I spent this past weekend with two old friends of mine. As we were all catching up on our lives and I was sharing the never-ending story of my divorce, my friends commented on how impressed they were that I have been able to pick up the pieces of my shattered life and rebuild it. My mother has also frequently told me how proud she is of me for being so strong and capable. Even my boss was shocked to learn that I was getting divorced because she didn't perceive any impact of my personal life on my work. Additionally, many of you readers have shared with me that you think I am brave and strong for sharing my story through this blog and for being able to openly discuss how I'm moving on with my life.
I've also had conversations with readers about their struggles with overcoming their own experiences with infidelity, divorce, and abuse. The common theme I hear over and over again is this: Their friends tell them it's time to get over it, and they don't understand why they're holding on so hard to someone who caused them so much pain and to something that they know they will never get back. There seems to be this idea that they feel less than, or that they are doing worse than, where they expected to be at x number of days, weeks, months, or years from D-Day.
I appreciate everyone's support and the kind compliments. And I've written before, both in this blog and in Facebook posts, about how one of the gifts of Wusband's absence is me finding my inner strength. I am grateful and also pretty damned impressed with myself that I have been able to respond to this life-altering crisis in a way that has led to finding the ever elusive silver lining. However, I don't know that I've really done anything that remarkable. Let me explain.
Here's the hard truth: I did fall apart when Wusband left. It doesn't matter how optimistic, strong, or even apathetic you are; when your husband abandons you for another woman while you are pregnant with his child, it devestates you. There's no way to avoid that. Add in the fact that I was facing the bitter realization that he is a narcissist and had emotionally abused me to extents I had not even recognized, and you end up with a terrified, distraught, emotionally exhausted, and completely irrational shell of a human being.
My entire life had become a broken mirror; I was crumpled in a heap on the floor amidst shards of broken glass. Each piece of glass reflected some dark and genuinely scary memory, fact, or fear back at me. It was like being trapped in a sick funhouse of your worst nightmares. This piece of glass showed me the memory of discovering a middle of the night visit to a motel via his Google maps; a second shard showcased my worst possible mental image of myself, an ugly woman who was so undeserving of her husband, her marriage, and any future love that she should just end everyone's misery and crawl into a hole to die; and yet another portrayed my worst fears for my future, ending up a lonely old shrew with 15 cats. I couldn't escape the horrors of my own mind.
I was trapped inside my worst memories and fears. I had to escape the mad funhouse and find my way back to sanity. This wasn't an easy task. It was the mental equivalent of climbing the side of a cliff with no handholds and no safety ropes. If you give up on climbing the cliff, you fall to your death. If you give up on escaping the negativity of your own mind, you remain trapped in this despression forever. So what choice do you have but to grit your teeth and keep trying, to keep pulling yourself up, and to refuse to look down?
At some point, the real reality of my life hit me: I am a single mom with a second child on the way. I am now solely responsible for providing for my family. I have a relatively new job and am still a new enough employee that I need to continue to demonstrate my value to my employer. I simply couldn't afford to remain trapped in that madhouse. I couldn't let myself fall to pieces, no matter how badly I sometimes wanted to. No one else was going to feed my child, pay my mortgage, or make sure the heat and lights stay on. I am so lucky that I have a wide circle of family and friends who have supported me through this awful experience (and who continue to do so), but in the simple everyday acts of life, I only had myself to rely on.
So I made a choice. I chose to put on my big girl pants, examine the mess around me, and clean it up. I swept away the broken glass, ignoring the horrible images that flashed across them as I dumped them in the trash (which really is where all this negativity belongs). I scrubbed away the stains of my previous life, acknowledging that I would never regain my marriage or even who I was before getting involved with Wusband. I entered counseling, found a local support group, joined online support groups through Facebook, read a bunch of self-help books, and began doing anything and everything I could think of to get through this horrendous thing that had happened to me. It started out as simply trying to find a way to survive. But it ended up becoming an entire new life.
Eventually, I was able to hang up a new mirror to replace the broken one, and this one shows me exactly what a mirror should: the truth. Not my fears, not my worst memories, not a terrifying false projection of the future. Instead, I see myself: a woman who is making the most of out being dealt a bad hand and who is slowly but surely rebuilding her life in the most positive way she can. And sometimes, if I look hard enough, I see glimpses of the real future. It isn't lonely but full of love, it isn't dark but full of happiness and laughter, and there isn't a single cat.
So to all of you who are struggling with escaping the funhouse, please know this: You are not less than anyone else. You are not doing worse than you are supposed to be. There is no guide book to overcoming your trauma. This is not a race. Heal at your own pace. Feel what you feel. But do not let yourself stay trapped in your own misery. Do not stop climbing. I promise you, it gets better. You find joy. You laugh again. You feel hopeful for the future. I can't tell you when this will happen for you, but I do know that you, too, will sweep up the pieces of your former life, and you will find immense relief in disposing of the garbage that you have experienced.
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