Anna Duggar Is Planning Huge Christmas Without Her Husband, Described Visit With Josh As ‘Best Three Days’ Of Her Life
Anna Duggar has big Christmas plans, but they don’t include her husband. While Anna spends the holiday with Josh Duggar’s parents and siblings, he’ll likely spend his Christmas in a recovery meeting.
After Anna Duggar’s troubled husband had admitted to cheating on her and looking at internet pornography, he decided that the best way to deal with the fallout from his actions was to go into a recovery program. Josh left his family for the Reformers Unanimous facility in Rockford, Illinois late in August, and he’s been there ever since.
During her latest chat about Josh Duggar on Jill & Jessa: Counting On, Anna described Reformers as a “Christian recovery program,” not a rehab.
“It was something that Josh decided. He really felt that he was at a place where he needed a lot of help,” Anna Duggar said, according to Rawstory.
However, Anna hinted that she wasn’t completely happy with her husband’s decision to leave his family for six months. Anna has had little time to talk things over with Josh Duggar because of Reformers’ strict rules on phone calls and visitations, and she’s definitely feeling her husband’s absence now that she has to care for their four kids without him.
“It wasn’t an easy choice [for Josh to go to rehab] when you have a new baby and three other little ones to take care of realizing, ‘Wow, I’m going to be alone for an extended period of time,'” Anna said, according to Radar Online.
However, Anna Duggar isn’t completely alone. She is currently sleeping in the girls’ room at Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar’s house, so she’s probably getting very little time to herself these days. Even though she misses Josh, who she described as her “one and only,” she’s reportedly looking forward to spending Christmas with his family while he stays in Illinois and sticks with the Reformers program.
“The Duggars, including Anna and her kids, are planning a big Christmas this year with the whole family together,” a Duggar family source told ETonline. “Regardless of all the negativity that has happened in the past few months, we are going to be positive and celebrate Christmas.”
However, the “whole family” actually won’t be there. The source went on to say that Josh probably won’t be coming home for Christmas.
“I imagine he still has a lot of issues to work through and it’s better he stay there.”
Radar Online is also reporting that Anna Duggar’s husband will be spending the holidays in Illinois. A source revealed that Reformers doesn’t let its students go home for the holidays, and they’re still required to attend mandatory recovery meetings on Christmas Day. Family members are allowed to visit on Christmas, but the source says that none of Josh’s relatives are planning on flying in to see him.
The last time Anna likely saw Josh was last month when she visited Reformers Unanimous with their baby daughter, Meredith, and she was very happy to see her husband. According to People, Anna Duggar described her November visit with Josh as the “best three days” of her life, so it looks like absence really does make the heart grow fonder.
Even though Reformers is extremely strict, and Josh is spending a lot of time there, some critics aren’t so sure that it will do Anna Duggar’s husband a lot of good. Gawker writer Ashley Feinberg described Reformers Unanimous as “little more than a glorified, bible-based labor camp” where campers “study the Bible and work for free for the next six months.” However, Anna Duggar isn’t relying on Reformers to save her marriage. During her appearance on Jill & Jessa: Counting On, she revealed that she’s hoping that God will decide to restore her marriage.
There’s no word on whether Anna Duggar is also planning to spend some time with her own family during the holidays, but Christmas would likely be a bit awkward at the Keller house. According to People, Anna Duggar’s parents, Mike and Suzette Keller, believe that divorce is never an option, so they’ll likely be thrilled about Anna’s decision to stay with Josh. However, Anna Duggar’s brother, Daniel Keller, has criticized his parents for telling Anna to say with Josh for what he felt was a very selfish reason. Allegedly, they feared that a divorce would tarnish their family’s reputation. Daniel tried to convince his sister that she’d be better off divorcing Josh, but obviously, she didn’t listen.
“But I won’t stop trying to get that pig out of our family,” Daniel wrote in the comments section of one of Jessa Duggar Seewald’s Facebook posts.
According to Radar Online, Anna’s younger sister, Susanna Keller, was also rooting for Anna to divorce Josh and “never really cared for him.” Anna might want to avoid her family this Christmas in order to avoid an argument about her decision to stay with her husband.
It’s astonishing just how much life has changed for Josh and Anna Duggar since last Christmas. 19 Kids and Counting hadn’t been canceled, Josh still had a job working for the Family Research Council in Washington, D.C., and his family decided to put him front and center in a special Christmas video.
Are you surprised that Josh and Anna Duggar won’t be spending Christmas together?
[Image via TLC/YouTube]
