Hope it's not too late

[what next?]

I know that the towels weren't the problem obviously. My point was that I was trying to understand what the problem was but she was unable to communicate it to me. I also know that I need a job but more for my own sanity than for what it would provide us. I was doing what I thought would be best for us down the road not understanding that she had a clock ticking in her head down to the day I graduated. Last year on our anniversary she gave me a card that was a (long) list of all the things she loved about me. I had no reason to suspect that she was about to walk away from our marriage. This year it was clear that she was unhappy but it coincided with her workload increasing dramatically and I attributed it to that. I tried everything that I knew how to do to respond to what I thought was the problem. I was booking us vacations, had her go out with friends, tried to get her to define herself and what would make her happy but none of that was the problem. I was. As soon as I understood that I went to work on me. Not that I wouldn't have before but the whole event humbled me in a way that I could not have been humbled any other way. When the one thing that you treasure more than anything else in life tells you that they are leaving you it is clear rather quickly that everything you think you know about your relationship and about love is wrong.

Through this experience I have come closer to understanding things that I never thought I would be able to know. I have seen the outpouring of support from friends and family and have felt genuinely loved. Getting on lexapro would have never happened without this and that alone has guaranteed me that my life will never be the same. I have always wanted to be a good person and to realize that I have failed to fulfill that crushes me. But the most painful part of this whole experience is understanding how much I have learned and gained from it all off of her suffering. Without her bottling up so much pain for so long and erupting it on me I could have never known the things that I know now and that devastates me.