A gray car - a symbol of my slow erasure

As I began my healing journey last year, I remember many conversations with friends and family where I was adamant that I had not lost myself in the marriage.  I truly believed I had maintained my own identity.  But I have now realized how incredibly wrong I was about that.  I suppose it was the very slow, subtle erasures that happened over decades that are hard to notice in the moment.  And I was still very much in the moment last year.  I did not yet have clarity.

On some level though, I started to question how much of me I might have lost as I discovered how hard it was to untangle what I knew he preferred with what I might actually want.  It started with that first grocery store trip after I moved out - I got lost in the shelves of possibilities as I bought things I had never tried before.  I remember the paralysis when I checked into my first Hilton property on their app and it asked me to select a room.  I knew what room he would want but did I really know what I wanted?  It continued as I tried out things like Improv and Hip Hop, two things I never could have imagined liking and found them to be so much fun.

And after a really enlightening moment in therapy last night, instead of making dinner at home, I grabbed my wallet and keys and walked to the restaurant next door.  We rarely went out to eat together.  It wasn't a priority for him.  He wanted to spend his money on other things.  I thought I agreed with him and made excuses about how it was more challenging with my dietary restrictions and that I wasn't a foodie.  But in recent weeks, I have learned, I really like to go out to eat.  So as I sat down last night with a glass of wine, I realized that I love sitting down at a restaurant, ordering both familiar and unfamiliar foods, getting a drink and sometimes even dessert, and being served by someone.  (After I typed this paragraph, I went and adjusted my budget so I can feel less guilty about going out to eat!)

So what really made it all click was a conversation about a gray car that I had with my therapist yesterday evening.

My first brand new car, the first car we purchased for me during the marriage was a Suburu Forester.  We bought it in about our second year of marriage.  When we bought that Suburu, we test drove both a gold one and a gray one.  The gold one had just a little higher sticker price.  As we were sitting across the desk from the sales employee, without looking at me, my ex-husband said that we would take the gray one.  

I hate gray.  Of all the colors of cars that exist, it is the one I can't stand.  So I spoke up.  After an awkward pause, the sales person responded by saying he could give us the same deal on the gold one and so ultimately that is the one we purchased.

But over the almost two decades of our marriage, my ex-husband never let me forget that.  He would remind me of the time I refused to buy a gray car and sometimes even referred to it as an "almost marriage-ending moment".  It came across as a joke but in reality it wasn't funny at all.

As I told this story to my therapist, I just casually mentioned that I drive a gray car now.  She stopped me and asked about that.  I can honestly say until that moment, I had never thought about twice about the gray car parked in my parking garage.  

We purchased this car in September of 2023 (not too many months after the May 2023 Hawaii trip which I'm starting to realize was an important turning point in our marriage).  It came down to money and what he wanted to spend our money on.  He didn't mind the color gray and so didn't want to spend extra money to upgrade it to another color.  I didn't question it because I had just absorbed his priorities with money so I also thought it wasn't wise to spend an extra $1,000 even on a color I would enjoy.  I rationalized it by saying we wouldn't keep the car long and I wouldn't drive it much.  

My therapist then asked why I took this particular car in the divorce knowing I hated the color gray.  I explained that both of our cars at that time were gray.

When we bought the other car in April of 2024, we again bought gray because he didn't want to spend the extra money on another color.  Honestly, I was so exhausted from trying to slow him down when it came to trading in our cars, that I didn't have the energy to care much what color he chose.  

I guess it is ironic that a gray car turned out to be the one that I will likely keep the longest, likely by a lot.  I think his vehicle is white now.

I walked away from this marriage with the gray car I had never wanted in those first years because he had slowly convinced me that it wasn't worth speaking up for what I wanted.  He slowly erased me until I accepted a gray car and then he left me.

Grace

Therapy was really intense last night.  There are so many different things that were said that I feel I need to process further.  I'm going to start with something really important that I had lost sight of.

For about three years of my career fairly early on, I worked directly with victims of domestic violence.   The first year and a half was mostly just through phone contact as I did intake and worked with an attorney to help them get a restraining order.  The second year and a half was physically in a domestic violence shelter and part of every day was spent in the District Attorney's office and/or courtrooms as I sat face to face with victims and walked right along side them through some really hard stuff as they tried to escape the cycle.  It was an eye opening experience.

One thing that surprised me was the fact that so many of the women I worked with were highly educated, quite intelligent, and at one point had had a strong sense of self.  These were strong, amazing, kind women.  I heard women express a lot of shame that they had fallen for the manipulation, that they had stayed, that they hadn't picked better.

Another thing I learned was how powerful manipulation can be and how damaging it is.  These women were experiencing some pretty significant manipulation on top of the physical and/or sexual abuse.  

In recent days, I have been able to see with clarity so many ways my ex-husband was manipulative and I'm still working through the damage it did to me.  I'm not trying to compare it to what victims of domestic violence went through but I need to use what I learned from working with them to give myself a lot more grace than I have been.  Honestly, I have more grace (and concern) for his new girlfriend (in her mid 40s) who I keep saying doesn't even realize what he is doing than I do for myself who was only 20 years old when I met him.

It's easy to get influenced by the online rhetoric that women just need to pick better.  And it's easy to listen to that inner voice of doubt that questions why I didn't see or chose to ignore the signs, why I tolerated what I did for so long, why I didn't know better.  But that ignores the power of manipulation and the toxic and destructive behaviors of some men.  It can't be on women to pick better.  It needs to be on men to collectively be better.  

So although it is my responsibility to learn from what I experienced so that I can try to spot red flags earlier in the future, it is not my fault that he was able to successfully manipulate and shrink me for his benefit.  It is not a reflection on me.  It is a reflection of who he is and on his character (or lack thereof).

It is in my humanity that led me to fall for my ex-husband and stay with him so long.  It is in my humanity the ways I learned to cope and grow in that relationship.  And it is in my humanity that I have approached my healing and stepped back out into the world after it ended.

Solitude, a social media memory

 

This photo from 2020 came up as a social media memory today.  When I went to reshare it and reflect on it, I discovered I had done just that a year ago and last year’s reflection was so beautiful.

October 30, 2024

I remember when I took this photo.  It was a cool, quiet evening and I walked to Railroad Park by myself, set up my tripod, and just watched as the sun set and the resident ducks enjoyed the pond.  As a silhouette, you can't see my face or any details.  I actually have my back to the camera as I gaze over the pond.  It's just the outline of me contrasted from the colors of the sky and reflection in the pond.

This image seems appropriate right now as many of the details of me seem a bit obscured, including my name as I feel a bit in limbo with all the bureaucracy that prolongs the process to make the change.  I am no longer [old name] yet I don't feel like I've fully stepped into [new name] yet.  Along with the fear of the unknown is a bit of intrigue at the details I get to fill in.

I’m in a different place today but the photo still feels impactful.  It is a reminder of the rejuvenating solitude I made time for even in my marriage.  He may have stopped joining me for most sunrises and sunsets as the years progressed, leaving an absence I definitely felt, but I kept showing up for these beautiful moments because they grounded me.  They gave me space to just exist.   They quieted my mind.  These were the moments when I felt least lonely and most like myself.

A puddle in my kitchen and hall

I walked through a puddle on the way to the bathroom this morning.  Socks wet, I reached for both the kitchen and hall light switches on the wall.  The leak had continued overnight.  

They finally replaced my dishwasher yesterday.  I came home to the sound of it running and was quite excited.  I had been without one for almost three weeks.  And then I noticed the puddle in front of the dishwasher.  Opening the cabinet under the sink, I found another puddle.  And water was seeping out from under my stove.  I wiped it up and made dinner, at which point the puddle under the sink had reformed.  

