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I think the loss of my husband is not so much about the loss of HIM as it is highlighting the loss of what is NOT in my life, with or without him.
although, I haven’t been myself for months and months now…(maybe even years) and I’m already sick of myself. I’m sick of crying. I’m sick of feeling sorry for myself and sick of this empty hole I feel in the pit of my stomach.
i do NOT feel numb. I wish that I did!!! So, why do some feel numb and I feel like someone shot me through the stomach and like I’m sure that one can see daylight behind me?
In the last 130 days since the real truth of my husband’s other life began to quickly unravel, I’ve noticed something quite disturbing.
You see, on that very day, August 2, 2011– I took off the wedding band that my husband put on my ring finger some 23 years earlier. Same exact band. I never take it off. Well, except in the final months of pregnancy when my fingers swelled and very occasionally in the summer months, for the same reason. But, 99.9% of the time, I have worn that ring. It became part of my hand, this thin gold band. I barely ever even noticed it, until now.
While the physical ring is gone, in its place is STILL a visible ring left. A definite indentation and slightly darker skin tone, that has not changed one iota for the last 130 days. When I first took the ring off, of course, I noticed it and figured that in a week or so, it would vanish, but no… now in my 5th month, post discovery– it is still there.
it is still there.
Will it be there for the rest of my life?
it was supposed to be.
my husband was my first and only real relationship. I’ve never had a break up (unless you count predator and I guess that counts) and I’ve never told anyone to fuck off before.
I’m a fiercely loyal person. I take my responsibilities and promises seriously.
God damn it!!! so did my husband!!!!!!!!!!!! he did and he still does—
damn it. we were not at odds with each other. we were not arguing or in contempt of one another. we had no irreconcilable differences…we enjoyed each others company very much…
However, for some reason that I do not understand, my husband simply could not keep his dick out of other women’s orifices either in fantasy or in reality; and he could not open up to me, as he did to other women that were far, far away…
but he COULD HAVE!!! I was here for him.
he shut me out. I didn’t know it, but he did.
damn him!!!
why would he do that to me?
i will never have this answer…
and now… it does not matter that I took off my ring.
its still there.
Hi Lexie, That was a very great piece you wrote. Maybe submit some or your writing to lynng (you too nap).
I understand what you say. When i first took my ring off, it was shocking, and like something was missing. I get so used to wearing my jewelry. I bought something beatiful to replace it with. Nothing expensive, but when i looked down at it, it still sparkled, and represented a change for good. That i was no longer tied the “that”. Its all a process and NONE of it happens easily. even if you are leaving the worst relationship in the world, you will have doubts, you will still feel that pull…is this the right thing to do? I feel miserable i feel broken i feel sad….but that does not for one minute mean that your relationship you had was good for you. That is something else, its not love. Your relationship was of conveinainace in a way, he was solid, you were somewhat amicable…but that is not a love relationship. its a partnership. And that would fine, excpet you know you want more, that fire is brewing inside you that says youw ant more. And we all want more, that is why we are here. So instead of being afraid of the fire and your body and mind so watning to break free, go with it. You have been fighting this for months, just as i had. I was back and forth, but one day i went with it. It stopped fighting it and it was what I truley wanted. And i went with it. I have even as of today, no regrets. I do not wish to ever be with my husband again. But when we first split up until about three months+, i did.
I wanted him to chase after me, tell me he loves me, bring me flowers, fight for me, go to therapy, go to 12 step, come after me with someone who has love, respect, and passion for me. But the thing is they don’t. He never fought for me, ever. Sound familair. I waited, still always waited a little in the back of my mind. But it never happened. There is no worse relationship than being with someone who does not want to be with you. You need someone who will cherish you. Your h does not cherish you, and neither did mine. Because if they did, we would not be here, they would never have acted in those ways, and they maybe just are not capable. But the problem lies in that we have that feeling in our gut, we know that there is more out there for us, and we cannot fight it anymore. Mediocre is no longer good enough for us, and no longer is mr right then or right in the past…as he is no longer mr right now. There is nothing wrong with wanting more out of your life. Something has been off for a long time with him, and you did your best to try to make it work. But it can’t, its broken.
