The Worst of It

What you did to me was cruel. And not just to me, but to our girls as well.  For 8 months, when your behaviour was increasingly distant.  When I could feel that you resented being here, didn't want to be with us.  Every time you came home from your business trips, you were impossible to live with.  Angry and self-absorbed.  Unwilling to help around the house or do anything with the family unless pressed.  When I asked you repeatedly about it, how it felt like you didn't want to be here anymore, you denied it.  You said that wasn't the case at all. I thought It was just your ongoing struggle with PTSD.

So for 8 months I worried about you.  Patiently supporting you through what I thought was a rough spot in our lives. I thought it was just you.  That you were broken, but eventually would be okay. The walks you would take in the pouring rain, and the walks down by the river.  When you would make comments to me that "You'll do just fine without me". I worried that you were suicidal.  But that wasn't it, was it.  It was because in your mind, you had already left us.  You were having an affair and planning to leave.  You just didn't have the courage to say it. 

You claim you wanted to give us "one last Christmas".  What bullshit.  Why on earth would you think that would be something we wanted? That when you told us, we wouldn't look back and realize that it had all been a lie? Like the other 8 months have been? What kind of Christmas memory would that be? It was because it was convenient for you, for whatever reason.  It had nothing to do with being considerate of us.  If that was true, you would have been honest from the start.

We've been married for 28 years come this Saturday.  And we lived together for a year before that. 29 years together.  A lifetime come to a sudden and shuddering stop. I feel discarded.There was nothing more you needed from me, having found someone else, and so I wasn't useful to you anymore.

You could have done this with honour.  Been respectful of me and our marriage.  This process would be so different if you had.  But you didn't.  You trashed our marriage like it was nothing.  Like I was nothing and had never meant anything.  You have no idea how painful that is, and what hurts more, is I know you don't care.

Missing the Ghost

I have to keep reminding myself that the person that I miss so badly is gone.  He is not the same person he used to be.  And so when it hurts so much it feels like my heart is literally breaking into tiny pieces, I have to remind myself that he doesn't exist anymore.

He is like a phantom limb that keeps tricking me into thinking it is still there.  It is worse than grieving a death.  At least in death there is some comfort in imagining that you will be together again someday.  For me, this person is gone forever.  His personality change transcending death to have become a new entity that I don't know, and don't like very much.

That person, I could happily never see again.  The old one...I miss desparately. 

It Doesn't Help

I am bereft. I am lonely. I am spent. Confused, frustrated and angry.  Mostly just so very sad. The emotional manipulation, the betrayal.  It's unimaginable.  So cowardly.

I feel like I am on a roller coaster that is also on a merry-go-round.  There doesn't seem to be any way to get off or make it stop.  Slowing it down is almost more painful than letting it run out of control.

I have good days, though they are few these days. I try to take advantage of them and get a lot done, because I don't know how long they will last.  On those days, I don't understand the others.  The days when I am paralyzed with grief and anxiety.  When I weep all day.  Slowly and silently leaking my pain through eyes of sorrow, heartbroken. Unable to stop.  Not caring about the things I need to do to get on with my life.  Not caring if I ever do. Not caring if I ever care again.

So many memories. So much pain.

So frustrating to miss him, and want him back. To just have things be the way they used to be.  I know that I only miss a person who doesn't exist anymore.  Maybe he never did.  That is the scariest part.  How long have I been wrong?  What if I am again?  How much am I wrong about right now that I don't even know yet?

I know to count my blessings.  And I have many.  I know it could be worse.  I know I am not the only one.  I know this will pass.  Will become something else.  I just can't see it from here.  And it doesn't help.

An Explanation

I started a blog a couple of years ago, when my life was as normal as it ever was. (Did My Life Have a Focus Group? - http://momma-bunny.blogspot.ca/)  I wanted to record events in my life and memories of my childhood.  I was a typically busy wife and mother with a full-time job, and so my blog posts have been sporadic.  I've enjoyed it nonetheless.

Then the bottom fell out of my life.  On the evening of Dec. 16th, 2013, I found out my husband of 28 years was having an affair.  That is a deal breaker for me, and so I am divorcing the bastard.

I had published several blog posts about the new unfortunate details of my life, but since my eldest daughter follows that blog, and one day I may want to invite my extended family to read it too, I decided it is best if I start a blog just for divorce and marriage stuff.

I have transferred those initial divorce related blog posts here. The blog name takes itself from the title of a book that was ironically on my husband's Christmas gift list last year.  And yes, I bought it for him.