So I walked down to the office which was still open.  Neither maintenance men were on site anymore for the day but one of them agreed to come back although he was stuck in traffic so would be a while.  The plan was to just stop the leak last night and then deal with fixing the issue the today.

I went off to choir practice.  I assume he came although I noticed it still had a very slow drip when I went to bed.  I hoped it wouldn't be strong enough to cause problems overnight but here I am.

So this morning, I wiped up what I could, moved my kitchen table to make room for maintenance to get behind my stove, ate breakfast, and headed off to work. On my walk, I noticed the airplane taking off into clouds of varying density.  It disappeared and reappeared many times.  Then I paused to watch a Cooper’s Hawk perched and watching me.  And I breathed in the calm I felt.

Was it irritating to deal with a non-working dishwasher and leak?  Sure, but I did what I knew had to be done and let the rest work itself out.  I am confident I will come home to the issue under control.

But it still felt foreign.  Had I still been married, I would have woke up to his swearing and complaints.  I would have had to simultaneously soothe him while I figured out how to solve the problem.  Was I always this calm about solving actual issues or was this a skill I developed because I had to devote so much of my energy to managing him simultaneously?  The chicken or the egg?  Was it a skill I already had which played a role in sustaining the relationship for so long?  Or did his behaviors cause me to develop the skill?

So now that I don’t also have to manage him, I have extra energy to admire the birds and planes and continue on with my day, in an empty office on this thirtieth day of the shutdown.

Catio, his latest priority

Maybe I needed a laugh today.  Maybe I needed a reminder of how much better off I am.

This morning on my way to work, I walked past his patio, as I always do when leaving the complex because that is my easiest way out.  Out of the corner of my eye I saw a huge cage-like structure sitting there.  I was past it before I had time to do any processing of what I might have seen so just kept walking figuring I would take a look when I returned home and would pass it again.

What used to sit on his patio were two oversized outdoor chairs with covers.  We bought them during the marriage.  He wanted something comfy.  Personally, I would have preferred something that took up a lot less space so I could move around better on our balcony but as usual, we got what he wanted.  My studio doesn't have a balcony and I wouldn't have wanted them either way, so he took them both when we separated and placed them on the first floor patio of his new apartment.

At some point in the past year, he added a cat tree to the corner for the stray cats that have been living at our complex and started putting food out for them.  At least two of the stray cats were regularly seen perched on the cat tree or one of the chairs.

Today, one of those chairs is gone.  In its place is a large cage that faces the door to his unit and the cat tree is now inside the cage.  Maybe he got an indoor cat that he wants to be able to go outside?  Is this a catio?  One of the stray cats was sitting on the remaining chair (outside the cage).  I wondered if it missed access to the cat tree.

I walked past there one more time on my way to choir this evening and that is when the symbolism stopped me in my tracks as I laughed out loud.  If he had his door or windows open, I'm sure he heard me!  He has a girlfriend and yet he now only has one chair on his patio.  He decided to replace the second chair that his girlfriend could have sat in next to him as they enjoyed the patio with a giant enclosure for a cat!

Early on, I realized his cars would always be more important than me.  I even wrote a journal entry about that before we married.  Then early in the marriage, I learned his mom would also always be more important than me.  After we moved back to Wisconsin and he was interviewing for a law enforcement position yet refused to talk to me about how it would affect our marriage, I realized his career would always be more important than me.  And as he lived up life in Philadelphia, the city where he decided to divorce me, much of the first half of 2024, I realized his freedom would always be more important than me.  Even his comfort was always more important than working through conflict to benefit us as a couple.  I was such a low priority, I'm not even sure I made the list.

Now, the cats have added one more level of priority that I'm sure will always be above any girlfriend he ever has.

He clearly hasn't changed at all.  And he is not my problem anymore!

Labyrinth

I've written about this labyrinth before here (which links to my other posts on this topic).  On my lunch hour today, I walked the path of the labyrinth and then sat down in the middle to pause.

The walk requires concentration as the path twists and turns.  It requires forgiveness as I stumble and step outside the lines on a tight curve.  It allows me to relax along the gentle long curves.  It reminds me of the larger picture in life without losing sight of the importance of focusing on the moment.  It grounds me in the present as I completely black out the cars traveling above or the skateboarders doing their tricks next door until I reach the end.

It has served so many purposes throughout my healing journey which is why I keep coming back.

Intention

We still have a couple of joint e-mail accounts that we both have access to monitor because from time to time important things still show up there.

Last week Thursday, he added his girlfriend to a cruise scheduled for February and paid off that cruise which resulted in a series of e-mails to one of those joint accounts.  I wrote about that in this post.  Those e-mails are still sitting in the inbox today of our joint account.

Since then, he has taken the time to delete the Walgreens receipt where he bought cosmetic products for his girlfriend and the series of Zillow e-mails where he looked at a property in Wisconsin.  But he left those cruise e-mails.  It feels like he wants me to see them, like he wants to see if he can rub salt in wounds.

My recent reflections have made me wonder how intentional his behaviors were during our marriage.  I honestly am starting to wonder where he falls far on the narcissistic spectrum.  So in light of these thoughts, this feels intentional.

It also makes me think back to that Friday morning after my family cruise on the ship where we were married when I saw him on his patio with his new girlfriend.  I had a passing thought that it was intentional - he knew exactly when I left for work but dismissed that thought quickly.  I wonder if I shouldn't have dismissed it so quickly.

But maybe the last laugh is on him.  Seeing these e-mails doesn't create jealousy in me.  It doesn't make me miss him.  It doesn't even remind me of the good in our marriage.  

A four night cruise is barely a vacation compared to 28 days of cruising I have booked for the next two years plus a week and a half trip to national parks and time in both Paris and London.  It doesn't compare the full community of friends I have built.  It doesn't compare to the interest the Atlanta district has in me should they ever be able to hire more staff.  It doesn't compare to the confidence I have gained in Improv, hip hop, poetry workshops, and more.  I have created a life infinitely better than the one we had together.  

The effect of seeing this is not about him at all.  It's a reminder of the way he manipulated me and how he is now doing the same to his next victim.  It is a feeling of empathy for her.  And if he is still feeling the need to try and hurt me, it reflects an emptiness that is still in him.  I wasn't the cause of his unhappiness.  He did that himself and will continue to do that himself until he actually puts in the work to heal.  A new girlfriend or a new car or a trip to the Bahamas won't fix that.

Parallels in a friendship

Before I went to bed after my date with myself a week ago, I posted about it on social media.  Almost immediately, I got a text from that friend who has been mostly missing the last year plus.  I wrote about that friendship ten days ago here.  She started her message with "So sorry I missed checking in on you on this important day" as if she would have had any way to know ahead of time it was my divorce anniversary.  I guess a close friend would have known.

She then went on to ask if we could go out for lunch on Friday to celebrate.  Even if I'm not really investing in the friendship anymore, I still do enjoy spending time with her so I agreed to meet her.

The lunch on Friday felt different though.  I could sense she felt guilty about not being there for me.  She almost scolded me for not texting her on Tuesday and didn't understand why I didn't want to celebrate my divorce anniversary with friends.  I think she recognizes she is no longer my closest circle.  This lunch felt a bit like a desperate attempt to hold on.

At one point she referenced talking to her daughter about relationships and waiting to get serious as if that was the cause of my divorce but then went on to say she was torn with that advice because of how lonely she felt when she was single - she married in her 30s.

She repeatedly told me how she has admired how I have handled myself this past year, it's become a repeated refrain each of the times I've seen her.  I'm not sure it even feels like a compliment anymore.  I have begun to wonder if there is jealousy behind it.  It's always followed by something along the lines of  "I don't know what I would have done."

I find myself explaining more than I should need to and then when I realize it, pulling back and going quiet.  I don't think she intentionally tries to misunderstand me like my ex-husband did but the feeling of being misunderstood feels the same.  

