Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Rolling in the Deep

Once upon a time I met a very nice, funny, smart man (bonus points for his English/Australian accent). We argued from the third date forward, bickered, drove each other mad... but persevered and fell in love. I married this man who fit into my family like a hand into glove, who had all the markers of a happy and successful life about him.

And then it disintegrated beneath our feet. We didn't do the work, we stopped appreciating, admiring and respecting one another and it all went to shit.

For the 18 months we have been separated he has been angry. His contempt for me and the choice I made came off of him in waves. This contempt kept me safe, kept me from really remembering who he is, and how good a person he really is.

On Fathers Day we took the kids out to lunch, and we had a very nice time all around. Grief did wash over me on the subway ride home when I looked across at my daughter sitting on her Daddy's lap, my son on the seat beside them legs tucked beneath him. It is another moment for me of the family portrait that I wanted so badly. I swallowed my grief, we got of the train and came home.

Yesterday, I got an email from him that I wish so much he had sent two years ago. The email that said, I see you, I miss you, and I love you. We have hurled too many poison darts, laid to many traps for the other, for us to even have a chance of a second chance. I do not love him like a husband, and I never will again, but I sobbed all night, and sobbed sporadically throughout the day, and my chest aches... and it feels like we are breaking up for the first time all over again.

I need to know, will this ever feel better?

1 comment:

100 Cups of Coffee said...

The short answer is YES.

The long answer is it takes time. You can't keep torturing yourself, or him. Forgive yourself. Marriages fail but it doesn't mean that either one of you failed. Sometimes we marry the wrong partner, we are the wrong partner, we become the wrong partner. People grow together or apart. They change, not always for the better. You have children with him so there will *always* be love there, and perhaps sadness over the loss of your family, but there doesn't always have to be sadness and despair over the end of your marriage. Take the 2 beautiful blessings you were given, thank God for the good times, and let yourself heal. It will happen - you just have to let it <3