An official end
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Sep 2013
Posts: 154
An official end
I am free.
It has been a long, slow, painful process spanning 7 years. Probably longer, if I’m honest. There was a lot of “1 step forward, two steps back”, a lot of times when I felt frozen and stuck between a rock and a hard place and just let the chaos swirl around me. And I think, honestly, I never thought I would get here, or that I even *wanted* to. But. Here I am: driving MY OWN car, in MY OWN HOME, with my beautiful 14 month old daughter who I have raised entirely alone for the last year. I have child support payments coming in. I have personal goals again. Life is good.
I look at my lying, cheating, sociopathic, alcoholic ex and I see nothing but a truly broken person who has never deserved my heart, or the last 10 years of my life.
This is not what I thought it would look like. This is not the life I signed up for. And my heart aches for the fantasy of my life with him every day. But today, that background pain of heartbreak is a million times better than the pit in my stomach after finding a bottle or catching a whiff of vodka... or picking up on a slight slur of speech, or wondering if my daughter is safe when I left the house. It is better than finding condom wrappers left in our car, or texts between him and other women/prostitutes. It is better than sleeping next to a man I grew to resent and hate. I will live this day over any other “bad day” in the past 100 times over.
All I can say is that.. I wasn’t ready until I was ready. And I took it inch by inch. But I finally got here. Finally. For all the years I spent waffling over leaving and making half-choices, all I can say is that while I wish I saved myself the hurt that would only continue to grow, I couldn’t do what I wasn’t ready for. I had to be ready.
These days, I am just trying to forgive myself for taking so much time and letting myself get so lost in his illness.... well, that and chasing my beautiful daughter around our backyard in the sunshine, laughing.
Yeah. I laugh again, too.
It has been a long, slow, painful process spanning 7 years. Probably longer, if I’m honest. There was a lot of “1 step forward, two steps back”, a lot of times when I felt frozen and stuck between a rock and a hard place and just let the chaos swirl around me. And I think, honestly, I never thought I would get here, or that I even *wanted* to. But. Here I am: driving MY OWN car, in MY OWN HOME, with my beautiful 14 month old daughter who I have raised entirely alone for the last year. I have child support payments coming in. I have personal goals again. Life is good.
I look at my lying, cheating, sociopathic, alcoholic ex and I see nothing but a truly broken person who has never deserved my heart, or the last 10 years of my life.
This is not what I thought it would look like. This is not the life I signed up for. And my heart aches for the fantasy of my life with him every day. But today, that background pain of heartbreak is a million times better than the pit in my stomach after finding a bottle or catching a whiff of vodka... or picking up on a slight slur of speech, or wondering if my daughter is safe when I left the house. It is better than finding condom wrappers left in our car, or texts between him and other women/prostitutes. It is better than sleeping next to a man I grew to resent and hate. I will live this day over any other “bad day” in the past 100 times over.
All I can say is that.. I wasn’t ready until I was ready. And I took it inch by inch. But I finally got here. Finally. For all the years I spent waffling over leaving and making half-choices, all I can say is that while I wish I saved myself the hurt that would only continue to grow, I couldn’t do what I wasn’t ready for. I had to be ready.
These days, I am just trying to forgive myself for taking so much time and letting myself get so lost in his illness.... well, that and chasing my beautiful daughter around our backyard in the sunshine, laughing.
Yeah. I laugh again, too.
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Join Date: Sep 2016
Location: Anywhere, USA
Posts: 869
I am SO happy for you! I know the journey well and can relate so very much to what you say. It takes a while and you can know it in your head and you can try and keep trying, but until you are truly ready, only you can decide when it's time. I am proud of you for the growth and recognition that yes, you deserve so much more. You captured perfectly the sinking feeling of finding a stashed bottle or being the "slur" police watching every tiniest bit of a clue that he had been drinking. I recognize the pain of finding yet another condom wrapper or explicit message that let you know you were being cheated on. It's a very hard life to be the partner of a self-destructive person. But you can come out of it, just like he can, whenever you are ready.
Keep it going and enjoy your lovely little girl and your new lease on life. I learned that once I truly left, even if I kept poking around, when enough time passed, I could not go back. Life is too peaceful right now. Too serene. And while I still feel sadness for him at being such a broken man, I feel like you, that I deserve to have a little more in life. I hope. Keep going
Keep it going and enjoy your lovely little girl and your new lease on life. I learned that once I truly left, even if I kept poking around, when enough time passed, I could not go back. Life is too peaceful right now. Too serene. And while I still feel sadness for him at being such a broken man, I feel like you, that I deserve to have a little more in life. I hope. Keep going
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Sep 2013
Posts: 154
Thank you for the kind words. I just hope someone else out there can read this and see that, even if it’s not what they WANT, it is ok. That it is an option on the table, and that it is survivable. I thought it would die without him. I thought life couldn’t possibly be good again. And some days are harder than others. But here it is: survival. We are resilient. We can create change. I spent so long (and still fall into this habit) trying to control HIM. But when I ended up taking control of ME, my whole life changed for the better.
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