She also spent time talking about how overwhelming life is for her.  Her kids need this.  Her church needs that.  Her neighborhood needs this. Her family needs that.  And in every single scenario, there is absolutely no one else who can or would step up to do these things that she thinks need to be done.  Her husband is clearly exhausted as well as he has started to set limits on how many activities he will help get the kids to (he thinks she signs them up for too much).  

We have this same conversation every single time - different obligations she has created for herself but the same overwhelming feeling.  And each time, the conversation is no less exhausting as she looks to me for validation, reassurances, encouragement, etc.  I reflect, going back six years, as I held her oldest daughter as an infant and successfully soothed her crying, something my friend was struggling with at the time.  At the same time, I was reassuring my friend that she was doing a great job as a mom.  She has that same exhausting need for repeated validation and so many reassurances my ex-husband demanded.  

During Friday's lunch, she leaned on her Enneagram type (3) to excuse her need to be seen as useful and to compete not understanding that the point of the Enneagram isn't to lock into a box of your type but to help you understand how to use your starting point to expand yourself.  My ex-husband used the excuse of "this is just how I am".

So I left Friday's lunch feeling unsettled, even a bit triggered.  There was a time when I felt so at ease with this friend.  From the moment we first met, she felt comfortable.  We even did some travel together, first sharing a cabin for a church retreat, then renting a cabin in the Smoky Mountains together.

What if that comfort had less to do with it being a good friendship and more to do with being a parallel to all I knew in my marriage?  Something familiar even though it may not have been very healthy.  And now that I've come so far in my healing, I feel that old familiar energy interfering with my growth.  But it makes me so sad because I really like her as a person.

He claimed he deserved "better treatment/more affection".

A year ago tomorrow, I had a breakdown as I ran into difficulties at work with my name change and was being told I wouldn't have the capabilities to telework while the process was happening which would likely be quite a few weeks.  I was also trying to figure out how to vote with my voter registration in my old name (and being too late to update voter registration for the presidential election) and having already started the name change process.  All the ways the burden of the divorce was falling unfairly on me were weighing me down to the point of collapse.  I didn't understand how he could create so much damage and escape seemingly unharmed.

This was two days after we sat down in a conference room at our apartment complex to close out accounts and split our remaining assets now that the divorce was final.  He was so cold and lacking any emotion at that meeting.  Afterwards I remember commenting to myself that I suspect he treated the taxpayers he audited with more warmth than he treated me that day.  He gave more consideration to strangers on the street than he did to me at that point.

In my moment of weakness and against my better judgment, I texted him.  I can still picture myself in my office with tears flowing down my cheeks as I typed into my phone.  This was our text exchange.

Me:

Do you have any clue how much of a nightmare everything associated with this divorce has been for me? Do you have any idea how much your dishonesty has cost me? Do you even care? The latest is that I will not be able to telework while I wait for a new PIV. I’m also trying to figure out how to still be able to vote in the name of my voter registration as I am in the middle of changing my name back.

The worst part is that I still don’t understand what happened and why you did this and you clearly have no interest at all in trying to figure out or articulate the why to help me find any closure. To leave a spouse after two decades with that much confusion is really cruel.

His response:

Why I decided to leave is like I have said before, I was not happy, I couldn’t see us working on things enough to get there, I feel like I deserve better treatment/more affection and I let resentment build up for so long past the point of return (which I regret). I am very sorry for all the difficulties.

Me:

Just think about how little that explanation would make sense to your spouse after not speaking up for 19 years. Just think about how it feels to be blamed for something you weren’t aware of (and I’m still not aware of). And based on the very few examples you have given, be blamed for your reaction to the other person’s poor behavior without any self-reflection on their part. Think about how that would completely shatter your sense of reality and ability to trust. Maybe if you could actually self-reflect on that you would realize how little closure your explanation brings and how many gaps there clearly are in that explanation.

You don’t need to respond any further. Clearly you still aren’t able or willing to have an honest conversation that would bring a little integrity to how this is all ending. I don’t even know why I tried once more. I guess I keep hoping I wasn’t so wrong about you and a glimpse of the man I once thought you were would come through.

I wrote in my blog on that day, "My text this morning accomplished nothing except further rile me up."  I laugh today at the truth of that!

Besides a few logistical texts and one meeting at the courthouse to sign over our titles to each other, we had no other contact after that.  So this is the last explanation I got.

His word that he deserves "better treatment/more affection" have repeated in my mind ever since because they never made sense to me.  It's as if that text is burned in my mind.  That is the only time he ever accused me of not being affectionate enough and it felt so hypocritical as so often he pushed away any attempts I made to be affectionate and he was rarely affectionate with me.  And I had no clue what he meant by better treatment but I knew the way he was ending it was horrible treatment of me.  So for someone who believed he deserved better, he was being pretty hypocritical.

It was also the closest I ever got to an apology from him.  And no, it's not actually an apology.  I also didn't believe he meant it.  From the first moment I read that text, it sounded like him just telling me what he thought I wanted to hear.  It felt so incredibly empty.

So why am I back here, stuck in this moment today?  Sometimes I think my body remembers these anniversaries.  I've been in a funk ever since yesterday.

My social media memory yesterday was walking the labyrinth in my city a year ago to get myself in the right headspace to have that meeting with him.  I wrote a poem that compared the walk through the labyrinth to the rhythms of what I was facing - the moments of insecurity as I navigated tight turns, the moments of confidence when I picked up the pace around a gentle curve, the understanding of the overhead view of it all mixed with the uncertainty of the moment by moment view, and the concentration required to just keep putting one foot in front of the other.  I wanted to go back and re-walk the labyrinth yesterday after church but the rain combined with the cooler temperatures and long walk convinced me to stay home.  Maybe later this week.

And my thoughts over the past day or two have been centered on the ways he used the highs and lows to manipulate me and how the gaslighting at the end erased the highs.  So I think this text that keeps repeating in my mind hits differently now.  He had erased the highs by this point and rewritten our story to make himself the victim of my alleged poor treatment which he couldn't even explain in words to me.  A year ago, that created nothing but confusion and doubt.  Today, it feels like part of a larger plan to manipulate me and evade accountability.

Anger

I'm not myself tonight.  I'm feeling bitter and angry.  I feel like I wasted two decades of my energy and joy on someone who wasn't willing to be a partner who was worth it, someone who manipulated me to get me to stay instead of just showing up.  He could have just left me the fuck alone if he didn't want to show up as a decent human being.

And then for him to end it by putting all the blame on me, re-writing our story to make him out to be the victim and me the villain, and then running out the door so he didn't have to actually explain or take any accountability.

I didn't deserve this.  No one does.

So I'm really angry at him tonight, maybe more angry than I have ever felt.  

It only took me 15 months to have enough clarity to see through his manipulations and the destructive effect it had on my energy, my joy, my nervous system, my physical health, and my sense of self.  

How can someone do that much destruction to another human being and still sleep at night?

His intentions and trusting my judgment

I think what I'm struggling with right now is that with more clarity, I question whether he was actually doing all these subtle things to intentionally hurt me, control me, etc.  It's the difference between someone with strong narcissistic traits vs someone who is insecure, lacks self-awareness, and has refused to heal his unhealed trauma.  Although maybe those two things are one and the same.  

In my mind for the past year and a half, I had convinced myself he wasn't intentionally hurting me, that he just didn't know any better and didn't have enough self-awareness to do better.  I suppose to believe he was intentionally hurting me was a greater incongruence with the image I had created of him than to believe he was just inconsiderate and didn't know any better.

But then I ask myself why does it matter?  The end result is the same.  The damage to my nervous system and physical health, the chaos and confusion happened regardless of his intentions.  

