Apocrypha's post-sep update
May 12, 2020 12:43:51 GMT -5
DryCreek, misssunnybunny, and 8 more like this
Post by Apocrypha on May 12, 2020 12:43:51 GMT -5
I've been long term separated now - a close separation - I sometimes say. Co-operative on finances and parenting, but living largely separately about 6-7 years now.
I've long wanted to step back in and say how wonderful it is - I love all these happily ever after stories, and I've even had chapters of that - but I've always felt it too soon to write because it wasn't over yet, and when it was going really well, I didn't want to oversell.
And sure enough, after 2 years in a romantic relationship with someone wonderful who lived also with her own kids, just a bit too far away -- it ended on Jan 1. We had been discussing the possibility of marriage and the seriousness of our feelings and intent with each other, and we hadn't found a solution, with lives and children established in different places. The breakup was devastating - very hard - but less so than the abandonment of the marriage.
I'm not gutted by it. I've been recovering faster, even during the COVID lockdown. So I'll share a bit about why I feel better about it than my latter-day marriage.
1. I accept the reason the relationship ended. It was too long difficult for the two of us to find time together. She is a big joiner - one of the things I loved about her (I'm not) and ended up packing her days and schedule with a million activities, dinner parties etc, and then complained we didn't have enough alone time. We discussed this a few times, though I did not realize the crisis level we were at. I concluded that the result (us not seeing each other, largely due to her commitments), was actually the intent. I don't really need to chase the why. It was in her power to solve if she thought it worth it. It hurts that she did not, and that likely she had another offer that was closer to her home and church interests - but I understand it - even if I don't feel that way to the same degree.
2. I have interests. I kept my interests - I feel that I remain an interesting person with my own ideas and activities, friends, and stories that I could tell another person about my day and my passions. These don't revolve around another person.
3. While I'm lonely, it isn't the kind of supplicating lonely in which I feel helpless waiting for someone to feed me. Dating where I live and in my circumstance has a lot of significant challenges. But I also have some advantages. One of them is in having confidence now that I'm actually attractive to women, and that I'm a person of quality. I also feel I have agency - in that I can make myself more attractive than I am (through self-improvement, exercise, skills), to open more doors. I'm in charge, and opportunity can happen.
In my latter marriage, I recall weeping almost once per day for nearly a year, operating constantly under trauma, constant rejection, contempt, passive aggression, gaslighting, cheating. I recall several times breaking down completely. I recall hating my own sexuality and sex drive, and thinking strange and unhealthy thoughts - as if my normal sexuality and modest needs were threatening my life and family.
I recall it taking over a year before I realized my attraction to my ex-wife dissipated. maybe 2 years, but I see her much more than most people see their exes.
Now she's almost a stranger to me, even though I see her a fair amount. I don't see her as a person I desire. I probably see her as she has always seen me, actually - someone she's stuck with due to a mistake. Someone who is likely a good person in her own context and with her own people - but shouldn't have been yoked to me.
I'm single - dumped even. But I'm ok. And I would not want to trade that I have now for what I had in my last years of marriage.
I've long wanted to step back in and say how wonderful it is - I love all these happily ever after stories, and I've even had chapters of that - but I've always felt it too soon to write because it wasn't over yet, and when it was going really well, I didn't want to oversell.
And sure enough, after 2 years in a romantic relationship with someone wonderful who lived also with her own kids, just a bit too far away -- it ended on Jan 1. We had been discussing the possibility of marriage and the seriousness of our feelings and intent with each other, and we hadn't found a solution, with lives and children established in different places. The breakup was devastating - very hard - but less so than the abandonment of the marriage.
I'm not gutted by it. I've been recovering faster, even during the COVID lockdown. So I'll share a bit about why I feel better about it than my latter-day marriage.
1. I accept the reason the relationship ended. It was too long difficult for the two of us to find time together. She is a big joiner - one of the things I loved about her (I'm not) and ended up packing her days and schedule with a million activities, dinner parties etc, and then complained we didn't have enough alone time. We discussed this a few times, though I did not realize the crisis level we were at. I concluded that the result (us not seeing each other, largely due to her commitments), was actually the intent. I don't really need to chase the why. It was in her power to solve if she thought it worth it. It hurts that she did not, and that likely she had another offer that was closer to her home and church interests - but I understand it - even if I don't feel that way to the same degree.
2. I have interests. I kept my interests - I feel that I remain an interesting person with my own ideas and activities, friends, and stories that I could tell another person about my day and my passions. These don't revolve around another person.
3. While I'm lonely, it isn't the kind of supplicating lonely in which I feel helpless waiting for someone to feed me. Dating where I live and in my circumstance has a lot of significant challenges. But I also have some advantages. One of them is in having confidence now that I'm actually attractive to women, and that I'm a person of quality. I also feel I have agency - in that I can make myself more attractive than I am (through self-improvement, exercise, skills), to open more doors. I'm in charge, and opportunity can happen.
In my latter marriage, I recall weeping almost once per day for nearly a year, operating constantly under trauma, constant rejection, contempt, passive aggression, gaslighting, cheating. I recall several times breaking down completely. I recall hating my own sexuality and sex drive, and thinking strange and unhealthy thoughts - as if my normal sexuality and modest needs were threatening my life and family.
I recall it taking over a year before I realized my attraction to my ex-wife dissipated. maybe 2 years, but I see her much more than most people see their exes.
Now she's almost a stranger to me, even though I see her a fair amount. I don't see her as a person I desire. I probably see her as she has always seen me, actually - someone she's stuck with due to a mistake. Someone who is likely a good person in her own context and with her own people - but shouldn't have been yoked to me.
I'm single - dumped even. But I'm ok. And I would not want to trade that I have now for what I had in my last years of marriage.
