Consider how productive and forward moving you are now. Compare that to your life in your marriage. Beginning to see that life in your old M was flattening you more than you knew?
I don't know about that. It's just...different.
While I was married:
I had two wonderful kids and was blessed to be able to stay home with them for at least their first year. While I was pregnant with my daughter, I completed a 20-week institute on parent leadership/civics, then went on to join AmeriCorps. My then-husband was super-supportive, going to each class with me after the baby was born so he could bring her into me when she needed to nurse, ensuring I could finish the class. I never felt pressured to work.
I went on to be hired in my career, which I love (teaching art).
I got involved in Girl Scouts at the local and county level.
I was a straight-A student pursuing my master's.
I felt like I had good friends, with good families. That my life was full of supportive and loving people.
I was able to be there for my sister while she graduated high school, then collage, and then as she married.
I was able to be there for my mom at the end of her life.
And I felt like I was in a solid, loving marriage to my best friend.
Now, I can look back and see that things weren't perfect, but flattening...? No, I felt supported, for the most part. I was happy, and comfortable, and felt loved.
I had a good life.
Don't get me wrong- I am making a good life, again. Just very different. I lost so much;and have been working hard on rebuilding things, looking at stuff that hadn't been dealt with. I'm not convinced that it is better. Not yet. Maybe that will come in time. But, maybe our unique coping mechanisms meshed very well, for the time that they did.
Now, I am much more reflective. I have turned attention to my spirituality. I have had to build all new relationships - family, friends. I am in complete control of my financial and household matters, along with the responsibilities and stresses that it encompasses. I can see different opportunities that weren't available to me before.
But I have paid a big price. And so have my kids.
There were compromises in my marriage. But I think there always need to be compromises when two people come together to share a life.
Things change.
I am struggling to get back to a fraction of my productivity and engagement in life. I feel like I have had to start all over again. None of the "bonuses" have been worth all of this - just making due with second-best.
Now, instead of building my life and foundation on the love of my life, I will have to build it on myself. Seems lonelier, if safer. My innocence is gone; my ability to trust will never be the same - I know what people are capable of, now. I will never regret loving him as much as I did. And even as I might realize that he is not good for me (as he has now chosen to be), I still love him. Yep, I know full well that I love people who don't necessarily deserve it. If this is a flaw or a weakness or whatever, I'd rather be like this than another way.
Simply put - when was my life better, 1999 or 2009?
1999. Definitely. But we can't go back. So, I'll try to learn, try to keep growing and becoming a better person, and move forward.