I think I wrestle with this because it calls into question my judgment.  Although instead of worrying about his intentions which I will never know, maybe my focus needs to be on the patterns that allowed me to ignore the signs I should have paid attention to.

I think the extreme highs and lows, an overall inconsistency created two dynamics that convinced me things were better than they were.  Most obviously, the highs were full of detailed love notes, attention, concrete future planning, doing things that were more for me like the trip to the Galapagos, and confidence from him about us as a couple.  In hindsight, they sometimes were even over-the-top.  These highs gave me something to hold onto even during the lows.

Then in the lows, he needed constant reassurance.  This constant reassurance which I provided him served a purpose in convincing me of how solid of a relationship I imagined we had.  In my experience, the more I say something, the more I believe it even if it doesn't quite match with reality.  And that's not that I didn't ever believe the reassurances I gave him but because I repeated them so often there wasn't space for me to see when my reality was changing.

A shift happened though last year because I didn't really try to convince him to stay when he came back from his work trips questioning our relationship.  It was as if I was done reassuring him.  I wasn't ready to be the one to leave myself.  I wanted answers from him on what the hell had happened to make him suddenly want to leave.  I wanted closure.  But I was done doing the work to keep our relationship together.  I even said that out loud when he suggested couple's counseling.  I wasn't willing to go through couple's counseling again with the focus just on me and what I needed to change.  It was his turn if he wanted this relationship to survive.

I wonder if that shift happened even earlier, maybe after I saw the way he treated me on our Hawaii trip.  That trip was May of 2023.  I was pissed at how that trip went.  I remember sitting in the back restaurant at a table for two against the windows, sipping a latte, watching a rainbow appear above the ship's wake and noticing the seat across from me was empty.  That image has stuck with me as representative of that overall trip and maybe even what our relationship had become.

And if that shift did happen earlier, he likely sensed it.  Maybe that is why he left.  Maybe he realized I wasn't tolerating his BS anymore.  I hadn't considered that the end may have started with me and the fact that I was starting to listen to my good judgment again.

A way he made my life harder

We used to keep the empty laundry baskets on a shelf that was just over my shoulder height.  He would leave them all stacked together and pile used towels in the top one.  When it came time for me to do laundry, I would struggle to lift them all and get to the empty baskets I needed to help me sort.  Over and over, I asked him put the towels in an unstacked basket next to the stack of empty ones (there was room for both) explaining how much I struggled but he never "remembered".  He acknowledged the request each time but never changed his behavior.

I don't know why this crossed my mind today.  Maybe because I'm puzzling all the little ways that I made his life easier or more enjoyable, all the ways I paid attention to his wants and needs, and the only examples I can come up about him are ways he made my life harder.  I had forgotten about this example until this evening.

My mind is finally catching up to my body

I think my mind is finally catching up to my body but it is a surreal experience.

Last summer when it was all still uncertain, I couldn't eat.  I couldn't sleep.  My chronic pain was flaring up.  I was dealing with night sweats.  My period was a bit off.  This uncertain transition time really wrecked havoc on my body as if it was one ultimate, final flareup.  Mentally I was so confused, heartbroken, and lost.  I can't even count the miles I walked throughout my city to try and escape the pain I was experiencing.   And it was mental gymnastics to make sense of what my ex-husband was telling me.  So little of it made sense to me which I realize now was because he was gaslighting me.

And then in July of last year when he told me he was done and started contacted attorneys, I still wasn't eating or sleeping but my energy level went through the roof. I suddenly had it in me to socialize and get out in ways I had not in twenty years.  Even though he was living in the same apartment as me still, there was a relief in not having to cater to him, soothe him, manage his emotions, etc. that let me reclaim my energy.  Mentally, I was alternating between survival as I figured out all the practical next steps and feelings of complete whiplash - what I thought at the time was a good marriage had dissolved overnight without an apparent reason.  But despite that mental overload, I was out living life.

Then the joy came back.  I danced in the rain.  I bought myself inexpensive but meaningful pieces of jewelry.  I traveled.  I started saying "yes" to anything that I thought might even remotely be interesting or fun.  This is where the fun in my journey began.  Amidst even the most challenging times I was in awe as I watched myself transform.

Then sometime in the fall my appetite came back and the rapid weight loss plateaued.  And I wasn't experiencing many moments of chronic pain anymore.

In November, I drove home to spend a week with my family at Thanksgiving.  That first night in my childhood bedroom (although it has been completely redecorated so doesn't feel like the same space I grew up in) was the first night I really slept.  And it was the first night of many to come.  Although I still occasionally have some restlessness sleeping, I haven't had those sleepless nights of last year since before that November week at home.

And then I realized how infrequently I've needed to take any sort of heartburn medicine since moving out.  It used to be that I had to regularly take those 14 day treatments because Tums or Pepcid weren't enough.  I haven't needed that in over a year.

And then this past spring and summer, I watched the inhibitions completely fade away as I moved my body in silly ways in Improv and danced in a hip hop cardio class.

My body had come that far.  My nervous system had settled down.  And yet I was still hanging onto what I thought was the good in him.  I was still trying to make sense of what happened by making excuses for him.  I did not yet understand that the improvements in my physical health and the soothing of my nervous system were evidence of the damage he had done to me over two decades and my body's way of celebrating his absence.

I still don't think I was there yet when I boarded the ship we had been married on twenty years early this past June.

In late August, I had my annual well woman visit which included a pelvic exam and Pap smear.  With my chronic pelvic pain, pelvic exams had generally been quite painful in the past.  This was a new provider so I talked with her about my concerns but also that I was aware my chronic pain had been improving since the divorce.  She stated that she has seen patients whose pelvic pain significantly improved after a divorce because of the effect of stress.  That pelvic exam was painless!

In mid-September, I saw myself in his new girlfriend.  I saw the way I physically carried myself.  I saw the lack of energy or glow.  I saw myself shrink.  This was so eye-opening, a huge turning point.

That day, I went back and looked at photos of myself and I was stunned at what I saw.  I don't think I ever posted that here.  I know I made a Facebook post about it with three photos of me all from late September/early October of the years 20223 (when I thought I had a good marriage), 2024 (after the separation but before the divorce) and 2025.  On that post, I labeled them:  Oblivious -> Grieving -> Joyful.

2023 - During a solo trip to Washington DC - even a few days away from him didn't re-energize me.

2024 - at the lantern festival, something I did that was important in my healing

2025

So now we come to today.  And if you read my post from last night, my mind has gained so much clarity on the subtle ways he was affecting my nervous system as he encouraged me to shrink myself and conform to the image he had of me.  It may have taken a very long time, but I think my mind is finally catching up to what my body knew all along.

Dancing to Uptown Funk

I added Uptown Funk to my playlist and played it this evening.  My feet began to move as I danced around my apartment, all my inhibitions replaced by pure joy.  The thought crossed my mind this week that a day doesn't go by that I don't sing and dance in my apartment, or as I walk the empty halls at work, or as I scooter through the park and soar down the hill under the railroad bridge.  I don't even need music to find my body moving to a tune only I can hear in my head.

He didn't like how I danced.  He claimed I only had one move.  He thought I was clumsy.  And the ways he told me this were subtle, with a tone that sounded kind, just a casual comment that barely was heard.  But it was enough to get me to stop dancing.  Even if he hadn't rushed me out of the room every time the first beats of Uptown Funk played, I wouldn't have felt free to dance to it when we were together.

He didn't dance himself.  He said he wasn't any good at it.  I don't know if that is why he didn't want me dancing.

So tonight I danced to it freely.  I even played it a second time.  And it now holds a place on my frequent playlist.

