I feel like I'm coming to terms with the loss of my marriage. Honestly, most days it feels a little like it never happened at all. That always makes me feel a little weird if I think about it too much.
The truth is that despite how it all went down, I'm in a better place mentally than I've been in years. I never wanted to admit it but our relationship was toxic. I'm not going to go so far as to say he did me a favor, because nothing about it felt like a favor. Strangely enough though, the block that I keep facing when I think about it all isn't even about him. It's about his family, and I can't seem to figure out why it bothers me so much.
I guess part of it is that I will probably never understand, and that I've come to realize is a fundamental part of my personality. I like to understand, it doesn't matter if it's uncomfortable as long as I know why.
Even at their warmest moments his parents were harsh, icy people, but then I started to see that trait in him as well, I don't know if it was always there or if it just became more pronounced. I always felt like it took hours just to get to room temperature and by that point I was so exhausted by effort that I couldn't hope for more. Have you ever gone out with someone and felt as if you have just run a marathon, sweat and shaky legs and all? I'll admit I can be a little socially awkward but I genuinely want those connections. For ten years I tried to make those connections, find common ground, and please them. I wanted so badly to feel the warmth I'd always felt in my own family. I never did, if anything it only got icier. Many times when we would leave their house I would be in tears, or frustrated and close to tears. His stepfather particularly disliked me, he always had these biting half- insult remarks and observations. Just this side of mean so you were always taken off guard and never knew how to respond. For a while I thought his mom and I were actually going to make it, but I see now we never stood a chance.
There wasn't much lead-up to my husband asking for a divorce, which I think is why the way I was treated by his family was so hard to handle. It was like I was there one day and invisible the next. They had nothing to say to me, like I hadn't been a part of their family for the last ten years. Just poof everyone I struggled so hard to connect to just left me all at the same time. I can't help but think they all knew how much that would wound me, but I had never been worth that much to them.
For some reason that's what sticks with me, not one person reached out or even acknowledged it happening and overnight I managed to be dumped by an entire "family" I know all the platitudes about how they weren't worth it or how it's their loss. I know that they were always going to side with him, he's their child but to be so coldly dismissed, it's what wakes me up at night and makes me feel dread. Not him leaving me because on some level I understood that.
Maybe I shouldn't be writing about this but I decided that if something is hurting me then I should probably get it out. Sometimes I wish I could confront them but I know I never actually would. For all those people on my life who had nothing to say when it mattered most; I'm sorry I ever gave anything to you. I'm tired of giving out these bits of my heart that are so easily discarded but I also know I probably will never stop.