Yesterday I got a text message from a person I know who used to live here, but moved to Australia a few years ago. They had visited here last December and he had asked me to help him with his web site. So, in the late afternoon / evening he usually IM's me since it's morning there.
I was in the middle of some stuff and I didn't reply right away. So he says:
"Are you OK? Are you guys OK?"
I was kind of in shock, nobody I'm doing work for ever asks me how I'M doing. Just 'when is it going to be done?'
So, I tell him my story. He and his W know my W also. Needless to say he was shocked, sad.
But, then he went on to tell me how HIS W was in a depression for years, how she turned to alcohol, how she crashed several times and how he got her help, got her moving again and she's on anti depressants now and they are building a new life, a new future together.
How he didn't give up on her. And how HE had to go to counseling to learn what HIS part was in her depression.
Like so many others, he didn't see much of a chance of things changing and in the end he felt I'd be 'ok on the other side'.
Still, it was a real revelation to hear someone else tell a similar story, but that the 'well' person had the integrity to stick it out, and actually help the 'sick' person through their ordeal. It doesn't make it hurt any less, it just reminds me how W and I are such completely different people when it comes to something SHE was real big on saying was important to her - 'Integrity'.
It gets a little easier to let her go as I see what a selfish, self centered person she has become and how it is such a contradiction, a lie, when compared to what she has SAID she believes in.
I'm a good person, I have integrity and selfless love for my family. I don't need to run to 'new age spirituality' so I can justify running away and abandoning my spouse or my kids. I'll stick it out to the end of time.
I finished one of my projects last night. That was a good feeling.