I can't believe I just didn't know.  I couldn't see the small ways he slowly encouraged me to make myself smaller.  He did the same thing to get me start shaving my legs.  He never would outright tell me what he wanted or what he expected.  It would be little comments, always with a tone that felt like kindness, until I decided on my own to do what he wanted.

When he first met me, it wasn't uncommon to see me in wearing that didn't quite match, at least according to fashion standards.  I wore what I wanted, combined the colors and fabrics that felt good to me, and didn't even think about what others might think.  Overtime, more and more of me matched - shoes, watchband colors, hair accessories until all the mismatching was erased.  In more recent years, he even joked about it.  I hadn't considered that it was his worldview and subtle comments that caused the change he was joking about.  Image meant everything to his family.

Yesterday, I put on light blue and red puffin socks with a busy green patterned jumpsuit.  I will admit I paused for quite a moment knowing they didn't match.  And then I reached for my Mary Jane shoes so everyone would see the socks!

I didn't even remember some of these changes and how they came about until I started dancing in my kitchen to Uptown Funk.  I'm coming to see I lost more of myself than I ever realized in this marriage.  

This year has felt so drastic and I didn't understand why.  While I was in the midst of it all, I couldn't see the ways I was being erased and made smaller.  And then I was suddenly free of it all.  I don't think I knew what to make of it at first.  To be able to do what I wanted, when I wanted, where I wanted, with the sole source of my inhibitions completely gone.  And sure plenty was quite ingrained but his absence was louder than those ingrained inhibitions.  

And so I danced in that first rain storm which occurred before I had even moved out.  He had gone to Wisconsin for two weeks right after telling me he would be contacting a lawyer about filing a divorce.  I went for a walk one evening when rain clouds threatened.  And halfway through the park, the skies opened up.  The rain pelted me so hard it stung my face.  But I danced, I raised my face to the sky, and I felt more alive than ever as the rain washed over me.  

After that, each time that I listened more to the loudness of his absence, the ingrained inhibitions grew smaller and smaller.  And maybe someday, hopefully soon, I won't sense his disapproval at all anymore.

Anger this morning

I am spitting mad this morning, swearing in the shower kind of angry, as I can feel my heart racing and am sure my blood pressure is rising.

When he suddenly (from my perspective) announced he wanted a divorce last year, we had six cruises booked, several with nonrefundable deposits.  He had one foot out the door while he was still spending our money on future trips, he had to know we might not take.

We lost the $400 deposit completely on one that would have happened last week.  That's $400 he threw away.  But that's not even the one that has me so angry this morning.

We had another one booked that he decided to move the deposit to another cruise.  That one had a $500 deposit plus a $100 change fee he paid before we divorced (so I'm pretty sure even that $100 was marital money).  In hindsight, we never added this to the balance sheet so this is free money he got.  At the time, I figured the money was a loss because I didn't actually believe I would be able to afford to cruise in the timeline it would need to be used by.  (I'm really glad I was wrong about that assumption!)

So combined that was $1000 of marital money that was a complete loss to me, money I never would have agreed to spend if he had been honest with me.

Last night and this morning, a slew of e-mails from Celebrity Cruises showed up in one of our joint e-mail accounts.  He added his girlfriend to that cruise where he moved the deposit.  Almost half the cost of that cruise was paid for with marital money.  So in essence, he is using (in part) my money to manipulate his next victim.

And this comes on the heels of information I learned that he took her and her two daughters to see Kamala Harris speak when she was in town last week.  He would not have had interest in hearing her speak on his own.  He actually disagreed with me about her run the last election.  He didn't like to talk politics much so when he spoke up, I feel like those were moments I actually saw the real him.  Those were moments that were a break from what I suspect was him mirroring me and what I wanted to hear.  So I am quite confident he did this just to impress her, to get her attached so he has a continued source of validation.

And maybe this hits me a bit harder right now because I've been reflecting a lot on the way he mirrored me and the other people in his life.  I'm seeing with clarity how much in each varying situation, he tried to become the person that would be liked, chosen, appreciated, validated, etc. without any sincerity or authenticity or true reciprocity.  And it bothers me that I didn't see it before.  Even if I was blinded by infatuation and immaturity in the beginning to see it in my own relationship with him, it should have become quite clear as I started observing his relationships with others.  

As the relationship ended last year and I started making something out my life, I realized he and I were very different in how we responded to life.  He lets the wind blow him where it may and complains about where the wind sets him down whereas I pull out my parachute to find some direction and then make something good of wherever I ultimately landed.  

I think this difference is also clear in the image he presents to the world.  He lets the world decide who he is as currency to extract from others what he needs and wants.  Every "gift" he gave was with an expectation of something in return, a way to manipulate others to get what he wanted.  In contrast, I stand as my own person, look internally for a lot of what I need and want and have built a community of reciprocal relationships where I don't have to manipulate people to step up.  They just do because they like the authentic person I am.  And I do the same for them, not expecting anything in return, but just because I like them and care about them.

Getting to the bottom of this blog post, I now feel that my heart rate is returning to normal.  It's amazing how my writing can do that.  To fill a page with all the negative emotions and organize them in a way I can understand and let go.  Re-reading the two paragraphs right above this one, I realize that lost $1000 is so worth what I have gained from losing him.  And the integrity that is reflected in my actions and the way I do my best to treat people matters far more.  And his girlfriend is an adult who can take care of herself.

Uptown Funk and an instinct to flee

There was a party in the street downtown this evening.  As a scootered by, the song "Uptown Funk" was playing.  Laughter bubbled up over me as I slowed my scooter down to listen as I passed.  I wonder if that song will ever not make me stop everything and pause.

I spent my marriage running from the song, literally.  He hated that song more than just about anything.  I don't even know why.  And you wouldn't believe how often it gets played at events!  It would just take the first beat and we would be hurrying out of the room.  I can even picture the way he would often cover his ears as we left.

I never understood why but I also didn't question it.  I just saw it as a quirk of his that I didn't need to understand to accommodate.   I do wonder though now all that I missed every time we ran out of the room.

The first time I heard it after the separation was last October.  They played it on the night small boat tour I took as we sipped rum drinks and made our way back to the cruise ship after exploring a shipwreck in the Bermuda Triangle.  He wouldn't have been able to escape that one!  That was probably the first time I got to hear the song all the way through.

I heard it again at the Orange Party on the late June/early July cruise.  I admit that I had a moment instinct to flee.  It was that ingrained and I wasn't confined like the small boat tour last October.  But then I realized I didn't have to and I raised my glass and weaved my way deeper into the crowd.

This evening I laughed in joy to be able to stop running.

A quiet low moment

In the early morning quiet as I sipped my coffee, my Facebook memories for today came up.  Today was the day I found out the divorce had been finalized and so there is a post about that.  Although I carefully chose my words, I can feel the pain behind them.  I got a little choked up as I felt myself temporarily return to that place.  Even as I recognize how much better off I am and even celebrate it, the way it ended was so cruel and painful.  That pain will probably take time before it no longer hits me in quieter moments like this morning.

Then there is a post with a new profile photo with the caption "Time for a new start, a new photo, and a new name".  I changed my name on Facebook that very day.  Reading it now, it comes across forced.  I wasn't ready.  But I also wasn't willing to wait until I was ready.  I learned last year that sometimes you just have to plunge forward because if you wait, the time will never be right and you will miss it all.

Then below those two memories is a post of him and I dangling our feet in the river in downtown Chattanooga three years ago.  Below that are two posts from five years ago that also include a photo of the two of us taking a walk in our city and ending at one of my favorite restaurants to order sushi burritos.  It was the height of COVID so the restaurant had set up a table outside to take and hand out to-go orders.

It's interesting that when I see these memories, I no longer focus on the disconnect between the then and when it ended.  Instead I wonder about the huge disconnect between my conscious view of our relationship and my body's view of the situation.  My body knew all along it wasn't good.  The signs go back to very early in our marriage.

