Uncommon Curiosity

The thing of it is, it’s never what you imagine it’ll be.  It’s not like tv, or movies, or even that friend of a friend you heard about from your sister-in-law.

It’s far worse.

The crying just.  Never.  Fucking.  Stops.  It’s like I’m made of tears some days.  Trying to change the way my brain works halfway through my life hurts a lot.  Sadness.  Guilt.  Loss.  Misery.  Rage.  Suddenly these are all lit up like a Christmas tree for me – each of the million facets painfully clear – as I experience each of them in terrifying technicolor.  Anger at myself for being one of “those” women.  Trying to imagine starting over.  Being told by my 9-year-old daughter that I’m making Daddy sad by not letting him sleep at our house, by not kissing him enough.  Watching my 6-year-old son fail at trying to pretend none of this matters.  Long nights alone.  Feeling like I failed.  Letting go of fantasies of what life would someday be.  Feeling more and more like I never want to let anyone touch me again.

And, yet, if you can believe it, it’s also far better.

We have kids together, and so we see each other every day.  He’s trying really hard, learning a lot from his therapist and the parenting class he took.  He’s not angry, and he’s becoming a much better dad.  I still love him, because loving him is a part of my being.  Talking – really talking – like we never did before.  He doesn’t hate me anymore, and I’m learning, slowly, to breathe again.  Believe it or not – we still laugh a lot together.  In fact, the day-to-day with him is a lot better than it’s ever been.

But there are still the terrible memories, the “greatest hits” from our decades together – the endlessly repeating loop of horrible images playing in my brain and I can’t turn it off.  There’s the final insult that he might finally become the man I’ve always deserved, but the man he used to be will keep me from ever enjoying it.  There’s a very real possibility that I’ll never be able to trust him, to love him completely, because of the things he’s done.  To me.  To my family.  To us.

How did I not know?  How is it possible to live with something so horrible and just blame myself?  How could someone who loved me hurt me over and over again, and not see what he had done?  I don’t know, and I feel cursed to keep asking these questions over and over and over like some bad reality tv show starring a celebrity therapist who’s more interested in ratings than healing.

Emotionally, I’m a wreck, and it’s everything I can do to keep my actions in check, because my feelings are completely out of control.  I’ve become so selfish, and very protective, and I’m fighting to rediscover my generosity, if it even exists anymore under all this pain.  I’m carrying on a relationship with Kyle, and, yet, still reacted badly when my husband tentatively brought up dating for himself.  My emotions betray me and I play the hypocrite because I’m in too much pain to rise above.

But we muddle through because, for us, there is no other way.  We’re too close to go cold turkey, we’re too far to come back together.  We’re stuck in the middle, halfway between two much easier hells.

But we’ll keep trying.  He’s learning compassion, and that is a wonderful thing.  He listens to my ranting, sobbing confusion and tells me he understands.  I’m learning about backbones and not putting him first, and that is also very good.  It’s sad, so much more so than you could ever imagine, and yet there are a lot of happy moments, even a few when I see a glimmer of a future, if not together, then still very close.

And that is the way it is.  Not like tv, not like the movies, not like the friend of a friend of a friend.  It’s hard, and it sucks, and it’s ok, and sometimes it’s even pretty good.

It’s human.  It’s horrible.  It hurts.  It occasionally surprises me.

And I don’t for the life of me know how it’s gonna end.