The Silent Tears of Polygamy
Page 13
When Alec got home, I mentioned to him what Ahmad had said. I asked Alec if he thought there was any validity in what Ahmad had said in comparison to his own life. Alec said that a part of it was true for him. He said that he was mentally tired, but not physically tired from living polygamy.
I didn’t push for him to elaborate. Would he admit to it, if he was physically tired as well? Would he admit that the sex was wearing him ragged and dragging him down, if it was? I doubt he would tell me. I don’t think it would be a very macho thing for most men to do. We know how men are about their masculinity.
I get curious about him and Carolyn quite often. I, however, have learned to restrain myself when it comes to talking about the two of them. I wonder how Alec maintains his sanity. I can’t take away from him that he is a strong man. It’s admirable how he has held up for so long in a lifestyle that has him torn between two women who hate each other’s guts. He has two masters and is the master of none.
Every now and again, Alec tells me that he has no one to talk with about his life of living in a polygamous marriage. I imagine that it’s a heavy-laden burden for him sometimes to have no one to share his feelings and thoughts with.
Alec wanted to discuss it with me. He wanted to talk with me about Carolyn and our lives. Well, I wouldn’t hear of it. I refused to let him talk about her to me. Although I tried to understand what Alec was going through and how he must feel about it, I was not willing to help him carry the load. I hadn’t any intention to share in it, other than what was unavoidable.
I have enough going on in my life, trying to maintain my sanity through all this without Alec burdening me with talk about him, her and me. He didn’t feel a need to sit down and talk with me about it before he did it. He didn’t ask me if I thought it was a good idea for him to marry her. He didn’t ask me how I felt and what I thought about it. What makes him think that it’s okay to include me now?
I said, “Don’t talk about her to me.” “I don’t want you to talk to me about Carolyn.” I have already lost time with my husband due to polygamy The time that I have with him, I don’t want to spend in discussions about his other woman. She shouldn’t exist to me. Two can play the game of non-existence.
My wise friend, Ali, had said to me, “What a person talks about the most is what means most to him.” If Alec bends my ear with talk about Carolyn, it would mean that she means most to him. I didn’t want his discussions of her to be my reality.
Alec’s mom says she won’t allow Alec to talk to her about his polygamous life. She said she doesn’t believe in polygamy and doesn’t believe that Alec has another wife other than me. She gets irritated every time that I referred to Carolyn as his wife. She never ceased to ask me why I do it. I do it because I know in Islam polygamy is lawful. I can’t deny that fact. Is Carolyn his wife? I can only go on what he says.
As polygamy isn’t accepted by the average person in the US, it’s best that Alec keeps his mouth shut about it and not go popping off at the mouth about it to strangers. It would be in his best interest not to speak with non-Muslims about it. He shouldn’t trust anyone because God tells us to trust no one but Him.
The non-Muslims wouldn’t understand about polygamy, and it could bring about trouble, if rumor circulate about Alec being polygamous. Some polygamous men probably end up unemployed when the word gets out that they are polygamous. It’s funny how most people accept that the masses fornicate and commit adultery but won’t tolerate a man who says he has more than one wife, and he maintains and protects them all.
I don’t flaunt living a polygamous life. I will be truthful and admit that this lifestyle is humiliating for me. One may ask how I could be ashamed of something that the highly respected and honorable Prophet Muhammad (Peace and blessings of God be upon him) did.
I felt ashamed because I wondered if people thought it was my fault that my husband went off and married another woman. Did they think that I was lacking as a wife and couldn’t keep my husband happy? Did I fail him in some kind of way, and now I am a failure? Those type of thoughts paraded across my mind from time to time. Where did I go wrong?
Well, as most people know, polygamy isn’t legal in the US. Thus, living a polygamous life in the States comes with its issues. My Marriage License is my good old, handy, standby. If I ever need to negotiate a divorce from Alec, the fact that he is polygamous would be my ace in the hole. It’s another thing that my wali, Ali had taught me. He told me to always have leverage. Keep the upper hand.
A lot of times when I’m angry at Alec, I remind him that polygamy isn’t legal in the US. I do so just to put him on edge. I try not to let talking about polygamy or living it invoke any fear in my heart. It didn’t stop me from trying to invoke fear in Alec. I still had a need for him to suffer for what I was going through.
I know that I’m supposed to only fear God and God alone. I shouldn’t be ashamed to live in a polygamous marriage. I really would like to get to that place where I believe and live the way God commands me to in all things. I won’t give up on trying to get there. Polygamy was the way of our beloved Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and the other Messengers of God, and their wives. Who am I to think that I’m too good for this lifestyle?
Be that as it may, of course I don’t walk about talking to strangers about Alec and his other wife . The only people who knew what was going on in our home were my non-Muslim immediate family, Alec’s non-Muslim immediate family, and my wali and his family.
As you know, my Muslim Egyptian friend Ahmad, knows as well. Ahmad is cool to talk with on the phone. He usually makes good points and gives me very good advice. He also has a real perspective of polygamy, having seen it lived in Egypt. Having a friend who could understand and relate to what I was going through was a source of solace for me.
