Harmonic Divergence

[Lord Grenville]

I titled this thread Harmonic Divergence, partly because that is what my marriage feels like right now, but also as a play on words, referring back to the August 1987 "Harmonic Convergence" new age event when my wife accepted my proposal for marriage so that we could partner for a lifetime of spiritual and artisitic growth together.

My W and I had graduated with degrees in Fine Arts from the University of Florida just weeks after we had met and fallen in love. We have always shared so many of the same interests in art, music and spiritual pursuits, and I always felt very lucky that she and I had so much in common.

Fast forward about 19 years...

She had seemed a little depressed in the past year or so, but I thought it was due to her having trouble adjusting to our move to the small town of Amesbury (one hour north of Boston) after living in boston for 16 + years, and the fact that she had put on weight as a result of us not riding bikes and exercising as much as we used to when we lived without a car in the city. She's never worked through self-esteem and body-image issues which date back to criticisms from her parents and an abusive boyfriend prior to meeting me. (I have always been careful to never criticize her phycial appearance, and the two nicknames that I use when I communicate to her are: "bellisima" and "beautiful").

In early December 2006, she decided she wanted to see a therapist, and I thought that would be a good thing to do. After just a single visit, she informed me that she was feeling numb and detached from her feelings and she felt like she needed "to spend time alone" to understand what she was going through. That was the first bomb because in the previous 19 years, she had never expressed any dissatisfaction with our marriage, never requested or nagged me to alter any habits, behaviors, etc.

We began to see a marriage counselor together once a week about 8 weeks ago, and she is still going to her therapist in Cambridge once a week. At our first marriage counseling session, she informed me that she was not interested in working with clay anymore, and that she did not want to pursue the dream of working full time together with me, in a business making decorative ceramic tiles, which is a dream we have shared and been working towards for many years. This is so inexplicable too, because she was very passionate about pottery and decorative ceramics over the recent years.

The second bomb to explode was a silent bomb that I still have not acknowledged to my Wife or counselor. I peeked in her journal a few weeks ago, and I saw in her own writing, a yearning for a new partner - someone to bring her "euphoric connections, joy, joy, joy! Someone to travel with" etc. She wrote about the fear that she might have to pay alimony, which indicates she has been thinking about divorce, even though she still has not ever brought up that topic in discussions. She also wrote about guilt that she feels because she does not want to work on repairing the marriage. And she says we have both "given and received all that we can in this marriage".

My heart and head does not agree with that last statement at all!
I realize now that I had taken her and our marriage for granted, thinking that we would always be together because we were soulmates. I truly do believe that if we could work through this period of multiple difficulties, we might enter the best phase of life and marriage yet.

Right now, I am 2/3 of the way through Divorce Busting, and I have read enough about techniques to know that I need to work on bettering myself and not putting any pressure on her. The frustrating thing is, as I have cooperated in verbally supporting her need for her own space and looking for an apartment. In the past week, she seems happier, but she has also requested that we not have sexual relations any more. So the Divergence is happening as I help keep things Harmonic.

I will try to finish reading DB in the next couple of days, while my W is away in New York City for a convention of the College Art Association. I am also busying myself with builiding a jewelry making work bench as a belated surprise Valentine's gift for her. After she told me she did not want to work with clay any more, she signed up for a metalsmithing class again that she used to enjoy in years past. I would like her to know that I am encouraging her artistic expression, even while I am coming to terms with the fact that our dream of working together seems to be fading away. I have to hold on to the hope that if I can change myself for the better, she might reconsider her future with me too.

Thanks for reading my novella. I will welcome any insights or advice as this journey goes forward.

Marc