I just read a short little book about a women who got divorced. Her h sat her down at the table one night, and told her he was leaving her. She begged, she pleaded, she cried. She had to leave her home, with her 4 cats, and move to a small rental house. She was devastated. She cried, drank too much wine, never unpacked, was stuck and miserable. Many nights she slept on the back porch to avoid all the disaster in the house. I guess what i am saying is that it is fine to mourn your loss. Just because you are sad and mourning does not mean, you should stay together. This lady turned her loss into something greater, she even wrote that book. What ended up bringing her out of the abyss, was knitting, just to get her back out into life and than formed friendships via that. Before that she had no one, her family was in loisianna i think and she was in california. She had no support base nor family. But she created it. She was not outgoing and from what i gather heavy. But she did it. She was even able to organize a trip to paris with her friends!! You could do a trip to europe. She never imagined that she would be able to do these things, she never imagined she would be single either. (but what i can gurantee, is you will not be to eurpoe with h either). So much of her life was planned to be married, that she was not anything without her marriage. I think the trick is to create a new life for yourself. She even went through her house and got rid of everything that she kept just because charlie( her ex) and her did together. In order to create a new life for herself she had to get rid of all the crap and make room.
I hope some of this makes sense. Honey you are not happy in a shitty relationship. And you shouldn’t be. So the only logical step is to leave it. And it does nto matter why or how he is such a loser; what matters is that he is. You know for sure that he is. At some point it much does not matter why and how he did this to you….as it matters as much as what you are going to do now in your life. It is not so healhty for you to dwell so much on the whys…because you will never really know. But what you do know, is that he is not right for you.
I hope some of this helps.
Love,
FloraFlora what a lovely post to Lexie. Very true and written with love and compassion. It really spoke to me too. Thank you.
Love, NapFlora,
You have such wisdom. Thank you for sharing your words. You are an inspiration to me. I am so happy for you that you have a peace about the end of your marriage. When did you find yourself getting to a better place. What were you doing? Did it happen gradually. You should write a book like the woman that you wrote about in your post. Thank you for caring about us Flora.
Dear Lexie,
I took my ring off over a year ago. Very hard to do that. It left a 30 year dent in my finger. I thought that dent would never ever go away. But it grew fainter and fainter. Now I can still see where the ring was but it doesn’t scream out at other people who might look at my hand.
I think it’s like the dent in your heart. It gets better, but never completely goes away.
I wanted my husband to fight for me too. But he just couldn’t. It was very very sad to see that he couldn’t, and that he didn’t even know what it meant. To this day, he thinks he did. But all it meant was his periodic emotional masturbation sessions where he worked up some guilt about what happened to me. He seemed to think that his feeling bad was equivalent to doing something for me. It’s just always always always about them.
Flora’s story is about a woman who simply embraced her life first. She didn’t wait for others to embrace it. She did it first, and in the process she created a life that was deep and rich. This is what we must do now. Perhaps love will come again, and perhaps not. Either way, we have the love we invest in our lives and it ends up blessing the world too.
okay first sermon done, now I must get myself together for the next one!love,
D.Great post Flora! Love your reasoning. Hey, what’s the name of that book you mentioned? Sounds like a good read. Love, Liza
Dear Lexie and everyone.
Thank you so much for the honest sharing of your raw emotions. Lexie I can hear your pain and relate to it. I hear all that could have been and all you offered that he never could accept– because of his own flaws.
I know that for me the wish that he would fight for us comes from wanting him to acknowledge or honor that…
I dont know if this has been addressed on the site anywhere, but one thing that hurts me is the thought that he would actually get it together for someone else. When I think of the possibility of us splitting, I imagine him moving on and getting well, while I remain hurt and grieving. This feels so sad and unfair to me– that we are in the wake of their destruction.
Im pretty sure that fear is irrational, but it hurts all the same.Hi Bonnie,
In my opinion, they won’t be better for the next one. They will remain sick and their addiction will likely escalate. If they do find another woman, they will ‘fool’ her too. It’s quite possible the woman they pick will be as damaged as they are in some way, shape, or form.
Love, NapI told my SAH that I just wanted him to spend half the time and energy he applied to planning and acting out to showing me he loved me and wanted to help me heal. No could do.
Wow! Thanks everyone. Flora, I am absolutely speechless with your breathtaking response! thank you! thank you!
I don’t think I fell asleep until after 4:00AM, but when I woke up at 10:30, I felt better. I don’t know why, but I did.H is coming over and this I wrote him a non-emotional email that he must clean up his entire desk area and adjacent bookcase. I told him that anything he wants he must take with him and if he doesn’t want it, it must get tossed in the trash, otherwise, I will be getting rid of it and I told him that he must do this with a portion of the house, in this fashion, every time he comes.
What I imagine, is the possibility of my h being “tender” and affectionate with a new woman as he was with me, at first… but could not sustain… because as he put it, “did you really expect me to be that way the entire time?”
yes. i did. and of course, no, not ALL the time, but for the love of God– SOME of the time!
He CAN’T sustain it and she won’t be me. In the ads that my husband placed looking for a RELATIONSHIP,(when I was desperately TRYING to revive ours) he described a woman that could easily have been me.
