Jeff, I've seen your comments on WCW's thread and then I noticed we share the same birthday -- I'm just two years older. So, I came over to read your latest thread.
Your comment about being in your home in front of your fireplace and celebrating with your family for your birthday and your comment about feeling old and not wanting to play the dating game really hit a sore spot in me.
I've gotten comments from friends that I just need to move on and get a boyfriend -- I'll feel better. If only it were that easy. My kids were not very happy with me but I spent my birthday this year working at a holiday bazaar. For my 50th birthday, my husband gave me a wonderfully orchestrated suprise birthday party that included web camming in friends from our dating days. Shortly before my 51st birthday, I got the ILYBINILWY speech and "I don't want to be married anymore." Shortly before my 52nd birthday, the D was signed, sealed, and delivered after a 25 year marriage. So, I can find plenty of empathy for your feelings regarding holidays and birthdays.
I've spent the last two years with a lot of anger and resentment, mainly because at a time I thought I would be working less and spending more time with H, kids, and grandkids, I work 70+ hours a week to balance out getting 50% of the bills on 1/5th of the income but I will not allow myself to be the statistical average "older" woman who never regains financial stability after the divorce -- quoted to me by my oh so blunt attorney. Alaska is a great state to live in but not if you are on the receiving end of a D.
So, I would simply say to you to give yourself time to grieve. A divorce, in my opinion, is really a more difficult life transition than the death of a spouse. To that, I added moving from our home of 23 years (although we were in the process of moving anyway so H did not have long commute, it became much more traumatic when there was no new family home), new job, loss of contact with long-term friends, and struggling with what HUD classifies "low income" for Alaska even though I was working one full-time and two part-time jobs (a light bulb moment as I was trying to purchase a place to live on my own as I hated the apartment and have two large dogs).
Even though I was with a lot of people, giving out samples of a new product I'm selling, I found myself thinking about our family a lot on Saturday. I've been on a couple of dates -- disasters, really. As much as I want to hate him, I still love XH and miss him a lot. I've had a lot of therapy on this BB, 1 on 1 counseling for this and a lot of other baggage, and I'm trying as hard as I can to be grateful for what I have including employment, a roof over my head, a car to drive, some really wonderful friends, and children and grandchildren who love me.
What any of us do from this point forward is our choice, without considering the influence it may have on a life partner. For what it's worth, I believe love itself is a choice once the head-over-heels phase of "love" runs it course and I don't buy into the it's not my fault I just fell out of love stuff. I've decided at this point to just be the person I am and do what inspires some happiness in my life. I still have those pangs of total aloneness when I startle awake from a dream and want to snuggle up -- only to realize I'm snuggling with my very hairy 120 pound German Shepherd and not XH -- or when I could really use a shoulder to lean on accompanied by a big hug. But when I look at our children and the hurt they've gone through I just don't see how "finding a boyfriend" could possibly resolve what's still going on in our family.
I don't really want to spend the rest of my life alone but for now that is the choice I've made. I don't know what type of basket case you were when you arrived here but I think you are certainly a wise, tempered person at this point in your life.
