Taking out the plank in a jail cell

It was necessary for me to see the damage I was doing to someone I promised to love until death do us part.

On May 16, 2020, I went for a hike with my husband, and my son. Hiking is the one place where everything seems to be okay. Even if there is chaos in our lives in so many other areas, we all feel connected, free, and alive when we are out hiking. May 16th was a Saturday. We hiked down to a lake that sits halfway down in the canyon. It is a beautiful little hike that has a very deep, but small lake that is fed by a spring. There is a small little waterfall that flows into the lake from a crystal, clear creek that the springs empty out into. On this day, my five-year-old son sat down by the little waterfall and started spontaneously singing “God is So Good.” He was filled with such delight, and pure joy to be outside in nature, and experiencing it all with his mom and his dad. I had no idea I was about to make a mess of things; well, things were already a mess, I was about to make an error that would disrupt my entire family – an unfortunate necessary error.

May 17th, 2020 was not a good day. I was feeling frustrated in my marriage. I mentioned in my first blog that: “I’ve been praying a long time now for healing in my marriage. It’s been a long road of sadness, frustration, anger, and even violence.” May 17th, 2020 was a Sunday. We didn’t go to mass Sunday morning because I had spent the morning in anger and had been yelling at my husband. I knew that I was angry enough to either hit him, throw his stuff outside, or any number of things that I had done in the past. I just couldn’t talk to him anymore. I decided to make myself a cup of tea and go upstairs to my room to calm down. I microwaved a mug full of water, and a bag of green tea for two minutes. I walked away from the kitchen and started to head up the stairs with my cup of tea. My husband’s back was to me, and something in me just snapped. Maybe it was the way he was standing, maybe he said something snarky, but whatever it was, I took that very hot cup of tea and threw it at his backside. He arched his back in pain. I knew immediately that that cup of tea was a lot hotter than most cups of tea because I was taking it upstairs to finish steeping before I drank it. I never made it up the stairs. I reacted. I reacted very poorly.

My husband would not let me touch him. He was mad. I tried to look at where the tea landed on him. He wouldn’t let me. He said he was taking himself to the Emergency Room. I decided to proceed with getting my son and I ready for evening mass. The two of us went to mass at our local parish. When I walked out of mass that evening, and headed to my van, several police cars came rushing around the corner with sirens blaring, and I knew why they were there.

The police cars surrounded my van, my son, and me. Two of the officers approached me and asked me if I knew why they were there. I said, “yes, I do.” One of the officers said that my husband was pressing charges for domestic violence and that I had the right to remain silent. I told him what had happened. He then looked at my son, and said, “Did you see your mom throw tea at your dad?” My son’s response was, “Mommy just wants daddy to love her.” Then they told me that some officers would wait with my son until my husband arrived from the Emergency Room and that I was being place under arrest. I was handcuffed, placed into the back of a police car, and drove to the Twin Falls Jail where I was put into an orange jumpsuit, and eventually placed in a cell with some other women.

I was hungry, frightened, and cold. The detainment area was full of women, so I didn’t get a bed, but rather a mat to sleep on and a blanket. I think I must have prayed four rosaries and at least as many Chaplets of Divine Mercy that night. The other women in the bay were loud, cussed a lot, and some were vulgar. In the midst of my emotions, my heart also went out to each of them. I had no idea how long I would be in there, whether I would spend some time in prison, when I would get to see my son, or if my husband would realize that maybe he shouldn’t have had me arrested. With all of the confusion, one thing became quite clear: God’s voice! What he had to say to me was firm, disciplinary, and yet the most loving thing I needed to hear.

“Jeanette, you can’t do this anymore“

Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me remove that splinter from your eye, while the wooden beam is in your eye? ~Matthew 7: 3-4

I sat on my mat on the floor. I was in shock, and scared, and praying to God to help me. What I got in return was a very clear, “Jeanette, you can’t do this anymore.” God knew my pain. He knew my frustration. He knew the sleepless nights, the fear of what I would be facing next in my marriage on any given day of the year. He also knew that I needed to be told to let Him take control. I had been trying in all my desperation to take hold of things because I felt so out of control. In my need to control things I had become nagging, criticizing, disrespectful, violent, angry, and overly controlling. I was controlling every little move my husband made. God made it clear to me sitting in that jail that in all my feeble attempts to control the problems in my marriage, I had become the problem.

I wept

I saw myself for who I had become, and I sat there, and I wept. I let it all out. I sobbed and sobbed on a mat in the jail in my little orange jumpsuit, at the realization of just how much I had made my husband feel belittled. He already was struggling in his life to make good choices. His very own life was filled with his own pain. In my own emotions, I had forgotten how to have compassion for the very person I promised to love for the rest of my life. I had been doing this for several years. It took me being arrested to see just how much pain and turmoil I was causing in our marriage.

It’s always easier to blame someone else. After all, I wouldn’t have reacted that way, had he not made me feel that way. In today’s world, this is accepted. My feelings are what’s important. But there is a problem with that because that means my emotions control me. It says that I don’t have control over my emotions. Well, then why did God give me a brain? I don’t like that it took me being arrested for me to see just how much I had let anger be my idol in my life. But I am grateful that God allowed me to be arrested so that I could start to take the plank out of my own eye. It didn’t happen overnight, but God started working on me in jail. He let me go through a really tough night to see that things needed to change on my side. He let that happen so that I could start to love my husband once again with the same love that God first showed to me.

I wish I could write and tell you that the next day my husband forgave me, dropped the charges, I got to see my son, and all was well. Instead, I went through six months of uncertainty. The following day brought so much more pain, and uncertainty but God was working on me, and I was finally ready to let him.