too.

Here's the thing that I often remember and when I do not I wish to JesusGodAlmighty that I had:
When that fine line is crossed and discussing and disagreeing becomes heated arguments and two heartsore people trying to make their point, the beautiful erotic climate is gone. Heated arguments hurl words and angst like throwing rocks. It's like a greenhouse whose glass pane is broken by a rock and all the lovely warm moist air rushes out and it's cold and dry inside and the delicate breathtakingly gorgeous blossoms and the tender green shoots inside start to wither. I love that symbolic image of orgasms and sex being blooming plants inside a greenhouse being the intimate climate of a marriage, because orchids grow in a greenhouse and we all know what orchids look like, don't we? (grin) Seriously y'all, the erotic intimate climate of your marriage must be protected, or you'll lose some delicate gorgeous glorious pleasure and oneness and joy and it will take a while to get it back. How long it takes is up to the two of you, but it will take a while.

Luckily, there's grace.

Grace came for me in the form of my dear dear friends who let me come unraveled in front of them and gave me a soft place to land. I called my friend that lives overseas on skype, buried my face in my hands and just sobbed. Every few seconds, they would reassure me "Oh love, everything will turn out all right."

Grace came for me with a handful of girlfriends that I could share honestly with and tell them the prolonged stress we'd been under had affected Delighted Husband's and my sex life. Not that I shared TMI, but golly moses, some friends would consider just the last few sentences TMI. But not these girls. These dear women. They told me, "So you're human, so what?" and hugged me and prayed for us.

Grace came for me when I was picking up clutter and tidying our bedroom, I was literally on my knees making the bed when a book on the book shelf in my nightstand literally fell off the shelf, to the floor and fell in front of my knees. It was my 9 year old dog-eared copy of The Power of a Praying Wife. I may not be a rocket scientist, but I knew this was God talking to me, so I stayed on my knees, grabbed hold of the book, and knelt at my bed in prayer. Being me, and considering what was bothering us, I flipped to the chapter on His Sexuality, and I prayed this prayer:
"Lord, bless my husband's sexuality and make it an area of great fulfillment for him. Restore what needs to be restored, balance what needs to be balanced. Protect us from apathy, dissapointment, criticism, busyness, unforgiveness, deadness, or disinterest. I pray we make time for one another, communicate our true feelings openly, and remain sensitive to what each other needs. Keep us sexually pure in mind and body, and close the door to anything lustful or illicit that seeks to encroach upon us. Deliver us from the bondage of past mistakes. Remove from our midst the effect of any sexual experience—in thought or deed—that happened outside our relationship. Take away anyone or anything from our lives that would inspire temptation to infidelity. Help us to "abstain from sexual immorality" so that each of us will know "how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor" (1Thessalonians 4:3-5) I pray we will desire each other and no one else. Show me how to make myself attractive and desirable to him and to be the kind of partner he needs. I pray that neither of us will ever be tempted to think about seeking fulfillment elsewhere. I realize an important part of my ministry to my husband is sexual. Help me to never use it as a weapon or a means of manipulation by giving and withholding it for selfish reasons. I commit this area of our lives to you, Lord. May it continually be new and alive. Make it all you created it to be."

And I started to feel a tiny spark of hope in my heart. I remembered the condition of my heart nine years ago when I first prayed that prayer and I took inventory in my mind of all the good things that had come from that since then. I thought, "heck I should just pray all the prayers in this book", so I flipped to the beginning chapter "His Wife". That's when I got a real shellacking because wow was I convicted of my sulky attitude! Get a load of this excerpt from the Chapter His Wife:
"I Don't Even Like Him How Can I Pray for Him? If you are angry at your husband, tell God. Don't let it become a cancer that grows with each passing day. Instead say, "Lord, nothing in me wants to pray for this man. I confess my anger, hurt, unforgiveness, disappointment, resentment and hardness of heart toward him. Forgive me and create in me a clean heart and right spirit before You. Give me a new positive joyful loving forgiving attitude toward him. Where he has erred, reveal that to him and convict his heart about it. Lead him through the paths of repentance and deliverance. Help me not to hold myself apart from him emotionally, mentally or physically because of unforgiveness. Where either of us needs to ask forgiveness of the other, help us to do so. If there is something I'm not seeing that is adding to this problem, reveal it to me and help me to understand it. Remove any wedge of confusion that has created misunderstanding or miscommunication. Where there is behavior that needs to change in either of us, I pray you would enable that change to happen. As much as I want to hang onto my anger toward him and as much as I feel it is justified, I want to do what You want. I release all those feelings to You. Give me a renewed sense of love for him and words to heal this situation."
Whoa Nelly. I have to tell you, folks, I felt peace after I prayed that prayer. I felt drained of the poison inside me. I felt hope. I felt like it could and would get better between us. I love him so much, always have, but for a few days there we were like two porcupines trying to get warm. We wanted cuddles and we kept getting and giving ouchies instead. It was awful.

