I would never have anticipated landing here. I probably should have. A lot of other people predicted at least part of this outcome.
I was asked plenty of times what I thought would transpire and I routinely predicted the best case scenario.
I prefer my version to the one we ended up with, for what that’s worth.
I often remind myself that discomfort is the best way to grow.
It took me two years to take the leap. Two very difficult, volatile and traumatic years for everyone involved. I hit dead end after dead end. I got incredibly ill. I started questioning whether the universe was trying to tell me to stay because I kept having doors slammed in my face.
And all that time I was hurting and heartbroken and watching the way it all fell apart.
The kind of falling apart that leaves a mark.
And all that time I tried to be understood. And all that time it just got worse.
I hated it. I dreaded the next betrayal. The next conflict. All I wanted to do was cut and run but I was stuck.
I understand now that I needed it. If not for those months of insanity and escalation, avoidance and abandonment I would still hold myself entirely accountable for every failure to ever befall us as a unit.
I might still believe there was a chance it could have been saved. I might still think there was anything worth saving.
I needed to hear those awful things. I needed to see the lack of accountability for what it was. I needed to lose the rose coloured glasses and see the truth.
Unfortunately I did that hiding at the bottom of a shoe closet during an intensely terrifying argument. Unfortunately my children witnessed this shit. Unfortunately there was never any alternate ending.
I gave it too long. I kept thinking it would get better and it just never did. I kept thinking surely if I could just make my case it would make sense and we could be better but you just can’t get understanding from someone hell bent on misunderstanding.
I’ve been reliving this whole thing relentlessly for months. I try to be heard and I am dismissed. I try to explain and I am attacked. I send the same consistent message about cause and effect and responsibilities and how we conduct ourselves and it gets spun.
How long is a person expected to express that harm is occurring? How long does one tolerate that being ignored? How many ways does a person need to demonstrate uncaring action before we believe them to be uncaring?
These questions are rhetorical. These questions have answers that may vary from person to person, even. These questions are questions I’ve been asking myself for some time.
Ultimately the answer that matters is mine.
Someone told me in October this was what I didn’t stick it out for. Someone told me I could have had this version if I hadn’t have walked out. Someone told me how much they’d learned, changed and grown. How ruining my life made them more sensitive. Someone told me that I was really missing out. Someone was dying to show me I don’t mean a thing.
Someone said those things to me as they simultaneously cast aside and disrespected the most important people in my world. As though I would want someone who could do something like that. As though this was a different way of behaving than we’d seen before. As though they were holding over my head some kind of prize.
The prize is knowing I did the right thing. As unbelievably sad and wholly unnecessary this display was to behold, at least I know I said and did everything to try and alter this path of destruction.
I don’t know what your threshold is, but as for me, I’ve seen more than enough.
Leave a Reply