I’m reading a book my therapist recommended. It’s by Lynette Triere with Richard Peacock and it’s called “Learning to Leave”.  It sounds more negative than it really is - it’s really an explanation of what women go through during a separation, divorce or reconciliation.  These two paragraphs really struck a chord with me:

...for many couples, it is not a question of finding new solutions to a building list of conflicts.  With some women and men, there is a fundamental difference in life goals, ways of communicating, belief systems, rhythms of living, temperment, and concepts of pleasure.  Faced with such basic incompatibility, women are now breaking out of their more common conservative roles and have become more frequently the initiators of divorce. 

But this realization is usually not an immediate one and the decision to leave is rarely hasty.  The very idea of divorce is so radical that some women refuse to even consider it at first.  In fact, stages of awareness can be outlined in the average movement of a woman toward leaving a relationship.  First, many women report that they only “subconsciously” felt the stirrings to leave, that these feelings would never be articulated even to themselves.  A surprising number have said that they harbored the secret for five years or longer before moving to the next stage of privately but deliberately thinking about leaving.  These thoughts might take the form of fantasy, the dream of living in another place alone or with another person, the desire to break out into a new style of living, the pursuit of a challenging career, perhaps a passion for travel.  This stage can be a consuming one.  A few women get stuck at this point and become permanent daydreamers.  But most will move on to relate their desires to a close friend, often a sympathetic woman who has experienced a similar situation.  They may at this stage seek out a professional therapist to confide in, or take the bolder step of seeking an attorney.

Not sure I agree with classifying seeking an attorney as a “bolder” step - it seems to me a premature step.  It’s also unfortunate that I am not alone in having been unable to express my true feelings firstly to myself, and then to my husband.  Had I been able to do that 36 months ago, we might be in a different place today. 

My goal set during Write Club RVA was to continue to blog through this haze and fog, and not shy away from the truth.  It’s very hard at times (like right now) to really find the strength to express my feelings in a way that others can understand. 

That being said, today has been hard.  I wish my medication would work, dammit, and work fast.  I know better than to expect it to erase all the pain and uncertainty and general angst I feel inside, but feeling hopeless day after day is pretty much a complete and total drag.  I even sat outside in the sun this afternoon soaking up some Vitamin D in the hopes it would snap me out of this horrible nightmare I can’t wake from. 

At some point, you have to start telling your friends and family you are fine, even when you don’t feel fine.  No one wants to hear, “I’m the same brand of shitty I was yesterday” day after day.  It’s depressing and boring.  I’m certain Mike feels the same way, though he puts on a good front for me - which is yet another example of why he’s a much better person than me.  He still worries about me, even though I’m in the process of dismantling and analyzing our life together that he thought was very solid.  I’ve made everything creaky and decayed with my words, and it’s an unsettling place to be - for both of us.  I do try to focus on my high moments:  pilates this morning, with sweat pouring off me, erasing any other thought than holding myself up on an elbow.  Arden’s face as she walked toward my car.  Cuddling with Arden, and stroking her hair.  Watching Lily drawing this afternoon.  Meeting a friend for a dinner in Carytown. 

In between those moments, I swing wildly between “WHAT AM I DOING?  I’m a horrible mother and wife” and “GET ME OUT. GET ME OUT.  GET ME OUT.”  Par for the course for me, there are no gray thoughts.  Perhaps that’s why I’ve been buying a lot of gray clothes lately - it’s a visceral reminder that there is such a color, and it’s not a bad place to live. 

On a happier note, I finally narrowed down my NaNoWriMo topics to two, and I’m going to force myself to pick one tonight.  Hopefully this weekend will get me working on the outline.  It’s been interesting to note that anything other than blogging has been impossible for me to write - my brain can only process my reality.  Fiction is a tall order these days.