So, once I got the toxic sludge out of my heart, all kindsa good things happened. My girls kept on praying and lemme tell you what happened next.

My office is in an alcove of the living room, so I get to work close to the fireplace. And as I've told y'all before, every year when it's cold enough to switch on the furnace, I move the Zepplin pillow downstairs in front of the fireplace. So Delighted Husband was lounging on the Zepplin pillow enjoying the fireplace while I was working at my desk. He looked so sweet and relaxed and handsome, and my heart just lurched in my chest and I felt tenderness towards him. I stood up from my desk, and walked over to him and knelt down and straddled him, lay my arms on either side of his body reaching up to hug him and I lay my head on his stomach and just let myself be. We felt so peaceful and calm. The atmosphere of safety and good connection perfumed the air around us. The warm humid healing air was filling up our greenhouse. The warmth of the sun was shining on our wintry cold greenhouse. It felt so good. Nothing erotic at this point. Just love and healing connection. Delighted Husband started murmuring and petting my hair with his hands. The feeling his of his palm wrapped around my head cradling me with his palm like a baby just melted my heart like buttah. I felt so truly safe for the first time in days. ohmyGod.

After a few minutes, Delighted Husband got up from the Zepplin and went upstairs to tuck the DC in bed. I laid there relaxing and feeling safe. I was feeling safe and good and normal but zero horny at this point. Zee-roh. I know this might sound spooky, but sometimes I feel God talking to me in my heart. And I felt this tug on my heart to take off my jogbra. I figured listening to that still small voice has given me only good so far, so I stripped off my bra and just lay there relaxing. I began to anticipate and wait for the sounds of Delighted Husband's footsteps coming down the stairs. I felt eager. I felt eager to surprise him. I felt eager to see his delight on his face. I did not at this point feel horny or overt sexual desire. I was just eager to see what good thing would come from following that still small voice in my heart. Sure enough, Delighted Husband came down the stairs, walked into our bedroom, and not finding me there, he walked into the living room. He took one look at me sprawled on the Zepplin pillow wearing nothing but running tights and a sneaky smile spread over his face. "What are you doing?" he asked. "Waiting for you." I replied.

In 2 seconds, Delighted Husband shucked off his clothes. I lost the running tights.

Grace came for us in the form of a shagfest that relieved us body and soul. I experienced firsthand that Dr. David Schnarch is right when he says that once the initial conflict is resolved properly, sex can be a verry healthy way to rid yourself of aggression. Oh my God, is he right. I came to my belief that night.
In the midst of our glorious rowdyness, I distinctly remember thinking:

I'm.
so.
glad.
they're.
praying.
it's.
worrrrrking!

I won't tell you what I said after that~I'll let Neil have the last word.

God has been working on my heart big time. I have been doing well to process and keep up with it in real time. Lots of soul searching and prayer and humility and then quantum leaps of growth and healing. Taint easy. I am so so so lucky to have an inner circle of friends that I can talk with and they will love me and accept me and pray for me and encourage me to process and grow. This weekend, I took a long walk. I was gone for several hours, solitude and journaling and duking it out with God. Going without sugar or any kind of emotional eating for several days has been like a fast that has revealed many areas in my heart that needed to be healed and forgiven.

