My mother passed away a few weeks ago, but I don’t tell you this to garner your condolences or make you feel sad for me. No. I tell you this because, besides the whole dying thing, which was bad enough, I had to make a lot of phone calls in order to share the awful news. Much to my surprise, most of the calls were strangely comforting, because reconnecting with old family friends and relatives, to whom I rarely speak, gave me a sense of re-birth and renewal, and allowed me to share old memories of my mom as well as a few laughs and a few tears.
But then it hit me-I was going to have to call my ex. After all, he and my mom had been close at one time and he needed to be informed, just like everybody else. But I dreaded making the call and that dread overpowered my grief to the point that the mere thought of placing the call would temporarily eclipse the pain of losing her. It was kind of strange but I didn’t have to guess why this was so. I knew. I couldn’t bear to hear the sound of his voice, especially when I was sure the first words out of his mouth would be “God Bless!”
Firsts. They are so memorable, especially the firsts in a relationship. Take first dates for instance. They’re brimming over with expectation: your hope that he will be the one, the desire that this time it will work out, and the joy at realizing that a second date is in the offing, when the first one ends in a perfect good night kiss.
There are other firsts as well: the first time you introduce him to your friends, the first time he tells you he loves you, your first fight and the great make-up sex that follows. And then, it’s a walk down the aisle, the first man you’ve promised forever to and your first dance as husband and wife, which makes you feel like the star of your own movie.
Eventually, the firsts fade from view and you settle into everyday life, blissfully unaware that there could be any surprises in the offing. You think you have him pegged, you feel safe and secure in the fact that your marriage is really on track. And then one day, like a shot in the dark, there it comes: Crazy.
So we often hear about the popular places women go to meet men, ie: the gym, the grocery store, bars, book stores, hardware stores, etc. But I want to suggest an unusual one — one that was inspired by a little story my married girlfriend Sue told me last weekend:
You see, Sue’s SUV was in the shop undergoing repairs. Consequently, she ended up having to drive her husband’s BMW for the day. ”I was really nervous driving it,” she said. “I was 100% focused on driving carefully cause I knew Jacob (her husband) would KILL me if I got in an accident.”
But it didn’t take long for her awareness to expand — it started while in the grocery store parking lot: “Men were doing double takes and smiling at me. I actually checked my fly wondering if I’d left it open. (laugh) But then I realized it was the CAR.”
I’m a real wimp when it comes to seeing blood or hearing about the deep emotional pain of others. I have trouble watching movies about the holocaust or documentaries about the civil rights movement, and when the Biography channel airs profiles of serial killers, I delete them from the menu on my DVR without a second glance.
The following community-created discussion threads have been organized by various topics relevant to navigating divorce to help you find advice and support, and connect more easily with others going through similiar issues or challenges of divorce (display names and avatars are not used here for privacy sake).
Lately I’ve been living in my happy place; it’s all about me and I like it that way. There’s no one asking me what’s for dinner? Do we have to go to that party? Are you really going to wear that? I do what I please, when I please and, quite frankly, this pleases me. But it does lead me to ask the question: has divorce made me selfish? And if so, is that really such a bad thing?
Before I got married I was anything but selfish. I was the poster child for people-pleasers everywhere. If you looked up people pleaser in the dictionary, my picture would have been there. And if I’d made a career of it I probably would be a very wealthy woman today. But after being married to a man who was very rarely pleased with anything I said or did, this penchant I had for pleasing was literally drained right out of me. As a result, I’ve lost my poster child status and my need to please a man has become a blip on the radar of my every day life. And this makes me wonder if I’ll ever be willing to please anyone ever again.
There were many reasons to feel sad when I finally made the decision to divorce my husband. Of course, angry and bitter outclassed sad, pound for pound, truth be told, but it was still there lurking in the shadows and from time to time it would hit me, like a bolt from the blue. For me, sad vs. angry and bitter was the emotional equivalent of a welterweight dancing around the ring with a heavyweight and although it wasn’t the norm, once in a while sad would do some fancy footwork and get a punch in, making itself known. At those times, I would have to consider that emotion and give it its due, although I would have preferred to ignore it altogether because it was just easier that way; it kept me from lingering when all I wanted to do was move forward.
