The Day After

I didn't have any dreams.  I woke up fine...at first..then crying a minute later.

Yesterday I was your wife.  The day after, I was someone you use to be married to.
Someone you use to know.

I prepared food the night before knowing I wouldn't be able to function.  I skip my meals anyways.

I keep myself busy every minute.  I make lists of simple mindless tasks to do.  Organize my closet. Put photos in an album.  Stupid things that I've always wanted to do but never had the time.

Today all I have is time.  It seems endless.

The silence in the house has never been so loud.

I remind myself to eat.  I cry when I remember there is no one else to do so.

I watch movies all day and cry. There is a funny part that I know you will love.
I immediately pick up the phone to call you.  Then I put the phone down and cry.

Even if I make it through this day...will anything be different tomorrow?  

I am not a wife anymore.  I liked being a wife.  It meant someone loved me enough to pick me.
Being divorced means I wasn't loved enough.

Everyone says how hard divorce is.  But they never say how HARD divorce is.
You simply can not understand it until you have gone through it.

After we divorced the true pain began.

Becoming A Statistic

We didn't argue.  We liked the same food, movies and songs.  We loved singing "Sweet Child O' Mine" at the tops of our lungs. We loved to travel.  We loved books on tapes on long trips. We loved our dog. We had our own secret jokes.  Doesn't everyone?  

We saw other couples who were miserable, not even nice to each other and we said we were so lucky we weren't like that.  We still said our please and thank you's.

He was unhappy.  Of course I could see that.  But he said it was work.  He hated working.  

"Are you sure it's just work?  You seem mad at me, distant."

"No.  I just hate work."  And then he would hug me.

I tried hard to make things easy for him. Yet nothing was ever right.  But he assured me everything was fine.  He just had to figure the work thing out.  I believed him.  Why wouldn't I?  He had never lied to me.

So, at the height of success, he sold the business he had convinced me he wanted.  He went to work for someone else. And hated it.  Then he left there and did temporary work.  And hated it.  I stood by him during all of these changes hoping he would find his happiness.  I didn't push him, or nag him, or demand anything of him.  I just let him go his own way, supporting his every erratic decision.

After all, I wanted him to be happy.  You only get one life and you should be happy in it.

Five years of mood swings.  It was like walking on eggshells. Me always waiting for him to find his peace so we could have some real fun. So we could enjoy each other the way we did when there was less stress in our lives.

Until one day.... "I don't want to do this anymore."  The words came out of my mouth.  I was tired of him being miserable. I wanted us to fix it together.

I asked him to go to therapy together.  He didn't want to.

I asked him to try a separation.  He didn't want to.

He wanted to sell everything and sail to the Bahamas by himself for four months.  He wanted to find peace on his own.

He wanted a divorce.

That was his solution?  It was not mine.

After 10 years together, seven of them married, it had come down to this. 

Wasn't any of it worth fighting for?  Wasn't any of it worth trying to save?

Apparently not to him.  To him there was no answer other than divorce.

You can't make someone stay when they don't want to.  What choice did I have?

So we divorced.  

And our marriage became a statistic.

Once Upon A Time

Most girls dream of their wedding.    I dreamed of being married.

I loved the idea of finding someone to share my life with.  Not someone to be my life, but someone to share my life.  I wanted him to have his own hobbies and friends outside of “us” so that I’d have time to miss him and so we’d always have new stuff to discuss over meals.

I dreamed of growing old with my best friend.  Of sharing a lifetime of memories to carry into our senior years.  Of having that one constant person in your life through the good and the bad who always had your back.  Someone to weather the storms of life and celebrate the joys.

I loved the idea, albeit old fashioned, of taking care of someone.  I liked grocery shopping, cooking, and doing the laundry.

I knew exactly what marriage meant to me and was very upfront about it from the moment the possibility of getting married arose.

I believed that your mate becomes your family.  And you don’t just leave your family when things get rough as so many people do.

I did not believe in divorce.  I made that very clear.

I explained how marriage was hard.  That there would be times when we would hate each other and question why were with each other.  But I also believed you could work through anything.  All you had to do was be willing to try.

It never dawned on me that someone would just not be willing to try.