One of my biggest fears is that I will become a bitter, depressed, lonely old woman and I am going to fight that possibility with everything I have. I’ve joined like half a dozen meet up groups. Most of them are at least a 30 minute drive and/or don’t really interest me, that much, but maybe I’ll go to some of them. I refuse to sit here and wither away.
It is a very bright sunny day, here is New Yawk. 😉
In a little while, I’m going to put myself together and I’m going go out to find my little tree and then I’m going to buy a little stand and some little white lights.
It will be a symbol of all of the light and love and joy that he robbed from me, all of these years.
And isn’t that what Christmas is all about, anyway?
After all, Jesus was Jewish and he never saw a pine tree in his entire 33 years.
I might even get my boys a few small things to open up on Christmas Day.
Maybe it’ll become a happy new tradition for this major change in our lives and be a reminder that good can come with change and to not be afraid of it.
Love ~ Laurel
Dear Lexie,
You are so bereft…..you are breaking my heart. I agree with what Adorable Flora said and everyone else BUT I am not going to say what you are doing is going to be easy because I don’t think will. The thing that just claws at my insides about your husband….is the way he rejected you emotionally and physically for the entire marriage is simply diabolical (to me). I just don’t get that…how can anyone be that way. And I certainly don’t understand how a woman like yourself could possibly have survived that kind of emotional deprivation for so long. I KNOW that you are frightened, lonely and have many different burdens to carry…burdens that your husband has helped you with over the years. The easy thing would be to maintain the status quo, BUT you do not seem to be able to do that, Lexie. It is like your soul is parched and you need water and something is pushing you towards that whether you want it or not? I wish that you would just step back, take a deep breath and realize NOTHING is cast in stone. You can take a break from all of the pain and confusion…for a little while? Your husband isn’t going anywhere, Lexie…no such luck. He is going to continue to hang around and try to get as much as he can out of you, while giving you as little as possible. That seems to be his nature and it is NOTHING new, Lexie. He has been short changing you for years and years and he seems to want to stay the way he is.There is a good chance that is all he is capable of,and that your courtship was just a damn good act to reel u in. You hear about things like that…where the guy simply changes after the wedding, like flipping a switch? In any event, I don’t think anything is irreversible here, Lexie. He certainly doesn’t have many options except his internet illusions? I do think your husband is very open to helping parent the kids and assist you in ways that don’t involve him having to give anything emotional. It seems you have been partners and friends for years and years. I am sure you can eventually return to that relationship with him. I am sure you can eventually return to living with him…..if that is what you decide. BUT you will NOT meet anyone else with him slouching around your house and your heart. You will not meet anyone else until you a) improve your relationship with yourself and b) you give yourself a chance to open yourself up to the possibility of something different. This is a VERY long way of saying why don’t you at least give yourself a chance…at least give yourself some time to heal, reflect and see what possibilities life may have to offer you. If you don’t like the new options you can always go back to the status quo at any time. I guarantee you, Lexie, your husband is going to hang around like last years Halloween candy. He will be ready to move back in as soon as you snap your fingers.You are a beautiful vibrant woman. Give yourself a little gift. Give yourself a little time free of his emotional disregard. We are all rooting for you. Karen xx
He is not moving back in. ever. He is also not going to be hanging around here, either. Did I give that impression? but yes, why didn’t he just take whatever he needed yesterday?
improve my relationship with myself? is there something wrong with it, besides chronic low self-esteem? haha! How do I go about changing that? I am doing my best in that regard and I am trying to changes. But, sometimes, I DO feel phenomenally overwhelmed by the enormity of it all.
As for my husband’s change. It was gradual, but perhaps the biggest change was when we moved out of the city with our hyper-active baby, 20 years ago… It all got muddled together.
I will say something though… and its something that I did not notice until more recently. When you look at old photos of us, I am usually draped all over him like a wet cloth, and he is just frozen, like stone. He doesn’t melt back into me, or draw me in close…
I used to fall asleep on his chest while we were watching TV sometimes.
But yes, he did a massive bait and switch. He had an awful role model in his father and a cold, critical, judgmental mother. He did better, when I met him, because he was in therapy and he ended it when we moved up here.
he never should have stopped. oh well…
he’s coming at 2:00.
I won’t be here.
