Suddenly
I feel that this has given me the most incredible and wonderful thing that I have ever been given, and also, the worst. […] I’ve had my whole soul undermined by it — on the one hand. On the other hand, in one sense, my experience has been about finding joy. It was Memorial Day weekend. The day before, maybe. End of May. Sunday? She was taking the kids to visit with her parents in Rochester. As they went outside...
4 responses to “Suddenly”
Good Lord! Fourteen years and she breaks up with you in text message??? WTH? I cannot fathom the degree of contempt I would have to feel to do that. The most profound anger would not be enough to even tempt me to. I have been married 40 years, and we have had 3 periods of separation that lasted 6 months or more. There were good reasons and they were shared out loud, and owned. I hesitate to say this, but the fact that you can feel happy now (most of the time), and not in a steep downward sprial emotionally, says this is right. At least for now. God bless you and your kids. You will find a way to keep them close.
Patricia
Thanks, Patricia.
I think the fits of rage toward her amidst the general apathy and my overall improved well-being are due to our relationship beginning so well. She genuinely seemed to adore me for most of the marriage, until only a few years ago.
Maybe I grew complacent and didn’t notice the signs when the adoration turned to disappointment, then resentment, then ultimately enmity. It likely had something to do with the stress of building a family, and my not meeting her expectations of a husband and father.
There was one concrete incident she brought up. One of our daughters had to go to urgent care and subsequently to the ER. It was late in the evening and I stayed home to watch the other. She was out til the wee hours, and had a really bad incident with a cab driver who was driving her all over town and she genuinely felt he was a threat.
She called me, but it was very late and I didn’t acknowledge the intensity of the situation, nor did I offer any help or advice. Maybe I was just half-asleep, but I do acknowledge that as a personal failure, and maybe it was the point where she realized she just couldn’t rely on me any more.
In any case, I’m pretty sure it’s over now, and I have to get over the bursts of rage so we can at least have a decent partnership where it involves the children.
As recently as this weekend, I indulged in a burst of email cruelty. Maybe I did it to upset her, because if she’s upset, doesn’t that mean she still gives a damn about what I think of her, and does that mean she still cares?
Do I even want that? I don’t think the damage done from allowing our wounds to fester over the past few years can be healed. It’s over, and I do feel much better about myself as an individual, if not regretful that such a huge life investment has gone so sour.
In any case, again, thanks for your support. I’d get back to the irregularly scheduled depression updates, but I honestly haven’t had much to report on that front of late. I know I have some chemical imbalance, but the situational change has alleviated that enormously.
Wow. Maybe that should have been an entry of its own. :)
Oh, and I should have acknowledged the source of the opening quote. From what I can find, it’s from Whitley Streiber relating his alien abduction experiences on the old Art Bell radio show, and it opens the radio cut of the techno song “Rabbit In Your Headlights” by UNKLE ft. Thom Yorke.
A bit too melodramatic, but I love the quote.
The closing bit is, of course, a paraphrased rendition of “Total Eclipse Of the Heart”. Not so obviously, it’s the lyrical version performed as a duet on the “Tundra” episode of The Mighty Boosh by Matt Berry and Rich Fulcher.
Extensive footnotes and citations for a blog post and … nobody cares! :)