When I was 12 years old I had to choose a poem to recite as part of a speech and language component for an English class. I chose for some strange reason, Robert Frost's, 'The Road Not Taken '. What could an 11 year girl possibly have known about the meaning of this poem. I am not sure what appealed to me, but I know I realized at that time, that life was full of roads and journey's and choices. I think I was daunted by life at that time. I was in my last year before hitting high school, my parents were burgeoning on their three year acrimonious custody dispute, I was overweight and extremely shy, and tremendously lonely, an outside in every sense. I loved this poem and the images it created in my head. I saw myself wandering 'knowing how way leads on to way'.
I am not sure why this memory should strike my as a consider the need to start another thread here, at this place that brought me so much solace and comfort at a time in my life, when I was not certain, which way was up or down, if I was alive or dead. I decided that I would start another thread as there are dear friends who remain here, either lurking, or come to update or are moving into the realms of becoming vets.
So here is my update for those who know me or are interested in where this road, this torturing dark, surprising road can take you.
I think back to a year ago and I was scared. Scared of another year of being alone, of being confronted with becoming 44 years old, a still single and childless. Still overweight, scarred up physically and emotionally, and trying to stop myself from getting pulled into the hole that is depression. I know somewhere over the course of 2015, I called to God and said ok you know this [censored] and I am done. Give me something, anything to let me know that there is something out there for me.
I don't know how and I don't know why, but whoever or whatever heard me, provided. 2016 provided me with so many adventures, wonderful soulful people and so many learnings. They are too numerous to tell and explain how each one prodded me to move forward, to begin a transformation into a life and happiness I never thought I could have. Please don't take this zealous account of happiness to mean there has been no pain and discomfort because there has. But my life is good and solid and loving.
I have a beautiful and loving man in my life, who loves me just as I am. I never thought I would find him. He is everything good and kind. We have our ups and downs. Long distance, time zones and daily life demands make things hard at times and challenge. I am fortunate that he does what it takes to make it work. I anticipate a move to his homeland in 2018 when his children moving onward to independence and when of course visa's will allow. I will be a student again when I move, starting my Masters in Social Work. Well that is the plan, for now. As we all know, life has a tendency to intervene at times and change plans.
For now though there are plans in March for him to come here to me, or for me to go there to him and in the summer a four week stay for me in his homeland. We need time together to know each other in life and not in a state of flux. I saying that knowing in my head and heart that I know him. But I have been wrong before. If I am wrong I am wrong I have lost nothing, gaining only a greater sense of myself and I guess that is gods work. You really do learn on this road that loss of the person you love doesn't break you, it really just makes you a a stronger version of you. If you let it.
2016 was tough for my mum, and she needed me like never before. The damn big C entered her life again. First when she was 36 and again now 74. Lymphoma, no cure, can only put into remission. Confronting the impending loss of my mother. Well I think I ignored it for most of the 8 months she did chemo. But at some point it hit. My rock, my backbone, my home, my love is someday soon is not going to be here. What will I do? I wondered at one point if there was some ridiculous trick being played on me. To give me possibly the love of my life in one hand and take the only love I have known in the other. I quickly moved along that path of thinking to a lighter one, where I need to make the most of the time I have with her. Then I was confronted with leaving her behind if and when I move to be with the man I love. What to do, what to do?
So here is my learning, there is nothing so precious as the present, the moment you have now. It's all gone so quickly. We all know it here, how from one day to the next life can explode and how you thought it was going to turn out, well, I don't need to explain.
All I can say after starting my journey here in March 2015. Don't spend too long grieving and processing what was. It is gone, can it be rebuilt, possibly. What you have a never lost, was you. Your incredible self and the potential for joyful, loving and peaceful life. What it looks like, who knows. But embrace the not knowing. It makes it so much easier.
To everyone whoever posted to me, who loved me when I couldn't love myself, I thank you from the bottom of my heart.
And as Robert Frost said
'I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I- I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference'
I have read all of your threads from the beginning to end, and you have grown so much. I Am glad for you. I am glad that you have learned and embraced mindfulness, even while struggling through some very difficult life events.
I guess it's not really a "hey, glad to see that your life is starting to work out and fall in place". It's more of a "hey I'm glad your able to find happiness despite life's obstacles". It's a well earned way to live.
Thank you always for your insight and posts. You are truly the most insightful and Perceptive of people I have ever had the good fortune to meet. I always look forward to hearing what you have to say.
I too consider you a friend, and even though you are unmatched in writing skills, I cannot wait for an opportunity to connect again with you in person. You are amazing!
