lilysreviews

Please welcome Sara Lunsford to Lily's Reviews on this stop in her blog tour:

Marriage and the Job

And I know what that’s like because I was one too. We worked at the same prison.

I speak a lot about my husband and what life was like then in my memoir Sweet Hell on Fire, but I haven’t spoken about what it’s like to be married to him now—since he still does the Job and I don’t. It was a special kind of hell to be at a post where I couldn’t respond to an emergency alarm in the cell house my husband was working, but at least there I felt like I had some control. Being at home and out of the loop is another flavor of fear altogether.

Sometimes, ignorance really is bliss. Since I’m a writer, my fevered imagination can come up with more horrible scenarios than what’s actually possible in any given situation. Except this one. The things that happen behind the walls could rival any horror story with the sheer depravity of what human beings are capable of inflicting on each other.

Even though this knowledge sometimes feels like a burden, it’s worth it because it helps me to be a better wife. I can truly be his haven and his best friend because I understand what he’s dealing with and the pressure he’s under.

In the book, one of the first things I discuss is how they teach us that we have to be two different people. The person we are behind the walls and the person we show to the rest of the world, shrugging the other off like a cloak as we walk through the gates. But it’s not that simple.

How strong can a relationship be if there are some things that you just can’t share with each other? I think that’s a big reason why there’s such a high rate of substance abuse and divorce among law enforcement. The Job creeps into that separate life, spilling like an ink stain over everything we touch. Instead of trying to hold back the tide, my husband and I have chosen to embrace it, to work with the flow instead of against it. He can tell me anything.

Before he goes to work, I make sure I kiss him and tell him how much I love him because there’s always the chance that he might not come back out through those gates. Yet, still I say I got my Happily Ever After because tomorrow isn’t guaranteed to anyone no matter what career path they’ve chosen.