No you didn’t give that impression….just afraid you will get overwhelmed, scared, whatever and cave. He is already so damn condescending I think it would be a HUGE mistake to give an inch. You are right…he seems really frozen. I mean I don’t know why that would be surprizing….sexual addiction is an intimacy disorder and PD is the complete inability to learn from your experiences but for those of us that want to give love it seems so bizarre that another wouldn’t want to do the same?? Anyway, what you said in your other post…if they were bloody normal none of us would be here because we would be busy living happy lives in happy marriages with happy. Ok maybe that is overly optimistic but it sure as hell would NOT be this hard, this painful and this complicated with your garden variety male. With a normal guy you waste your energy wondering why they wash all their clothes in one load, why they hog the remote, why their eyes glaze over when we say “We need to talk.” That all seems so innocent compared to the sick stuff our husbands do. Sigh. I think you are right. People don’t change at 60. Especially when they don’t want to.Hang in there Lexie. Karen xx
Karen,
With respect I found your post to Lexie like raining on her parade. She’s got the dick out , she getting the tree, has joined support groups, seems really together today. He’s not coming back and Lexie is just fine, like the rest of us!Karen, hope I dont upset you, just thought your post was very ‘heavy’ and presumptuous.
Love, Nap
Is ok Nap. I didn’t get to see Lexie’s later post before I sent mine so I presumed she wasn’t doing very well…..then I went back and read and see the rest of her day and see that she is doing pretty good. 😉 Sometimes posts overlap and though we do a pretty good job of communicating our feelings…sometimes things do get lost without the visual cues to guide us. Just the same…some times I wonder who I am speaking to? Another sister or myself?? Maybe a little of both. 🙁 Karen xx
I totally understood what was behind Karen’s words, after-all, we WERE separated at birth- LOLOLOL!!! And of course, we all put into our posts our own perspectives, which also includes our own innate fears.
And thank God we have the ABILITY to empathize. How refreshing is that?
I got it that Karen was afraid that it would hurt so much that I would cave, or that it was going to be too difficult, and I would get so overwhelmed that I just say “nope.”
And at the same time, she was also giving me permission to do whatever it was that I needed to do. I’ve been standing at the edge of the pool for five years– afraid to take that plunge, but if I never do, I’ll be standing at the edge, forever.
I get it now.
Now, I just came back from Tarzhay LOL where I spent nearly TWO hours buying $100 worth of ornaments and lights and NOW, I’m going to the closest nursery for the tree and a stand.
I can’t begin to tell you the joy I got from hand picking out each ornament and wait until you see it. The woman in line behind me, went gaga over the colors. 😉 (well, of course! that’s what I DO!!!), and haha! She’s a stylist and then told me about a networking group in my town that I call “whinyentitledton” on my blog… (for obvious reasons).
Well, I’m off!
Oh wait… there’s a bit more. SAH, came over and of course was 5 minutes EARLY and I cracked the whip while he cleaned up the “mother ship” (desk, wires… dust, dirt, etc) and surrounding area.
and when I returned, it was all nice and clean and normal.
normal is good. 😀
The book is titled: Crazy Aunt Purl’s Drunk Divorced & Covered in Cat Hair. The true life misadventures of a 30 somthing who learned to knit after she split. by, Laurie Perry a.k.a. Crazy Aunt Purl. It is available on amazon, i found it at a place we have here called the book barn, which is this huge re-sale book store.
I thought it was a very cute book.
Dear Lexie,
I am very happy for you and your move to a new life and new freedom. And while I think all of us here worry if we leave, we will be alone always, or angry and bitter always. But how can that be? even those of us still married are angry and bitter as hell. And often, very alone. Being single agian, is not that bad.
What is bad is the loss we experience, the men we thought we would love for life, the memories. But, the years. no one can give us back our years. Our husband’s spent them. Or we gave them too willingly. Lexie TAKE BACK YOUR YEARS. I mean ok, we are not 25 anymore. but if we don’t start now, when? when can we take life by the balls and put ourselves on course? When ar we going to matter???? It won’t be done by them, that’s for dang sure.
Ok it sucks. Ok what he did really sucks. what’s terrible, and unforgiveable is taking our time. take it back. don’t look back. and for God’ sake, have Santa bring you new pretty ring to cover that finger in something new, something you would like. Something he never would have picked to buy you. make it new. no more wallowing. 🙂 your doing what so many of us on this site should be doing. we are all cheering you on. keep going….
Dear Pam,
You took the words out of my mouth a few times with this post. Your observation that we are afraid we will be alone and bitter and angry forever if we leave them so instead we stay and are alone, bitter and angry. 🙂 My God…..that is a real gem of an observation! Also, that it is not so much the loss of them as the loss of the years that we cannot get back. DEAD ON. Add to that the oft repeated observation that we all miss the men we THOUGHT they were…some of us for most of our adult life….and you have 3 big issues that keep us stuck?? I guess we shouldfocus more on our own faulty thinking and less on their asinine selves. 😉
You are so right Sexie Lexie. I am afraid you will cave because I would be afraid I would cave? So scary to jump off that cliff without the normal old parachute…..so I am still standing on the ledge. 😉 I will tell you one thing, I sure respect all of you that have jumped into the abyss. Karen xx
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