Today I watched a dear friend suffer through the next part of her divorce journey. The custody and care of her daughter. It triggered such strong feelings in me, taking me back to my own experience of being the child of separated parents. And I felt angry and sad at my father's actions in his spitefulness to use my sisters and I in his games with my mother. Like my friend's experience today, my father's bid for sole and full custody, was never to ensure my best interest, it was not to ensure that he was involved in my life. It was nothing more than to torture my mother. Another means of making her hurt as she had made him hurt by ending the marriage.
It is rare that I feel such a strong response to this issue, it has long been resolved, with many tears over many years and through lots of reading, and therapy and my work ( I attempt to support families to piece their children's lives back together after abuse and neglect). But sometimes life and associations bring the sting of it all back.
I am gutted, mortified for my friend, that through no decision or action of her own, she has the possibility of her losing her daughter, because of the entitlement of man, who appears to have bullied, coerced and manipulated her over years and even though wanting to be out of the marriage, still feels a right to stand over, threaten and intimidate her into giving in to his demands. What right does he have to behave in this manner. Oh that's right my father's answer always, "because their mine", meaning me and my sisters.
I am outraged that helping professionals (like myself) will not see past his charm and manipulation. My father was charming and entitled and had our (my siblings and I) court appointed lawyer eating out of the palm of his hand. Her lack of perception and understanding of my true feelings about my father, meant she didn't realise she was sending me to emotional torture every time I was required, expected to see my father for visitation. She had no idea at 13 that I knew my father well enough to know the emotional games he would play with my mother. Nor did she know my character, that I knew my own mind. I didn't require my mother's influence or judgement to influence my thinking and feeling about my father. I had a lifetime of his treatment of me, that allowed my to know my own mind. My lawyer (Shelley -yes I remember her name some 32 years after we first met) told my mother that she felt that she was manipulating us against my father. She wouldn't listen to me when I told her I knew my own mind and I didn't want to see him. I didn't want to go on holiday breaks with him. My 13 year old self was outraged at the idea I was expected to see my father when I didn't want to. I was outraged that no one saw how my mother protected me from him. I was his least favourite. Why would no one listen to me.
I am saddened today that all these years later I am watching my friend suffer as I watched my mother suffer. Her sense of powerlessness leaving her at times completely paralyzed to act. My father took the car when my parents separated and as result my mother took the 30 minute bus ride into town for every court appearance, 12 court appearances in one year, 20 something over almost three years. I remember the state of my mother when she would arrive home. She always carried sunglasses in her big black leather handbag on those days and she would arrive home wearing them. But as she removed them when she entered the house, the telltale signs of a journey of despair and devastation was written all over her face and in the redness of her swollen eyes.
That was my friend today, unable to get through an hour without the burden of loss, frustration, anger and devastation overwhelming her. The tears seeming endless. This was not her choice, this current life, this was thrust upon her. She is one the kindest, smartest and bravest woman I am fortunate enough to know. And today I could offer her nothing. Today the world seemed decidedly unfair, unjust and her ex was repugnant to me, as my father had been when I was 13 years old.
I felt ridiculously powerless and without advice today. No words would make this better. How do you encourage someone in a battle that seems so stacked against all that is good and kind and just. But I need to have faith for my friend that good will prevail, that there is justice and right will overcome wrong.
Please whoever is out there-God, the universe, the something that is bigger than us mere mortals. Watch over my friend and her daughter, and provide them with the best possible outcome that is in the best interest for all involved. Please watch over them at this time. Please provide healing and outcome that restores faith and a happy life.
To all those walking this road, let there be a light shining on you that shows you the path forward to more positive things.
Hey, JellyB. You are a caring friend and know that although you say you could offer her nothing, just being there for her is an amazing thing. When XH left and I was at my lowest low, not one of my so-called friends checked on me. Yet when I branched out and found friends, those who have stuck have shown me what true friends can offer: presence. Just calling to say hello or how have you been is an amazing show of support.
Be there for her so that she is not alone. I know you will, but know that that is a very powerful thing to her as she goes through this. Better than any advice, probably.
M-51 H-54 2D-27 and 25 M-26 yrs Bombshell and IHS 7-29-15 He moved out 10-3-15 D filed 1-27-16 D final 10-27-16
Hi Jelly! Just wanted to stop by and give you some virtual hugs! Your great empathy for other people is what makes you such a wonderful person. I hope all the best for your friend on this difficult journey.
Oh Jelly, I am so sorry your heart is aching and reminded so much of the days when you watched your mom go through all you described. I am in tears. What a tough situation and heartbreaking battle.
I am so sorry for your friend and for all the pain she is facing but to know you are there with her, while it doesn't lessen the pain, allows her to talk to someone who REALLY GETS IT! That is invaluable.
