Leah, part 6

[25yearsmlc]

Leah

VERY well done!!!

So, I'm divorced as of 2-3 weeks ago. And the sun still rose and set.

I found out I was divorced after the fact. Strange and anti climatic, but not that big a deal, to be honest.

I felt surprisingly calm and detached. I had gone to a personal growth workshop I'm a big fan of, the weekend before. Thank God.

Because the workshop jettisoned me down the road with letting go of a lot of this pain and anger at the betrayals and injustice and somehow, as much as I tried to depersonalize a lot of what xh had done, I had not let go of residual rage.

But at teh workshop I was finally able to see how much of his behavior had nothing to do with me. And so much to do with him.

OTOH, MY role - I looked away and avoided seeing SO MUCH crap on his end, directed towards me. I wanted to believe he had my values, that we would reconnect and I stayed largely b/c of his potential as a spouse, and his past, as a spouse.

He stopped being a loyal man, if he ever was. I don't miss that, now that I know of it. I can see the good we had, and not negate the whole marriage.

But I swear I believe in (most of ) my heart that he lost far more than I did. So if this were a contest, as it often felt like, he's not the winner. His life is not the index for MINE, but even if it were, he's lost a loyal wife, and I'm funny and smart and attractive and I like sex! Plus the shared history -OMG that, yes losing THAT bothers me.


But that's how it is. I have lost the person with whom I had a ton of shared history. And so has he. Bummer. Alas, there are worse things.

I believe I already am happier than i would have been if we had stayed married the way he is. Sure, sure, I wish he was the man he once was OR who I believed him to be. I do.

But i accept that he's not the guy I loved for decades. Accepting that was a huge leap forward. The second leap was realizing that his choices have more to do with him than me.

I just didn't know the real him of late, until the D. (Someone wrote that "you never really know someone until you divorce them" and that made me sort of laugh, but now I also agree. XH was a real jerk from jerk town in the divorce process. Just so dishonest and greedy, needlessly cruel, etc etc etc. NO THANKS).

There's zero question in my mind and heart that if I had joined him in Alaska, I'd be bereft.

If we remained married solely b/c I once again followed him where HE wanted to go even at MY EXPENSE,

how could I retain self respect? It'd be so in my face that I was a distant 2nd or 3rd or 8th priority to him, and that's assuming he wouldn't have had OW.

Um, no thanks. I suspect you may feel the same.

I've decided not to go on about how xh has still not seen the kids, or spoken to me in well over a year. Enough said.

My plans are to live abroad this fall for however long I feel like it. Hopefully with a job, and that's not solely financial but for social reasons. (Jobs give us interaction on a daily basis, as you know. In a foreign country it'll be hard to just start up conversations so I need some form of structured interaction).

I'm excited about what is starting for me, and I can tell you are excited about your new life, too. I'm dating as well. There are good men out there.

Keep us posted and let's try to connect in rl.

((( )))