Cowboys Wife Wisdom
Chewing tobacco! Ever since I met my husband CW, I knew that he had chewed and that this habit probably would continue on after we got married. Well, I was correct in guessing that! He did continue to chew throughout our marriage. At one point, I couldn't even tell you how many cans a week he was going through because it was a lot! I had always heard him say "I'm going to stop one day". My thoughts were…one day? Really, how many times have I heard that "one day" you will quit chewing? I remember a friend of mine told me that her husband had kept saying that he would quit chewing and she decided to tell him he was not welcome in his own home if he came home with one more chew can. Well, that worked for their family… But I will tell you that when I tried telling my husband that, it didn't go over so well as you can imagine if you know my husband.
This conversation of "I may quit one day", had always come up a lot in our marriage. Although I would like to say I was always supportive, I was not. I would nag and I mean a lot! They say when your spouse tells your that they are quitting an addiction to not nag! In fact on the "killthecan.org" website, it clearly says "Don't nag, it won't help and will only cause underlying feelings of anger and resentment, all of which are likely to drive your spouse back to the can out of spite". Ooops!!! I definitely can say that was sometimes true. I would find myself trying to tell him what to do and when to do it. I was not very positive at times.
One day, I asked my husband the "correct" way why he was feeling tired and dragging. He told me he had quit chewing. What? I had not idea that he had quit chewing for a week and a half already. Honestly I think that it was probably a good thing that I didn't know he was quitting this time because I probably would have spouted off "I'm sure your quitting". I will tell you from that day forward of knowing that he was quitting was quite different than any other time. I was in for a rough ride, little did I know. I was officially now the target of sudden outbursts, anger, ect. Knowing this was not him and was the addiction was hard for me to figure out in the past, but I choose to be above that this time and support him 110 %. I won't say it was easy, because it wasn't. He was putting in the work of quitting and I needed to be supportive through it all. I had to encourage him daily with what he was doing and encourage myself that I could be a good wife through out this time period. We would pray over him and ask God to release the pain that his body was going through, the mental and the physical side of things and as well as the spiritual. For me I never knew there was so much to an addiction, yet overcoming one. I will say that through this time, God surely had his hand over my husband, me and our marriage! Quitting for him was such a release from a stronghold he had dealt with for several years. With all of this is for me to tell you…Believe it or not, but there is a HUGE difference between a "want" to quit for yourself verse a "need" to quit by someone telling you to do it! Stick with the want! There has to be a desire in yourself to do it for yourself! My husband had to do this for himself, not because I wanted him to or because I told him that he had to. He had to realize that he wanted to do it for him and for God and no one else. I truly believe that we can want something so bad for someone else while they don't want that at all. Then, when we find out they don't want what we had wanted for them, we become irritated, and disheartened to the situation. The desire of us wanting a change has to be from us wanting to change it, and that's just what CW did. He has now had no chew since December of 2013. Praise the Lord! This was a huge testimony for him and for myself as well! I'm so proud of you CW!!!
Till next time,
XOXO Cooped Up Cowboys Wife Kirste