Woke up early this morning feeling mildly down. I find that I remind myself each morning that this isn’t a nightmare, my H has left and he wants a D. Reality-based thinking but not overly helpful.
Been thinking about the concept of love and how it starts out as an overwhelming, chemically-charged feeling that eventually goes away and morphs into a comfortable familiarity that is easy to under value. It is also very active in that each day, you must choose to love someone...forgive them for their shortcomings (and we all have many) and accept them for who they are. You also have to continue to give something of yourself and make efforts even when you are tired and don’t feel like it. Too many of us become complacent and just let things go. I did this. My H did this. We are both guilty of it and if I could go back, I would do things so much differently. I would stop telling him how much I loved him and start showing him. Action... that is what was missing in our marriage...on both our parts. I will forever regret not figuring that out sooner. But...you can’t go back and can only move forward. So now I need to focus on actively loving him...by letting him go and becoming a better person, a better parent, a better (future) partner. My H? Not sure what he would do differently. In his mind, he would probably just leave sooner without all of the lies. That makes me sad. I wonder if he is actually really capable of truly loving someone - through the good times and the bad. I suspect not. For him love is a passive thing. You either feel it or you don’t and it is the other person’s responsibility to make you feel it. I wish I had known that before I married him. He has a lot of emptiness inside of him and he used me to fill it for awhile. But it has caught up to him and to us. I think he will look for something or someone else to fill it because it is the easy way out. I don’t think he will ask himself the tough questions or really do the work he would need to do to be capable of real love. I am sad for him in that regard because I really do wish him peace and self-fulfillment.
Bittersweet moment this morning. Since our kids were born, I’ve really struggled with my self image which was tied a lot to my weight. It affected our sex life big time. I did not feel attractive. I could not imagine he found me attractive. So I avoided ML even though I craved intimacy. I did not talk to him about it. I think I was too ashamed and embarrassed and I know he suffered from what probably looked like indifference. Last January, I decided to lose the weight once and for all so I could start to feel like myself again. I set what I thought was a bit of a lofty goal (high school weight) but I thought...go big or go home, right? So this morning I stepped on my scale and not only did I reach my goal, I am actually one pound under it. Yay me!!! So...feeling better in my own skin, for the most part. I guess it is important to find something to feel good about even when things seem pretty dark. Progress...even if only in tiny little steps is important. I feel like maybe I made some progress these past few days but it has been really, really tough. Better days are ahead.
