Celia Brews It Over

Good morning! Happy FriYay!!! Things have been getting pretty deep on this blog of mine! Whoo! I promised, I would talk about the hard stuff. We've been talking about it!

How about we lighten things up today? Five on Friday is back! It's been a while, right?!

I've been good, more than good. But I've had my head down, working hard towards my goals, and finally coming up for a breathe of air. I've had most people support me, and only one that took issue with me needing to retreat to work towards my goals. Good riddance. Keep your tribe tight and full of those who fully support you.

Let's get this thang started.

One. 


This guy. I couldn't be more lucky to have him in my life. It's like all those things I threw out into the Universe that I wanted in a guy compiled into this amazing human. When I thought I'd had enough the Universe was like "wait! found him!" We had our first real vacation together earlier this month. I'll cover it in its own post. I loved exploring a new city with him. We learned I'm great at figuring out where we need to go, and he's great at actually navigating us there. Team work!

Two. 


For this trip I couldn't take my little furnugget with us. I was so anxious over this. Who was going to watch him? Could my Mom spend a week with him? What about another family member?
The last time someone offered to watch him they were super inconsistent. & I partially wonder looking back now if they did it on purpose. Which makes me really sad.
From what I've been reading Angel and I are really closely bonded FurMomma+FurBaby. & sometimes cats that are extremely bonded to their owners get separation anxiety. So when they have a sitter they need to be really consistent so they know they haven't been abandoned.
With Angel being 18 I always worry that something is going to upset him and then I am going to lose him. I know he's getting up there and I know the time is coming, but I want to extend that little life of his as much as I can.
I was chatting with a girlfriend of mine that has both dogs and cats and I know she loves her animals just as much as I love my little furnugget. She was telling me about PetSitter apps and I think I actually downloaded the wrong one but I found the most amazing sitter!
This girl was so punctual! The moment the clock struck 730, my phone was ringing for me to open the gates for her. She not only fed and cleaned his litter box, she swept the hard floors, we ended up having some ants and she took it upon herself to clean the area with vinegar and water and by the time I got home we were ant free! She took him out on the balcony and although I paid her for 30min visits. Most of the time she spent about 45mins with him. She gave me detailed reports of his food consumption, litterbox use and overall mood. He got upset a couple times and threw up, and she cleaned the areas. I couldn't even tell he threw up! Her last visit we both showed up at the same time and he greeted us both. He loved his sitter!

Three. 


This Month's Personal Development book is The Miracle Morning. Y'all it is so so good! I'm not waking up every day as early as I should, but I'm learning new things to incorporate into my morning to ensure I have the best days. I can't wait to finish and share with you my favorite pieces of the book.

Four. 


My Life Coach had her very first public workshop and y'all it sold out! I was so honored that she asked me to speak on The Benefits of Personal Development and my own personal testimonial working with her. I'll have blog posts on each here soon(ish) and I'll link them back here. Talk about out of my comfort zone though! Whew!

Five. 


Since the time that I took off to San Antonio back in February and rang up my friend Tori to see if the invitation was still open to crash at her pad we have grown closer. We both have that drive to grow grow grow, to work our asses off towards our dreams and to serve others. We recently learned that we both want to launch our own podcasts! How crazy is that?! Neither of us knew that the other even remotely thought of that!


& that's it for today!

Just counting down the hours until me and the Novio get to see each other!

& on today's episode of Celia Brews It Over... What not to say to a woman going through a divorce.

Yes, all of the below are things people said to me when they began to learn I had filed for a divorce.

Your best-friend, daughter, sister, or co-worker may not tell you it is hurtful or not okay, but I'm here to tell you for them. They have enough that they're dealing with. If you can't offer an ear, or shoulder, then just zip your lips.


How could you break a promise like that? Yes, marriage is a huge promise. For better or for worse. But when someone has been unfaithful to you, when you've constantly had to fight for your place in the marriage against a "friend" & when you've been the one putting in all the effort and begging them to please read an article, read a book, or go to therapy with you and they won't. There's only so much you can do on your own to keep that promise. Eventually you break. My break happened after I completely lost myself in my marriage. I had no idea who Celia was anymore. What I stood for, what I believed, who I could trust, heck I couldn't even tell you what I liked or liked to do. I did everything in my power to keep my promise. & I'm sure your friend did too. 

Marriage is hard, no one said it would be easy. I highly doubt anyone got married thinking this is going to be easy. We all know it is going to be hard. You're combining two lives. Your friend isn't divorcing because it wasn't easy. You may not ever know the true reason why they decided to get divorced. Especially if they have kids. 

Why didn't you try harder? I gave everything to my marriage. I tried everything possible. Read every book I could get my hands on. Even the ones that didn't sit well with me. I searched every corner of the internet on how to be a good wife, how to love him more, how to choose to love them, and how to fall back in love with them. Because everyone says that love and marriage is a choice. 

You're probably being too harsh. Maybe. But, maybe not. If this is your friend, give them the benefit of the doubt. Remember, you may not know the full story. My friends and family started learning about what was happening little by little, piece by piece. & still to this day, almost two years after we separated I'm still remembering things that happened behind closed doors & things friends said to try to make me see little red flags that I missed.


Be prepared to lose friends and maybe your family. Although this is true, and sometimes by choice to protect your energy or safety, let a therapist tell them this. Perhaps just let them know that not everyone will be a part of their support circle, and that's okay.


Let me know when you're ready to date. Guys. This is not what your chick friend wants or needs to hear. Although this helped with confidence, it made me sad every time. What I wanted was to know that I was safe and supported. Wait until some of the anger, grief and confusion has passed. I'll tell you right now, anyone that told me this was immediately black listed from my dating pool.