I may never reconcile how someone I loved so much and saw so much good in could be so cruel but I'm grateful to have been given this opportunity to create something better.

My date with myself to celebrate my divorce anniversary

What a beautiful evening!  And the food was so good!  I'm so glad I did this, took this time to celebrate me.  I really don't have words so I'll just end with a few photos.

I even found a grate to boldly walk on!  Grates have become such a symbolic piece of my journey.

A sparkling rose to start the evening

These salmon skewers were my favorite of all I ate.  The drink is a citrus drink with Japanese whiskey.

The last colors of sunset on my walk home!

Daisies are my favorite flower and I just love this red and white combination.

Divorce Anniversary

On this day last year, at 3:53 p.m., the court entered the Final Judgment of Divorce in my case.  It was a Monday, the first business day after the required minimum 30 day waiting period had passed since filing the divorce.  But I didn't get notice that day.

I was still on a high from my trip to New York City, Bermuda, and DC which I had returned from on that Sunday.  It was Tuesday morning.  The office was mostly empty as it was still early.  As I was settling in, I got an e-mail from my now ex-husband telling me the divorce was final and that I would probably be hearing from my attorney but if I needed a copy of it he could forward it to me.  I don't think I ever responded to that e-mail.

I closed my office door, sunk to the ground, and cried.  The moment is still vivid in my mind even today and it brings me to the one other time that is just as vivid many years ago where I collapsed on my kitchen floor in tears as he left for work the first time I thought it was over, except this time it really was over.

Then I picked myself up and colleagues started to arrive so I went and found supports.  The day included a really nice lunch with several women.  I wrote about that day here.  

I remember once the initial emotions had run through me early that morning that I was just so pissed that he felt the need to be the one to tell me.  I did get an e-mail from my attorney later that morning with copies of the documents.  There was absolutely no reason he needed to be the one to disrupt my morning like that, absolutely no reason I needed to hear from him on that day.

So here I am today, a year later.  And I have come so far.  Seeing this date coming up on the calendar didn't leave me with any feelings of dread like I might have expected.  I didn't even worry that the day would be hard like previous milestones had been.  

I had needed to lean on friends for my wedding anniversary in June.  And I was so thankful to my family for the support on our family trip on the ship where I was married.  And July was overall a rough month with it being a year from when he called it quits and we started living separately in the same home.  And then when September came to mark one year living on my own, I proactively made plans with friends although I think by that time it was more about wanting to celebrate with them vs needing to lean on them.

This milestone feels like a victory.  I have made it through every single first year milestone, holiday, etc.  And I have used this year to do more growth than I could have ever imagined possible.  I have fallen back in love with myself.  I have reclaimed my energy.  Even amongst the sorrow, I have filled this year with more joy than I experienced in the over two decades I spent with my ex-husband.  I have started building something so incredibly beautiful out of my life.

And I have not only gone inward to re-find the authentic woman I am but simultaneously I have let the world in to finally see me.

What a truly amazing year it has been!  And I can't wait to see what I do with year two of this chapter.

But for now, I'm really looking to this evening.  I've got a big date planned for myself - a nice dress, meaningful jewelry, photos using my tripod, dinner and drinks, a small journal to fit in my purse to do some writing, flowers and chocolate.  The last milestones have been about the community I have built.  This one is all about me.

Falling in Love Again with Me

Falling in Love Again with Me

the horizon glows orange
a cool breeze enters as a piano plays
matching my internal rhythm
I feel the rise and fall of my breath

I hear my earlier laughter echo
along with the patter of my twirling toes
I whisper, “I love you”
and feel the intimacy wash over me

a burgundy dress hangs in the closet
a lacy overlay that begs to be caressed
the restaurant picked out for tomorrow
anticipation builds for my solo date

embracing each of my thoughts
I pause a moment with gratitude
continuing as thoughts build
I hold close my loosely held dreams

the peace I find in solitude
the courage I find in connection
continue to lead me back to me
in this greatest of all love story

Happiness

A cold front came through last night with some much needed rain and so the temperatures right now are in the upper 60s with low humidity and a gorgeous breeze.  I've opened up my patio doors and am welcoming in the sunshine and the wind.  Across the street at the brewery a band that is so easy to listen to plays with a saxophone leading the melody.  I've poured myself a glass of wine.  I've talked to my parents.  I really love the way our relationships have evolved over the last year.  Every conversation with them is so enjoyable.

And now I'm trying to decide if I'm brave enough to travel to Puerto Rico all on my own next December.  I mean I know I am but as I think through all the specific details I have to draw upon my courage.  Will I find the taxi stand at the airport?  Will the third party excursion I book to El Yunque National Park to tour the rainforest and view some beautiful waterfalls meet my expectations?  Will I enjoy the beach I pick for my hotel stay?  Will the hotel help me obtain transportation to the cruise port or should I make arrangements ahead of time?  Will the beach in Barbados remind me of my last visit there?  

In therapy this past week, I talked about how travel plays a different role in my life now.  After talking about how spontaneous my last trip was which was quite a contrast from previous trips, my therapist asked if all the time I invested in planning before was about trying to maintain control of the situation.  And there probably was some truth to that.  I'm not sure how much control I had in my marriage but I definitely had a lot of control in the plans I made for all our travels.

But I think now there's a hesitation to do the planning because I no longer have someone to help me implement the plan.  And not that he actually was all that helpful but he was another presence that theoretically I could have turned to if we ran into issues.  I don't know that we ever ran into anything that I couldn't handle myself but the lack of someone else standing next to me as a fall back is intimidating.  For no good reason though!

It's funny how my confidence stumbles even in situations where I am perfectly capable.

Anyway, I didn't mean to go off on a tangent about my confidence.  I truly am just enjoying this day.  The weather, the dreams, the music, the slow pace - it is all quite glorious.

I used to be so small and invisible

Before the church service starts, after I have put on my choir robe, I find a spot in the balcony to just observe people.  This wonderful older lady who sings next to me often joins me.  Sometimes we talk.  Sometimes we just sit.  

Today I told her about my plans to take myself on a date for my divorce anniversary and she mentioned how far I have come and started talking about the moment last year when I disclosed to her that I was going through a divorce.  She said before that moment, I was just a quiet, introverted person who sat next to her who she didn't actually know.  And so she told me about how she was reacting internally to me suddenly opening up about this as she tried to make sense of what I was saying with the silent woman she had sat next to for months.

That made me think back to the day I opened up to one of my colleagues last year.  I had been present for office gossip conversations.  I had listened to her tell her stories about her mother-in-law and her family.  But I had shared very little of myself.  On that day, she was complaining about her mother-in-law to several of us colleagues.  As we both walked back to our offices which were near each other, I said, "I don't have to deal with a mother-in-law anymore."  I still remember the look on her face until my story started to tumble out.

Before the separation last year, I was an almost invisible presence in my daily life.  My co-workers knew my name and that I scootered to work but not a lot else.  I had rarely said a word in the choir I had been singing in since 2019.  People knew of me at church but didn't actually know me.

And for all the work I've done in the last year, did you know that there isn't a single non-family person in my life today that knows my birthday?  I hadn't even shared it with the one friend I had, the one I wrote about yesterday.  I have her birthday in my phone and I think both her kids' birthdays but I don't think I ever shared mine with her.

Today's conversation and ones I've had with others over the last weeks and months remind me of how small and invisible I used to be.  It makes me kind of sad at what all I missed by hiding in the shadows.  I let him drain so much of my energy that I didn't have time to find my space in a larger, fuller, more connected world.

Grief over a friendship

It was a Facebook post of the protest she attended today that reminded me of my friend's absence.  She was the one local friend I had when this all started early last summer.  And yet she has been mostly missing in action since then.  When I needed someone most, she didn't have time.  When I asked her to check in on me regularly even with just a quick text, weeks and months would go by in silence.  

