Originally Posted by ShootingStar1

Pia, that is wonderful! What a great change for you!

For me, when I left my then AH after 20 years of marriage, what I noticed first of all was the silence. No one yelling, no Wolf Blister on CNN yelling at top volume for 4 hours, no one questioning me, just pure blissful silence. (Yes I know I spelled his name wrong - my XAH used that show as a form of torture requiring me to sit with him and listen to the same stories over and over).

What I didn't realize for a while was that that blissful silence was the beginning of healing.

I didn't have to react to someone abusive around me all the time; I wasn't interrupted every second moment; I didn't have to be vigilant about what was happening or going to happen next; I didn't have to pay attention to protect myself; I didn't have someone else at the center of my life, demanding something from me.

The next step for me was realizing what I DID have - -

Solitude and the opportunity to follow my own train of thought without interruption; freedom to listen to music or listen to the silence; freedom to choose my own environment, as it suited me; freedom to just relax, just sink into a comfy chair and just BE.

When I first left, I was shell-shocked, over stimulated by living in his alcoholic porn filled demanding and compelling presence.

I got to be ME again, on my own timetable. The first months were just letting go of all the reactive self-defensive knee-jerk almost autonomic responses I had developed to cope with my former life.

Then, as time went on, the silence led to introspection, a quiet and sustained sorting out of what had happened to me and how I truly felt. Healing, and finally, now, after 3 years gone, peace.

It will come for you too, and congratulations on making that possible.

ShootingStar1