After one particularly intense rant, I had a moment where Jesus became so real and relevant for me. I was angry about a situation, at someone in particular and I was telling God about it. I was legitimately angry for some wrongs done to me and I told God, "God I just want to punch them!" and in my heart I heard this thought. It was as though Jesus answered me saying "I was punched and beaten. Can what was done to me be enough. Cause that person deserves a good punch and I was beaten up, can it be enough what was done to me?" This so shocked me that I stopped in my tracks. Peace seeped in to that angry pit in my stomach, and I let it go.

As I was walking back around the lake, I was startled to see all these golden sparkly lights on the water. It was only visible from that one point on the lake. This song was playing on my phone's mp3 player at the time. I stood there and just drank in the beauty. I got to wishing so so badly that I could record this. I've never seen golden lights sparkling at random on the water quite like that. I decided to at least take a picture. And while I was monkeying around with the camera settings I discovered my camera phone would shoot video. I had not known this! So I held the phone as still as I could and took the video. I'm not gonna win any awards for cinematography but I hope you can sense the peace and tranquility and beauty that overwhelmed me that day in such a lovely good way.

This song was playing on the alarm clock this morning. I soaked up every word. Hope your hearts drink it in like mine did. This is day seven of sober eating.
Love,
Shula

Well darlings I have decided to screw up my courage and really go for it.
God has given me so much healing in my marriage and sexuality and emotional and physical health, I've decided to be brave and dare to hope Himself will also bring healing to my weight. It's an interesting place to be. I feel gorgeous and sexy now. I don't feel unpretty or unsexy. But my doctor, Beloved Endocrinologist, really wants me to lose weight. Since I'm being treated for a metabolic disorder, the Atkins low carb way is the best match for me.

I feel so nervous!!

I have lost weight before eating the Atkins way, and I did very well. The problem is not the eating plan. The problem is emotional eating. I have lost 15 pounds, gotten some momentum, and then hit an emotional wall and gained 5 pounds back. I'm still at net loss of 10 which is good. And I want more.

I feel like this is the last battle for my heart. The last place in my life that needs to be healed. It's not that I want to look like anyone else. I am so tired feeling victory failure and frustration in this area of my life. I want to conquer this area of my life. I want to be the curvy, athletic girl I used to be.

On the fun side, Delighted Husband and I have looked at each other with a gleam in our eye thinking about some of the hot stuff we could do if I were smaller and more flexible and had more, er, stamina. (blush) (grin) In the few months I have been working out at the gym, I have been amazed at how much faster and easier I can orgasm. Lord only knows what else might be in store for Delighted Husband and me! I intend to find out.

So, does this sound like a good goal? Is this something y'all think you could support?

Love,
Shula

I woke up today in a cold sweat with an awful sense that something was wrong and I had no idea what it was. Some of you who have been reading with me for a while might not be surprised at this. It's not uncommon for a flareup of vague nameless fear to crop up after a victory. I call this a battle for my heart, and it's happened before. Hell, there's a whole category for it. I have to smile at that. There's a whole category for it. For some reason, that is just so funny to me. A great big smile has spread across my face. Here's the payoff for being humble and accountable. People know where you're at.

So I sat up for an hour or so, trying to snap out of it and getting nowhere. So I went back to bed. I told Delighted Husband, "I woke up in a cold sweat at 4:30 with a vague sense that something was terribly wrong and I don't know what it is. I've been sitting in the living room trying to figure out what it is, and I don't know what it is. So I figured if I'm going to not know, I may as well come back here and be warm while I don't know."

Delighted Husband snuggled up to me, and mumbled in a sleepy voice, "If you don't know what's wrong then nothing's wrong. The thief comes to steal kill and destroy" and then he began to snore.

Just like that, I was filled with peace.

Oh, after seeing it happen a few hundred times, I am learning!

Huge strides up the mountain are sometimes interspersed with little bouts of vertigo.
Don't jump off the mountain.
Just hold onto your partner.
Ask them to pass the container of oxygen.
Stand still and breathe deeply.
Rest and collect yourself.
When you feel ready, move one foot forward.
You are so worth it!

Love,
SW