Cagz,

How are you doing today? I know the weekends suck, but the more you find yourself the more you will see what great company you really are! Last night I was all alone, and I found myself hoping that my H (oops, XH) wouldn't stop by or IM me! How weird is that?

I don't know how to talk to you about my sitch, as it sounds as if I am still working to get my H (oops, XH !) back when I read my words back.

I'm not. It took me these couple of years to realize that I deserve better. It is still hard for me to write those words since I know that I wasn't the greatest wife in the world, and I don't want to come across as if I were perfect and he was the problem. But, Cagz, I can't keep owning all of this, and I can't keep making excuses as to why I don't deserve more.

The odd thing is that now he wants to give me the things that I wanted in the first place. He needed to know that I loved him enough to let him go, that if his happiness meant being without me that I could give him my blessing to pursue it. I used to have the hardest time with that! I didn't want him to be happy! I wanted him to be miserable without me!!!

I have come to learn that is the easy way out. I didn't want to have to do all of the hard work on myself, I just wanted to wait him out...hoping for the big moment when he would realize that I was the greatest thing, ever.

Well, Cagz, I wasn't. I'm still not, but I have a healthy respect for who I am for the first time. It is getting easier and easier for me to see that I want more, and I deserve more. The past is the past, and I have to quit revisiting that.

Being in this place makes me patient. I am not jumping all over my H's (damn it! XH's) \:\) words now. This is making it easier for him to say them! Who knew?

My biggest fear is that he will now want back and I won't want him! That is a hard thing for me to wrap my mind around after fighting so hard to save this.

I am in a good place. I want to want him, not need him. That is a huge difference. And quite frankly, I don't want that old guy back. I will patiently wait and see if he has it inside of him to do the work now, too. If so, great. If not, well, I will be ok.

I hope this doesn't confuse you further. I am just trying to show you what is on the other side of letting go. And, if you aren't ready to go here, I understand. I wasn't, for the longest time. You are doing much better than I did, because I found that I would avoid people like me on this board! I have already told Betsey that this included her for a bit. I thought that I was missing some big secret that the "success" stories had.

Cagz, this is my shot at a happy relationship. I have learned so much about myself in these past years. I see now that maybe I could have tried to fit myself back into my old marriage (basically by sucking it all up and doing everything he wanted me to do), but I would have lost my spirit. I would have had to fake it for the rest of my life. Ugh. To think that I really considered that! I just wanted the marriage back. I didn't care what my role within it was.

This new me is sooooo attractive to my XH. How crazy is that?

Guess what? If he wants me, he'll have to work for it! He has years of non-valentines or "I love you's" to make up for. I used to convince myself that I didn't really need those things; I just needed my H here with me. NOT TRUE! I do want the romance and the simple gestures. Whats more, I deserve it!

As do you. You deserve to have all that you want in this life. Lets keep working on whatever is blocking you from believing that.

Happy Saturday!

Pam