I can't believe you'd walk away from the life he could give you. This floored me. You don't always know how the finances work. Most people thought I was a stay at home wife. I don't usually talk about my day job on any of my social media profiles. & most days I cooked 3 meals a day. My day job doesn't make me rich, but it affords me a decent life. He wasn't giving me a life. He made more money than me but not SO much that I could never afford life on my own. Even if that was the case, money isn't a reason to stay, ever. Especially if the relationship is extremely unhealthy. 

You should/shouldn't date for X amount of time. Only work on yourself. Let her do what she wants/needs to do. The timeline is different for everyone. Yes, she may do some stuff that's destructive. Let her get it out of her system. Be. There. For. Her. Without judgement. I didn't sleep around with a lot of guys. But, I believe I've already mentioned it on here, my husband wouldn't touch me for months. Months, y'all! We've got needs! I felt crazy, and confused. I knew something about me was attractive, I could see the way other men would look at me or even notice when men made blatant passes at me. So why wasn't my husband sleeping with me? To be desired was part of my healing process and part of working on myself. I needed to get comfortable with my own sexuality again. & yes, she knows she needs to work on herself. She doesn't need to be a nun to do this. Because I fully believed I was 100% of the problem in the marriage, I had been working on myself hardcore not even a year after we got married. I had a head start, but I was still working on me daily, even if I was dating. 



Things he said to me in order to break me down and get me to come back to him.

I hope you get your life together. I felt like my life was in shambles but I knew better. My support circle also played a massive role in making sure I knew I had my life together and my feelings were just that. Feelings. They reminded me that although I didn't own the place I was in. I had a nice place, a car, my things, my kitties, and my career that was affording me to provide a life for myself.


You're a whore. It was okay for him to sleep with someone, but when he found out that I started dating #CarGuy, I was a whore.


You have no friends. In addition to telling me I needed to get rid of my therapist, & push my parents away he told me that I didn't have friends. Hmm. Well who were the girls that were making sure I woke up every day? Who were the girls making sure I had lunch/dinner even if it was just a little bit? Who were the girls making sure I went out from time to time? Isolation is an abusers best weapon. & my girls weren't going to allow that anymore.


You're an idiot. This was his favorite way to insult me. Everything I had to say was stupid & I was an idiot. He made sure to constantly remind me I never had the chance to finish my degree. 

You might be asking yourself, how does any of the above make you want him back? I would learn that these were all tear down tactics. Ways to try to get me to feel bad about myself, and make me believe I was unworthy. If I felt bad about myself and unworthy, then I would likely do what was comfortable and go back to all I had ever known.

Regardless of anything that happened, having #CarGuy in my life and my support circle was everything! 

I mentioned in my separation post that I walked into a doctor's appointment and was told "you're an abused spouse." 



I was shaking when I walked into her exam room. As soon as I opened my mouth I started sobbing uncontrollably. I told her that I thought I needed to be on anti-anxiety medication again, but I was scared because before it had made me feel like a zombie.

She asked me what was going on in my life and I told her that I was currently separated and about to file for divorce, that my soon-to-be ex had made the appointment for me because he felt I needed to be medicated.

She immediately told me that I was exhibiting signs of an abused spouse. The uncontrollable shaking, continuous vomiting, uncontrollable crying, lack of appetite, and becoming paralyzed when I needed to get the ball rolling on certain tasks.

The fact that he had called in to have me medicated was a huge red flag.

I should also mention she had seen him a couple weeks prior. So she knew both of us and both sides of what was happening.

She asked me to explain to her what was going on during the separation. I explained to her the rules we established in our therapy session, explained to her all his behaviors, showed her texts, emails, and even let her listen to his voicemails. I told her about his admittance to an affair during our sessions and let her know that they were now public as well.

She walked out of the room, came back in and then started a report. She told me "you're an abused spouse and you're exhibiting all the signs of a battered woman trying to get away." She had the front desk staff put on alert, and then locked all my files so he couldn't try to use my doctor's appointment as a way to stall the divorce.

She told me that he was acting the way he was, because he was losing control over me and couldn't handle it.

What neither of us knew was that this doctor specialized in the care of abused women.

As we went through everything that had happened during the separation and what had gone on during the marriage she suggested a few books, & suggested a therapist for me.

She told me that there was a lot of damage done that I couldn't even see yet. First I needed to see a therapist to help me heal, and I needed to learn how to establish boundaries.

She didn't understand why the marriage counselor was allowing my ex to act the way he was, SHE wasn't establishing clear boundaries for him and wasn't creating a safe space for me. She was pretty livid about this.

She gave me a prescription for anti-anxiety meds to help me get a grasp and simply be able to function so I could get out.

I left my appointment pretty stunned. Me? I was an abused spouse? But he never touched me... I'm a strong woman. My girlfriends come to me to ask about relationship advice.

When I got back to my car I had already missed texts and calls from him wanting to know what the doctor had said and what medication she had put me on. I was hesitant to answer him, but once I felt safe in my own space I told him (why, I'll never know) that she told me I was an abused spouse.

He laughed and told me that I wasn't an abused spouse, she didn't know what she was talking about. Then proceeded to tell me that I needed to get rid of my friends, because they weren't my friends. & that I needed to separate myself from my parents because they didn't want what was best for me. He told me that I should know that he was the one that loved me the most and wanted the best for me.

I wouldn't schedule the appointment with my new therapist for a couple more months, but I can tell you I sure was glad I did because I learned SO much. Hey! I'm not crazy!