My theory is that it will be a cathartic process to record all the mixed emotions in my spinning head and broken heart.  Maybe it's just a form of torture.  We'll see.

Living with Judas and The Last Supper

Well, it has been a month since my life fell apart.  I guess not my whole life, just the portion of it that has been the 28 years of marriage.  Funny how you can build a whole life around that.  Untangling it all is virtually impossible.  Just like untangling the old Christmas lights.  It's really just easier to toss them out and go out and buy new ones.  Oh, you give it a try for a while, but you know there is no hope.  You just go through the motions anyway to say you gave it the old college try before cutting your losses and moving on, I mean, buying new ones.

My husband moves out of our family home tomorrow.  How weird.  How very final.  It is for the best, of course.  His living here, with me and our daughters, while we all go through the repeated cycles of processing our grief and readjusting to the new world order just makes it more painful and awkward for everyone.  It will be a relief I'm sure, but still...it is so very sad.

There will be no more unwanted ghost in the house.  A ghost of the past haunting our hearts and making us remember.  Remember the good times, the history of us, our family.  Remember the pain.  Trying to hide the tears.  Going through the motions of unavoidable daily living while the man who betrayed you with a kiss (and more) so calculating and cavalierly is somewhere in the house. The astonishment that he thinks everything should be as before, and can't understand why everyone is so mad and avoids being in the same room as he.  He pouts and has an air of put-upon, while suddenly being very helpful around the house. No more trying to be civil, so the house won't be a war zone, despite every fibre of your being screaming to do the opposite. An unwelcome guest in your life now, for all the pain he's caused.  The future he's changed forever.

I look at him in amazment.  I wonder who he is.  This isn't the man whom I fell in love with and married.  Commited my life to.  I have no idea who this is.  I don't recognize him at all, in any way.  When did this happen?  I look back to see, and I can make out vague shapes of change that I didn't notice.  That only now make sense.  Things now conspicuous by their absence.  The other day I stumbled across a photograph of him as I remember him.  My heart leaped and I thought  "Oh, there you are!"  So incredibly sad that he is gone forever.  Replaced by this stranger.  I start to wonder if I'm insane.  Did it all really happen?  These 29 years that we've had together.  Did I imagine it all?  I couldn't have.  Not all of it.

I try to remember the last time we all sat at the table as a family for dinner.  We have been avoiding this family ritual now, and have done since it all came to light.  There is no earthly way we could all sit around a table together to share a meal.  There is no civility in me strong enough to do it, and I certainly would not subject our daughters to such an obscene charade.  So when was our last supper?  I have only vague memories of it, but I miss it just the same.  We didn't know that we were sitting with Judas at the head of the table, listening to him bless our food and asking how our days were. Didn't know that it would never happen again, like so many other things.

I remember our last kiss.  The last time he held me.  The last time we slept together.  Our last family event.  There was no warning for all of these "last" things, and I didn't know that he was Judas among us during all of them.  I didn't know to cherish them because they would never come again.  And so I missed them. I start to think back.  To try and remember when what we had was last real.  Try and separate the lies from the last truth that I know for sure.  Sometimes I think I have it figured out, but then again, I could be wrong.  I have been before.  They are as tangled as the Christmas lights, and I have to find out where the old ends so I can put them in a mental box marked "Old Life" and start building on the new.

I don't know if the first Judas ever got to enjoy his poisoned reward, or if he ever regretted his decision or sought forgiveness.  I know that mine will not get to enjoy a life with the woman he betrayed us with, because she dumped him.  It may have had something to do with the Facebook message I sent her.  A clarification of the status of our marriage, despite what she had been told, a thank you for using condoms so I can rest assured my STD test will be negative, a reminder that adultery is a sin, and a Merry Christmas wish from the wife and daughters of the man she is sleeping with.  It may have been a factor, but I'll never know.  I'm sure that being alone was not part of his plan, but he seems to have adjusted well.  He's taken to reading the Bible nightly, and going to church.  Seeking redemption and comfort that only God can give, because I certainly won't. 

He is eager to start his new life with no responsibilities.  Just he and his ego alone together at last.  So Judas will take his 30 pieces of silver tomorrow, and move to his new condo.  It seems so easy for him.  To just end one life and begin another.  Like the first never existed at all.  And that's why it makes me wonder...did it ever?