This divorce stuff isn't for the faint of heart. The courage required to fight, to detach from the emotion of it all, to have the courage to NOT give in is all very hard to find some days. Your friendship provides a touchstone for her, i am sure.
You are a gem!
Previously known as ss06 Kid: D9 M: 12 yrs together 18 D final: pending
"These mountains that you are carrying, you were only supposed to climb." - Najwa Zebian
Thank you 010207, Ciluzen, Anna and Courage for your kind words. My intentions are more honorable than my capabilities and capacities to offer much to my friend. But she is a strong woman with the softest heart and more tenacity than she possibly knows she possesses. What I have seen in her this week, makes me feel very confident that she will thrive!
Im just going to journal and process here , if that's alright?
This week has been emotionally tough, and I am surprised at my calm reaction. I finally feel able to practice the art of letting emotions pass by like clouds, to roll like waves. Lots of triggers around at the moment. I'm an observer, an introvert, an empath -I take on my surroundings and people's emotions and intentions easily. That coupled with changes that are coming in my own life. Well it can be exhausting living in my world. But I am getting so much better at dealing with my responses to a world that can leave me wiped out.
For a long time I rejected myself for being sensitive to a world that other's seem to cope with and brush off. It is hard living in a world and particularly my ex partners who told me to harden up, to not be so sensitive, brush it off. Their responses left me feeling crazy, and different and broken. I think you will find in my initial posts (if someone ever wanted to and I don't know why anyone would) that I struggled with how I was viewed, my craziness and difference. I was devastated that Mr Ex saw me as such, saw me as so broken that I wasn't worth being with. I realize now that the depression and anxiety I have suffered over a lifetime, has been the externalization of years of the emotional abuse suffered at the hands of my father, and the years of self rejection I suffered at the hands of myself. I chose men to replace him, that treated me the same as he did, and then when they didn't do enough to make me feel unworthy or unloveable, I did it to myself.
Recovery from abuse, trauma and mental health is one of the hardest things any one can do. It is a daily experience for me and requires more than I have in me some days. The biggest thing I have given to myself is to embrace the labels, the stigma and the judgements that people make and run with them. This has been freeing and the more I have embraced my issues and people's perceptions of me, the more I realize that I am no different from everyone else on the planet. We are all broken, all imperfect. It is human to be these things.
The relationships we have with our partners, is the first place we really all experience our broken-ness. Our mates are our mirrors, showing us where we need to grow. When we find ourselves in the position of our mates wanting to leave we are confronted in the biggest way possible about our own brokenness, our flaws, our imperfections. It is devastating and leveling. What a ridiculous gift our mates give us in their leaving.
I don't think I would have really dug as deep or learned or grown as much as I have if Mr Ex, had not been so cruel in the way he ended things. (He left me in the middle of a mental health breakdown. On a sunday morning he left me alone, naked in foetal position on the floor, sobbing uncontrollably for my pain to end, taking with him when he left a bottle of sleeping pills. He ended our relationship via a 10 minute phone call two days later, while I started anti-depressants, managed suicidal thoughts and began therapy, leaving me to the support of my family and me to start recovery on my own.
He gave me a gift. I finally took responsibility for my recovery, and I finally started to just embrace all that is broken. I realized in my journey I don't need to fix any of it. I don't need to fix me. I bucked against Lady V, Zues, Uturn, Pigpen (PP), Anna74 and JujuB, telling me that I was ok as I was, as I am. But they were right, the healing was in the acceptance of who I am. This was my journey through DBing.
I will plow on through this period of emotional triggers and change. I feel Winter is coming.
"God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. Courage to change the things I can . And the wisdom to know the difference"
Hey J, sorry I didn't catch up on your thread until this late in the game. I'm super tired right now so will probably just absorb and talk later. Sorry to hear about your mother. I just know she must be really proud of you and happy you are her daughter.
I talked to my dad for the first time in a couple of months tonight, he is out of the country. It's hard knowing that at his age and with months going by between conversations you never know which one might be the last. Very tough.
But when I shared some of how I felt more in acceptance lately he just laughed. He said that life beats the crap out of all of us, and eventually we just loosen up a bit. When we're riding a rickety roller coaster we can either hold on with white knuckles and feel every bump, or we can just relax our bodies and just kind of bounce along the way.
Maybe we all need to be broken by life a little bit to get to the point where we can go with the flow and enjoy a terrifying ride.
Even if this is true, I'm still willing to join forces to track down your ex and make him swallow a 3 ball. OK, this is why I shouldn't try to be funny this late. All I know is you didn't deserve that treatment and just because you made lemonade doesn't mean you don't deserve more than lemons. Hang in and talk soon.
Me:38 XW:38 T:11 years M:8 years Kids: S14, D11, D7 BD/Move out day: 6/17/14, D final Dec 15