Oh, I forgot to mention that one of my non-Muslim female colleagues Elaina, knows about my new lifestyle as well. She was astonished upon hearing of it from me. When I first told her about it, she said that she would divorce Alec, if she were me. Well, she wasn’t me, and she was surely talking out her rear end, as no one knows what they’d do until they are in the situation.
Another time that I spoke with Elaina after she now knew of my situation, she asked me if I needed a man. She said, “Do you really need a man.” Though she didn’t say it out loud, I think she wanted to add the words, ‘that bad’ to the question. Do I need a man that bad?
I could tell that she thought that I was foolish to tolerate such a thing as polygamy in my marriage. Well, I said, “Yes. I do. I need a man.” I know that my answer blew her mind. Sometimes it comes super easy for me to be direct with others. I’m instantaneous with it at times. It’s just hit or miss. Nothing more was said between her and me after that.
I thought to myself that even with all that was going on in my life, at least I have a husband. She didn’t. She was engaged once until she caught her fiancé in her bed with another woman. What she thought about me and my life didn’t really matter to me. I was only talking with her about it, because, honestly speaking, I had just needed to talk. I needed an ear that could hear me at the time.
I had listened to many of her sob stories over the years. I thought it wasn’t too much to ask her to listen to me and mine. She didn’t mind listening. She just couldn’t believe that I’d allow my husband to do such a thing to me, and she expressed it. It was understandable that she’d think that way. She wasn’t Muslim. Actually, she was Buddhist.
When I listened to Elaina; my younger sister Elouise; Alec’s mom; my mom; and Asiya about their take on me and my marriage, it caused me to question myself.
I was unsure of myself lately. I thought that somehow, without meaning to, I had failed Alec and our marriage. I wondered if he loved Carolyn more than he loved me. I thought that she must be better than I am. After all, he had married her. Maybe I was deficient in some way, and she had more to offer him. I thought maybe I just wasn’t good enough. I never thought that way about myself before he married her.
The destructive thoughts kept running a circle in my brain. I was in a discombobulated state of not knowing up from down. I doubted myself and Alec’s love for me. Now, I was insecure, wondering if my husband would one day say he was leaving me for good and was going to live a monogamous life with Carolyn.
So now I fear losing my husband to another woman; although Alec has assured me that he will not leave me for her. Again, no one knows the future except God. Therefore, I couldn’t count on what Alec said to be the Gospel Truth. What he said was meaningless in a sense. I had no real assurance.
I was living polygamy in agony, and a great portion of it was my own doing. I agonized myself. Although I know that God knows, sees, hear and controls all things, it didn’t deter me from playing detective. I kept watch over Alec and had my finger on the pulse of everything that he was doing.
When Alec was home with me, I was almost his shadow, tracking his every step. If he and I weren’t in the same room, my ears perked up, and I tried to hear what he was doing. Whenever he picked up the phone and dialed, I wondered who he was calling. If he was speaking on the phone, I wondered if he was talking with Carolyn. When his phone rang, I wondered if it was her who was calling.
I was obsessed and it was alarming for me to see myself this way. Was I developing an Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)? Being all up someone’s butt had never been a part of me before. Alec couldn’t move without me being there, so to speak. If he were to pass gas, I’d get caught up in the cloud. Not only my lifestyle had changed, my habits did, as well. I had picked up some that I wasn’t proud of.
Alec didn’t leave our home without me during my days, other than to go to work. I went with him to the store. I went with him to his mother’s home. I had the crazy thought that if he left me to go to his mother’s home or anyplace else, he possibly could end up at Carolyn’s home. There was no way I was about to let that happen.
My thoughts constantly tormented me. They were the source of my pain. They were the bane of my existence. I must have forgotten about Satan and his whispers. Satan creates false illusions that seem real.
I was having illusions about Alec, about where he was going and what he was doing. Satan was having a good time playing in my head. I was becoming more and more out of touch with reality the more that I listened to Satan. I was at fault for giving him air time in my head.
Due to different reasons in our lives, we think and react to all things differently as humans, even in the same situation. Alec being a man had different expectations. He had thought polygamy would work well with him, Carolyn and me. Here he was, one man, Alec, thinking for me, without my permission.
He often said that Carolyn and I were nice people. Alec frequently said how nice Carolyn and I were. Maybe indeed, we were kindhearted people. But we were nice people as separate entities, individuals who didn’t overlap, and we certainly weren’t nice to each other.
Once the intersecting happened, everything changed. Speaking for and of myself, I had buried the nice side of me. I seldom saw the person who I once was, the nice one who smiled and was excited about life. She was long gone, and I didn’t think that I’d ever see her again.
Alec said that because I read the Quran, studied, prayed, and tried to live Islam, he thought that the three of us could learn Islam together and be a family. It’s where I hit a roadblock, and I get confused. Alec and I didn’t pray together or read the Quran together, except for a few times in the five years that we’ve been married. All throughout my marriage, I had done those things on my own.
It bewilders me that somehow Alec thinks things will change now that he is married to Carolyn whom I believe only took the Shahada (vow to be a Muslim) to marry him? Sometimes, no matter how hard I try, I just can’t process Alec’s thought pattern.