On several occasions, she cancelled the plans we made.  Even though she lives a 15 minute drive from me and works a half mile from me, we have only seen each other 4 or 5 times in the last year and a half.  There have been no phone calls in between, texts have been very infrequent, short, and superficial, nor does she interact with most of my Facebook posts.

I quickly learned last year that I couldn't depend on her.  I suppose I've been grieving the loss of the close friendship I thought I had with her at the same time I've been grieving the loss of the illusion that my marriage was.  As I type that out, I realize how significant that is.  I lost close relationships with the only two people who knew me well in this entire state at the same time.

The beauty of this blog is that when I type things out that really hit home, I can just pause and sit with it a moment.  The evening breeze is flowing in from outside, embracing me in this pain.  The music playing at the brewery across the street seems so distant.  Tears threaten but won't fall.

I am sad.  I am disappointed.  I'm frustrated with the internal battle inside of me that for the last year has tried to weigh how much I enjoy the moments I do get with this friend with the pain of her silence.  I've distanced myself a fair bit since I realized that I couldn't trust her to be there, although not cut off contact.  I've eliminated my expectations of her and turned to building a new community of people who are mostly showing up consistently.  That's helped temper my disappointment some but it hasn't eliminated the pain and the grief.

I played a role in it.  I didn't ask much of her.  This whole year has been a steep learning curve as I gain confidence in asking for any help.  So last summer and even fall, I struggled to speak up.  I didn't even know what to say.  I didn't yet know what I needed from people and what I could reasonably ask of them.  I remember her telling me last year that she knows that if the roles were reversed I would be there holding her as she cried and that she would be blowing up my phone.  I definitely never blew up her phone and I'm not sure she ever even saw me cry.  That conversation was so early on, I didn't know how to use it to speak up about what would be most helpful to me.

But still I did occasionally ask for very specific things of her that she didn't follow through on.  And the cancellations of plans hit hard.  What hurt the most though was that she never seemed concerned with whether I was okay.  She knew if the roles were reversed she would fall apart but didn't bother to check in and see if I was falling apart.

I'm so grateful for the community I have built thus far and for the people who have shown up for me.  Maybe this loss pushed me to invest in something larger.  But I'm still really sad that one of the people who knew me the best couldn't be bothered to show up for me at a time when I was losing the one other non-family person who knew me the best.

Listen to your body

I slept an uninterrupted eight hours last night.  My sleep the past couple weeks seems to be normal again.  And I'm not so tired during the day anymore.

And this morning when I looked in the mirror, I realized the skin irritation on the right side of my face near my jaw line was completely gone.  There's not even a trace of it!  And I can't recall the last time, I ran my fingers across it so clearly it has been healing over these past weeks, maybe months.  That one spot had refused to heal for years.  I think it even predates my move to the south in 2018.  Can stress affect the skin?  I suppose.

This is just one more reminder that in the future I need to listen to my body a whole lot more.  This past year has been really eye opening as I start to understand all the clues it was giving me over the last two decades.  The chronic pain, the digestive issues, the struggle with weight gain, the lack of energy, and this skin irritation were all (not so subtle) clues from my body.

Joy

I just stumbled upon a live thread I had done for our last cruise together on Cruise Critic (a forum for cruisers) and it reminded me that regardless of how much better my life is without him, I still found joy even when I was with him.

That's something I admire about myself - my ability to find joy in any circumstance.

Unconcerned, inconsiderate, self-absorbed

A Flashback

a flashback to a dealership
in pain I sprawl
stretching on an dirty showroom floor
unconcerned the deal went on

a flashback to a conversation dismissed
a dream of a drastic change
I only had questions
but I was accused of not supporting

a flashback to a vacation in paradise
I planned for him and his mom,
me an afterthought, the third wheel
my efforts unrecognized

a flashback to a gray car
he never forgot, not in two decades
the way I contradicted him
about the color I wanted for my car

a flashback to a balcony I gave up
for an apartment he had to have
that I knew he would hate
I was right and I missed that balcony

a flashback to the school-year visits
that had to be perfect
yet took energy I did not have
he wouldn’t say no

a flashback to the end
I asked for communication, closure
he even had a therapist to help him
yet it wasn’t worth his time

he showed me who he was
two decades ago
yet I did not believe

I took my journal to the Greek restaurant next door this evening and wrote and wrote as I sipped wine and ate good food.  (And took a giant slice of chocolate cake home.)

The rose colored glasses are gone and now all I can see are the ways he was so self-absorbed he couldn't even consider my needs.  I'm angry at him for the ways he used me and I'm angry at me for ever aligning myself with someone who didn't match my values.  I think the chocolate cake will help me get over it though.  And I'm loving the fresh air flowing into my apartment this evening.

Finding myself

I read something this morning on my social media feed about how finding yourself isn't actually about discovering someone new, it's about remember who you were before the world changed you.  That really resonated with me.

This last year (and continuing) has been an exploration into what feels most authentic to me.  It's been about understanding and shedding the influence of my ex-husband and probably all the societal expectations that came with stepping into adulthood as a newly married woman.

And what I'm finding is a version of the little girl I enjoyed as a child who has grown up, learned from her mistakes, found a bit more confidence, reclaimed her energy, and is pushing back against external expectations that don't serve her.  And it really has been and continues to be a beautiful process to reconnect with her and step into the adult version of her that I want to be.

I'm planning a date for myself next Tuesday, the anniversary of my divorce.  It will be a celebration of work I have done to remember who I am and rebuild that relationship with myself.  This morning as I dressed for work, I brushed my fingers over the texture of the dress, I think I've decided I will wear.

Cruelty in this world

Sometimes these days my optimism and positivity fade a bit.  I still see the good around me - the positive in what is happening and the positive things I'm making happen out of the hurdles.  But I'm not blind to the chaos, confusion, and destruction that is ever-present this year (and in a different way, last year).

I keep striving to see the good in people but then their ugliness figuratively slaps me in the face.  I struggle to understand why people can treat others the way they too often do.  I don't want to understand that kind of cruelty.

This post is about the ninth vote that happened in the Senate today.  It's about the hiring restrictions that came out today.  It's about the mass firings.  It's about the Politico article.  It's about the division I see on Threads and the way the algorithms implemented by rich corporate CEO's play a role in that division.  It's about the AI videos being put out by people in power.  It's about some of the limited interactions at work in a mostly empty office.

And it's about my ex-husband.

It feels like just as I have discovered my own internal light again, the light of the world collectively has dimmed.

I haven't lost hope and I feel very disappointed.  

My favorite song right now is "Be a Light" by Thomas Rhett featuring a lot of big names including Reba McEntire.  I'm going to go listen to it now.

A Walgreen Receipt

I don't think he realizes that his Walgreen receipts still go to a joint e-mail account we haven't yet closed yet.  He clearly doesn't shop at Walgreens often as I only recall seeing one other such e-mail in the last e-mail.  The reason I hesitate to close the joint e-mail accounts is because of how many things might still be tied to it, like Walgreens.  Just when I think I've made it through all my accounts, I find another.  Clearly the same is true for him.

But anyways, back to this particular Walgreens receipt from Saturday.  It kind of surprised me but then I laughed at the irony.  It was mostly for Maybelline products.  To put this in some context, on Saturday, we were on day 11 of a government shutdown which they are predicting could last into November.  He is a furloughed government employee that has received his last paycheck until the government re-opens and although I don't know how likely it is, there are threats that furloughed employees won't get backpay this time.