Should Auld Aquaintance Be Forgot

Well, 2013 is definitely not ending as I expected it to.  After a year of renovations and family ups and downs, as the year was drawing to a close, I expected a little calm. A regrouping and recouping of energy.  A refocussing of our lives to normality and enjoying our newly spiffed up home. Turns out my marriage was drawing to a close without my knowledge or consent.

How does this happen, you ask.  Or I did.  Selfishness, laziness, egotistical narcissistic arrogance. To name but a few.

My husband of 28 years reconnected on Linked In with an old friend from high school. With my full knowledge and support.  Hey, I'm a progressive woman of the 21st century.  Men can have friendships with the opposite sex and they can remain just friends, right?  We're all grownups here.  Especially if said female friend is a devout Christian of the Anglican faith, who is raising 3 kids on her own after being divorced and escaping an abusive marriage.  Adultery is a sin, after all, and she works for the Diocese.  She must be an observant Christian whose only interest in my husband is....what was it I was thinking exactly?

I should mention here that this is not the first time he has been unfaithful.  The first time was when we had been married two years.  In fact it occurred during the week of our second anniversary.  He had a deliberate one-night stand, just because he wanted to, with a woman he picked up in a bar.  I found out about it because he was acting weird.  Going for walks in the middle of the night.  I asked, half joking, are you having an affair or what?  Riddled with guilt, he confessed all.  You can imagine my surprise.  I was pregnant with our first child at the time I found out, and was devastated.  In the end we went for marriage counselling and stayed together.  The counsellors and others convinced me to chalk it up to youthful stupidity, and afterall, it had only been once. So I forgave him and learned to live with it.  As far as I know, that was the only indiscretion until now.  But I could be wrong.  I have been before.  I know.  Fool me once, shame on you.  Fool me twice...

I have recently wished for a time machine.  To go back in time and absolutely forbid that this friendship be renewed.  My youngest daughter wisely set me straight...you can't change stupid, she said.  And she's right.  The players in this little farce were always destined to make terrible, cowardly decisions, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

What gets me is all the plotting and planning.  All of the opportunities to examine their choices and stop before they reached the point of no return.  The mistress, whom I'm referring to in my head as Sandy Sinner, insisted that condoms be used.  So, condoms had to be purchased.  Apparently on both occasions (because my husband assures me it was only a couple of times, and he wouldn't lie...right?)  Anyway, on both occasions, condoms had to be bought.  Because he threw away the extras in between.  He helpfully informs me that you don't have to buy a big box, they have small ones.  Why do I know this?  I asked, and he told me.  I was in a weepy cycle, and I needed to get mad.  So I asked a question of which I was curious, knowing full well I was not going to like the answer.  Mission accomplished.  Anger enough to push back the tears for a little while again.

So, this discussion had to happen, and then - each time - a trip to the condom store had to happen.  Find the aisle with the fun stuff, then select the raincoat of choice, take it up to the bored young person at the counter, and pay.  Then trek back to the hotel, which is being paid for by his employer - because he is working out of town, providing for his family - and then commence with the adultery portion of the program.  Lots of time to think "wait a minute, this may be the wrong decision."  People may get hurt.  People like the wife who supported me without question through a military career of 27 years and 6 overseas tours in theatres of war. People like the two daughters - grown now - that said-wife raised mostly on her own due to the frequent absences innate in a military career.

I am informed that it is all my fault.  That our marriage was broken and had been for a long time.  I hadn't been aware that marriage had been added to the growing list of things in the world that are just so much cheaper to simply replace than go to the effort of restoration and repair.

It was apparently my fault because I chose not to meet his psychologist.  The psychologist he is seeing to help him with his PTSD.  He's right, I did decline to meet his psychologist.   It was presented to me as exactly that.  Come meet my psychologist, she's really nice, you'll like her.  I was quite distracted at the time, with the full time job, our youngest daughter dealing with Narcolepsy, our oldest daughter in therapy for an anxiety disorder.  He & I were trying to get ready to go on vacation together to Cuba, and the house was in an uproar because the renovations that had started almost 2 months previously, were not finished yet. We were both up for 40 hours straight before we arrived in Cuba, just trying to wrap everything up to go. It's true, I was a little busy with all of that. 

Had he said to me, "I would like you to come talk with my therapist and me, because I think our marriage is in trouble."  I would have dropped everything and moved heaven and earth to be there.  But it was presented to me as a meet & greet.  Not a final ultimatum of which I was not included.  He never asked again.  He had already started his "friendship" with Sandy Sinner, and I, and our marriage, were no longer important. Auld aquaintances best forgotten indeed.