Carolyn and I don’t speak to each other and yet, somehow, Alec thinks we will suddenly do everything together as a family. I shake my head when it comes to men. I just don’t know about them. They are strange creatures. Alec was living in his head. I’m not the only one whom Satan was playing with and having fun with.
One day and out of nowhere, Alec said,
“Sometimes you want something, and you get it. But once you get it, you don’t want it anymore.” That was all that Alec said. He didn’t expound on it. I don’t know why I don’t follow up Alec’s statements with questions. I just listen most of the time.
What Alec said led me to believe that things weren’t as he had expected them to be in his marriage to Carolyn. Maybe he didn’t expect polygamy in general to be the way that it was.
Alec sometimes says to me that he doesn’t have any time for himself, but Carolyn and I do. Whose fault is it? It certainly isn’t mine. I didn’t say, for instance, ‘Hey Alec, I’ve got a girlfriend over here who is in need of a husband. Why don’t you marry her?’ Alec initiated a relationship with Carolyn during his and my marriage. He needs to look at himself when it come to this predicament that he is in.
Anymore, I try not to expect anything to look like what I thought it was going to look like. Assumptions and expectations are things that get one’s hope up. If one gets something unexpected and unwanted, his hope is shattered. He goes down a steep hill fast and it’s furious.
It’s better for one to keep her mind and options open. Hope for the best, but prepare for the worse. At least one would suffer lesser disappointments that way.
I didn’t feel special anymore. There was no cheery feeling when I got flowers from Alec unlike how it used to be. Receiving flowers from him failed to move me anymore. It was no longer a big deal to get them. I knew when I received them, Carolyn received them as well. How special is that?
Naturally, Alec is a very organized and structured man. Nonetheless, I explained to him that he doesn’t have to give Carolyn and me the same material things. It would please me for him to be original and inventive. I know men have a difficult time knowing what good gifts are to give women. Nonetheless, I needed Alec to try harder than ever now to figure it out. I don’t want to receive from him the same thing that he gives her.
“She and I are different people, from different backgrounds and with different tastes,” I said. I wanted to make sure that he understood that being married to the same man doesn’t make Carolyn and me each other’s clone. “We have different likes and dislikes.”
No matter what I said though, Alec didn’t hear me. I think he had figured out the manner in which he would get things for Carolyn and me. He had programmed himself. No matter how much I tried to deprogram him, it wasn’t working. It was embedded in his brain how he’d do things.
All was not lost though. By Alec being so regimented, I was given a window to see into the person that Carolyn was. I found out a lot about her just from knowing what Alec did for me. He always bought for her what he bought for me. I knew this because the things that he was bringing to me, I hadn’t asked for. She must have needed them or wanted them, so I got them by default.
For instance, one day Alec said that he was thinking about buying yoga lessons for me. Yoga what? Why? I hadn’t discussed anything of sorts with him. I do my workouts at home, which includes yoga. He knows good and well that I like to workout at home, not at a gym or fitness center. He and I only workout at those type of places when we are on vacation together. I enjoy and prefer it that way. He knows this. I never asked him to buy me any type of lessons.
And on comes the light bulb. Oh, okay, I see. Carolyn must be getting a bit chunky and needs or wants to go to the gym. Well, I wasn’t, and I had no interest in visiting the gym. I could stand to lose some pounds, but
it wasn’t to the point that I had a fat derriere that needed to hit the gym.
Nonetheless, Alec wanted us to go on a planned diet, so I thought, okay. It could only help. When Alec and I started dieting and documenting our weight, I assumed he and Carolyn were doing the same. It turns out they were. I looked through his phone and there was a text message that she had sent him with her weight noted. She weighed in.
Whatever Carolyn wanted, I got, and it didn’t matter if I wanted it or not. What I got was based on Carolyn’s wants, needs and likes. She was down and out financially when Alec married her. I knew it by where she lived.
Alec never even asked me what I wanted, and I got very tired of getting what she wanted or needed, even when I didn’t want it or need it, which was a lot of the time. The biggest problem was that I got very tired of telling him just how tired that I was of it. I was tired of telling him that I was tired.
It was silly of me to complain that Alec became more generous towards me once he married Carolyn. It benefited me. For instance, one day I was flipping through a catalogue and there were a few things that I liked and wanted. I mentioned it to Alec. He said, “Go ahead and order them, if you want them.” That had never happened before. My head spun around and I looked at him in disbelief.
The icing on the cake was when he gave his credit card to me. I was beyond shocked. Who was this man? Where did my husband go? What had gotten into him? In all the years that we have been together as husband and wife, he had never done that before. I looked strangely at him, took the credit and went shopping.
One day, just out of the blue, Alec said, “I haven’t seen you in a long coat. I’m going to buy you one.” Really? A red flag immediately went up. Humm, Carolyn must need a coat. I mentioned to you that Carolyn was in dire financial straits when he hooked back up with her. Anyhow, I immediately thought that here she is in need again. Now, Alec was trying to get me a coat as well.