Divorcee Seeks Peace

S.E. Rittel

We met on a warm May day, the 26th to be exact, at a barbeque. Our meeting and courtship was all of the ordinary, our friends introduced us, we moved in together, and were engaged within a year. We married in the summer of 2000 and everything was beautiful, for a time. Things were difficult financially, but as cliché as it sounds, we were happiest then. A short time after we wed, my husband left to become a flight attendant, and I was pregnant and alone. Still, I was happiest when he would fly home to visit each week, and loved my new life as a wife and mommy. As time passed, I found it easier and easier to deal with the time he spent away from me, but never really came to terms with living two sets of rules, as often happens when Dad is gone a good portion of the time.
Our communication started to break down as we acquired more things, had another baby, and bought our first home. I was lonely and having a difficult time being a single mother of two, then three. All the while my husband was resentful of having to come home and live our boring life three days a week when his friends and their money and prestige were out in the world. He grew less and less patient with the children. I grew less and less patient with him. His anger was more noticeable, and his charity less apparent with each passing week, until I began to hate him.
By the time I filed for divorce I had utilized every resource I could think of to save my marriage. I had gone to therapy and clergy, tried to just take his anger and let things be, and finally, become angry and prone to retaliation. I did not like the woman I had become. I asked him to leave in March and the children saw less and less of him after that. I cannot say 2008 will ever be replaced as my worst year ever. I certainly hope not.
Accusations, insinuations and shunning were the mainstays of this process, from neighbors and “friends”. Those who do not judge, give you a wealth of advice on how to cope. None of the advice from those who have been through it really prepares you for the heartache, depression, anxiety, and all around rough time you go through. At least it didn’t for me. I was told, many times over, “This will be the hardest thing you will ever do.” They were right. No matter how sure I was when my mother, my divorced friends, my religious leaders made that statement to me, it was worse than I expected.
I do not lament the life I lost, or the time that could be considered wasted. I do not regret taking care of a husband. My single greatest regret is that we are so easily able to cut one another. Verbal assaults stinging and pricking almost to the point of physical pain. Heavy artillery that pierces through most carefully assembled armor. He hurt me; a lot. Now, I hurt him, all the time. We both hurt our children, and our families, and our friends, who feel obligated to take a side and stand behind one of us. To them I feel the most sorry. I hurt for my babies and the people I love that became collateral damage in our stupid little war.
Civility is overrated. Sometimes I cannot even believe I knew the man I have divorced let alone slept with him, cooked his meals, cleaned his toilet. I hardly even recognize myself, though I know I am still in there when I look hard enough. The things that he says to me, emboldened by, even justified to it by the fact that I am the “bad guy” are astonishing, even after eight and a little years of marriage. He still knows all the buttons to push to optimize my guilt. Sometimes I hate him.
My ex-husband was deeply hurt. Hurt by my lack of desire, by my complete lack of interest in him or his life. I had been through neglect, disdain, and bitterly cruel, nonsensical rampages for years and yet, after all I could claim he had put me through I was honor-bound by the rules of engagement to be gentle with him. He was in pain. His life had been ruined. I was the perpetrator. Just as our marriage had been my responsibility, the collapse was my fault.
I am on the verge of losing my home. I lost my job, my family is too far away to help with anything more than love and encouragement, and I cannot remember the last time I had a good night’s sleep. My fear is still not as great as my loneliness, my sensation of dissonance to the real world, and feelings of worthlessness were. As terrible as the outcome looks in the face of economic crisis and personal crisis combined, life is still better now. Peace has been worth the cost.

This failure is simply another part of life I am coming to accept. I finally am beginning to understand my part in the travesty that was my marriage, the cruel joke that has been my life while I divorced and learned how to be a single mother, how to be truly alone again. Even though I loved you, and only wanted to be loved by you, I failed you. Miserably. I am sorry. Sorry that I decided my only way out was to destroy everything you insisted was fine. So very, very sorry that I did not know how to get through to you any other way. Sorry that I did not love you enough to be stronger, to take it until you decided I was worth kindness and love. I am sorry for causing three of the most perfect little humans I know an unspeakable amount of pain, and for doing so purposefully, even though I truly did not understand the scope of what was to come.

To any who have seen the world through the grey tint of the perpetrator, I see what you see in the eyes of your friends, family, and neighbors. I know the pity and sometimes contempt you are met with. I hope you have forgiven yourselves, whatever the reasons, and learned how to give of yourself after closing off from one who was your closest confident.

The truth of divorce is so personal that no one can truly prepare another for the distress they will feel. You cannot tell another exactly how to cope with the difficulty of such a complete upheaval of their life. I won’t lie and say I have come through the other side a better woman. All I can hope for is that someday I can say it and say it truthfully, earn my children's forgiveness, my own, and most of all, my husband’s. After all is said and done, I desire the forgiveness of the only man I ever loved enough to say, “I do”. Because for what it is worth. I really, really did.