During the last long government shutdown which lasted 35 days that we weathered together, we cut our non-essential expenses to as close to zero as possible.  I can't imagine dating a federal worker right now and being okay with him spending money while his income is so uncertain on things for me, especially personal cosmetic products.  At a time like this, I would be using my own income for all of my own expenses and minimizing or covering date costs.  Maybe he has found someone as self-absorbed as he is.  That would make for an interesting pair!

I have some curiosity about his life and his girlfriend because I kind of want to understand what he meant by us not being compatible.  Although, if he is just mirroring her, am I really learning anything from observing him now? The ending was filled with so much chaos and confusion with his lack of communication that I'm left with watching these clues, if I want to try to understand his mindset.  I hope someday I'll get to the point where I've accepted that I won't ever understand but I'm not quite there yet.  But in the meantime, every clue like this is confirmation of why I'm better off without him.  I'm definitely NOT compatible with what I have been seeing.

A different person in different scenarios

My ex-husband was a different person in different scenarios.  Around his Mom he would act really entitled and quick to judge others, often for things he thought was okay for him to do.  He would be more cautious, less likely to try something new or adventurous.  He would order the exact same thing both of his parents did at restaurants.

I think this added another layer onto my struggles to connect with his Mom because in addition to her own challenging behaviors, she also brought out some challenging behaviors in my ex-husband.  The two would feed off each other's negativity, judgment, paranoia, entitlement, etc.

When he was with friends and colleagues, but he seemed to really mirror the person he was with.  There was a friend years ago that was a very abrasive, crude, and at times a mean person.  I used to dread the time we spent with that friend because some of those same traits would creep out in my ex-husband.  Earlier in his career, he found an ally with a common enemy in another colleague, and the two of them would spiral into an almost obsession of this other colleague.  

He had a female colleague in recent years where his interactions with her just felt weird.  I don't know how to describe it.  I never got the gut reaction to her that I needed to worry about him with her like I did with his crush but it still always felt a bit off.  I suppose it is the ones that brought out what felt most contradictory that stand out most.

Thinking back to the beginning of my relationship with him, I remember feeling like we were so incredibly aligned, in values, in what we wanted out of life, in how our personalities meshed.  In hindsight, he was probably mirroring me.  

As the marriage progressed, I think there were some ways he felt more free around me.  I got to see a side of him that loved adventure and spontaneity, the opposite of what he displayed around his Mom.  And although, I now realize he still held back a lot, I got to see a much wider range of emotions - I suppose this part was necessary if he was going to lean on me to help him manage them.  

I now realize he also held back on a lot (but not all) of his judgments and criticisms with me because I wouldn't participate in it.  In a bit of irony, he used to get irritated when my parents got critical, while refusing to see the same behavior in himself.

His comments at the end that we weren't compatible really confounded me.  With the information I had about him at the time, I didn't see how we could be more compatible.  When I asked him why, he pointed to superficial things like me not liking horror movies or playing video games with him but those aren't relationship incompatible things - those are differences in interests that make a relationship more interesting.  But maybe he really felt a deeper incompatibility with how much he had mirrored me and as a result silenced himself.  I'll probably never know what was authentic to him and what was just a mirrored image.

How much do I mirror others?  How much do I show up as a contradicting person in different scenarios?  And I'm talking about something more than just adjusting for what is appropriate in different circumstances.  We all use different language around our boss than we do around our closest friends.  We share different things about ourselves with different groups of people.  But those differences shouldn't be start contrasts of one another, right?  

This past year, I have really focused on tapping into what is authentic to me and my relationships all feel really authentic.  So I would be surprised if today people saw significant contradictions in my behavior in different scenarios.

But what about all the years leading up to now?  Outside of my marriage, I don't think so.  I've always been someone who worries little about what people think and has a strong sense of self.  But inside my marriage, did I at times to cope?  I know I made myself smaller and convinced myself I didn't need much in the relationship.  There probably were ways I mirrored to just avoid making waves.

Why did I not see through his mirroring?  I was aware of the discrepancies.  I was even irritated by them at times.  I suppose that is what made the illusion I created of him all the more necessary if I was going to stay loyal to him.  I needed some way to make sense of what I was seeing.

The role travel plays

I almost cancelled this trip.  I'm in a phase where I'm trying to save money and for some odd reason a weekend away didn't seem quite as important.  As this trip comes to an end, I have realized these trips play a different purpose now.

Before it was about escape, escape from the monotony of life, maybe even escape from the day to day of my marriage.  I used to count the days until the next trip.  And there wasn't a federal holiday that I didn't earmark for some trip which was prompted my gut reaction to book a hotel for this weekend.

Now the trips just sneak up on me.  The days between trips no longer feel like just marking time.  These trips no longer feel like an escape.  I have a full life now that I don't need to escape from.  Now it is about the journey and what I can learn about myself.  And it's about reconnecting with my spiritual side, my draw to Mother Nature.  It's a way to remind myself of my place in this world.

I walked two and half miles (round-trip) on the beach last night after sunset.  I arrived just as the sun had dipped below the horizon.  The breathtaking colors were reflecting off the sand where the waves had retreated, the same sand where sanderlings were running along.  I followed those sanderlings until the last light faded and all I could see where the lights of the condos in the distance and the beginnings of the stars coming out above my head.  

And then I turned around.  The moon had not risen yet but my eyes had slowly adjusted as the sunlight had faded away.  The waves crashing on the sand sounded so much louder, drowning out my thoughts.  Occasionally, I could hear the songs of the sanderlings as they flew past me.  The sand where the waves had just retreated felt warm to my bare feet while the rest of the sand was starting to cool with the night air.  Occasionally a large wave would surprise me, splashing the hem of my dress and making me smile.

It's moments like this that leave me in awe as I feel the connection between my body and the earth, as I get lost in the present moment without a care for the past or the future.  As my life feels small, yet without losing meaning and significance, in a world that is so much greater than me.

So maybe I didn't "need" this trip in the same way I used to feel I needed these weekend trips but it has added to my journey in ways I couldn't have contemplated when I booked this hotel a few months ago.  I'm so glad I didn't cancel.

Is his ghost at the beach?

I thought I had picked a beach location I had never been before.  I realize it’s hard to keep track because we always went wherever the hotel rates were cheapest which allowed us to experience a new part of the Gulf of Mexico each time.  But my memory isn’t that bad.  I thought I had a general sense of all the places I had been.

But last night as I drove the last couple blocks to my hotel, I passed the Fairfield Inn.  I could see us having breakfast in the front room near the entrance, the morning sunlight pouring in. And this morning, as I sit in the sand listening to the waves and watching the terns fish and the sanderlings scurry as the waves rush in, I can picture us standing on this very stretch of sand, the same condos in the distance, the state park behind us.

There may be a bit of his ghost here but it’s not really here because the thing about the shoreline, the beaches, the waves is that they are never the same.  You can’t put your feet in the same water twice.  The sand that you lay on is constantly shifting, eroding, being blown into the sea grass or being swallowed up by the sea itself.  So even if he was by my side, we wouldn’t be standing on the same sand and walking in the same water.

And like this beach, today we are definitely not the same people we were when we were here a little over two years ago.  So I’m going to sit on this empty section of the beach and enjoy the solitude that renews and restores me.  I’m going to breathe in the new-found energy and joy that this year has shown me.

The greater context of my personal challenges

As I follow the news and social media groups regarding today's politics that hit very close to home, I hope that when I go back and read this years in the future, I remember the greater context.  I've had one of the most challenging years of my life on a personal level and it happened to coincide with what will likely be written about in history books as one of the most challenging years for my country in recent history.  And my personal circumstances put me right in the thick of it all.

And although it has been quite scary to face all alone, I now can clearly see how much more easily I am able to face it now that I am no longer married to him.  It's almost as if the universe saw this coming and chose last year to meddle in my marriage to prepare me for this year.  That's crazy isn't it?