And I Blew Take 1...

A year ago today I was sitting in my condo, legs crossed on the floor. A year and a half of work lay in front of me. I sorted through invoices, checking my account balance after studying each one. I checked off lists and crossed off points. Text the girls to ensure all plans were inline.

A Year ago I sat in a home I thought I would share with a man forever. My wedding dress was hanging in the closest, the loveliest thing I had ever owned. I had a count down going on FB, everything was ready.

What the heck was I thinking? I can see you know, yelping at your monitor like a wild woman. How on earth could you marry a man who hit you?

Yea, I know.

In the happiest of moments he was not that man. He  was my true love. That's what I believed anyways.

The last couple days have been rough, really rough. I look back often as the date that would be my first anniversary. The anniversary we promised we would return to Costa Rica where we honeymooned. It would mark the first in many years together.

Instead I am sitting in a Starbucks Grande Green Tea Lemonade beside me as I sit hunched over Pouring my feelings out. Trying not to cry.

It's been six months of healing, and although the notion that my marriage failed hurts like bare feet on hot concrete- a lot of hot concrete. What troubles me the most is the thought that I used my shot. My chance to wear a white dress and walk down an aisle on my daddy's arm, my shot at planning and laughing and fighting through the process. I missed my chance to say that I married the (true)  love of my life.

I was never one for marriage, I probably would have been fine without it. I could have been happy without it.  But now that that shot is gone, I wish I had never cashed it in.

I know I wont be alone forever, I hope anyways. I know one day I will find that man who makes me happy without making a mark. I know I will one day get that happily ever after. And I know this person will love me with or without a ring.

I just cant help but wonder what my life would have been like without the divorce handstamp.

Learning to Forgive, and Move on

Trust has always been easy for me. You wouldn't suspect that. 

I believe that people are inherently good, that there is a fine layer that separates what makes us bad people and the good we are all made from.
I have always believed that if you focus on understanding the person, forgiving faults and believing that individuals are good, that they will be.

Here I am almost 6 months after finally having to give up believing that my Husband would stop hitting me. How do I feel?

My position hasn't changed. 

I still believe that people are good. We are not born or created bad. I don't believe that there is anything inside of any one of us that is preventing us from being a kind, or decent human being.

Growing up I was taught to be compassionate...

Even to those who did not show me kindness. I was taught that when a bully was mean to you it maybe was because someone bullied them. I was taught that when people where angry or upset or mean, you understand that that behaviour is wrong. 

Then, you forgive them...

Forgiving does not make what you went through right, or make negative actions or situations okay. By doing this you expel hatred or upset or disdain from your mind.  You release yourself from the situation, it allows you to continue to grow and move on.

Perhaps, even transcend into understanding....

Wish the person well. Wish that somehow they find their way and rediscover the natural good within them.

And eventually learn to trust...

Even though you might be ready to trust, you must learn balance Trust with wisdom. You can mend a wound, but would you put yourself back in harms way again?

Forgive yourself...
You will make mistakes too. Marry people you shouldn't, try too hard, eat too much desserts, buy expensive jeans. It's okay.

Does any of this mean you go back? No. Is what I went through okay? Not even a little.
But somewhere in my heart can I forgive my Husband for what he did to me and leave him in a distant memory? This I will need to do. One day.

Reflection

At the end of yoga practice you meditate. 10 minutes of peaceful reflection.
I cry every time.

No matter how good my week has gone or what I've accomplished my mind wanders to him. It is like a shadow you don't notice until you are alone, until you are vulnerable.  When it doesn't matter how reasonable or rational or tough you are. It is the shadow that always manages to get inside your head and terrify you.

Today my mind wandered, I thought about how my husband felt the day I left. What happened the moments after the door to my condo shut. What happened to him as Kay and my mother loaded me into the Pontiac. Did he cry? Did he get up and clean the broken glass from the floor. Wash the spit and blood from the 800 thread count cotton sheets. Did he have a cigarette and absorb what has unfolded.

My head ran through a thousand different scenarios each one of them amplified my silent tears as I lay there on my mat. Each taking me back to last Tuesday.

Last week I spoke to him on the telephone, for the first time since Christmas. If you read the post from that morning you are already aware that it was not a conversation I would chose to have again.

When I hung up after 43 minutes and 28 seconds I was alternating between sobs and gasps, by chest hurt my head pounded. It was 4am and I couldn't call anyone, my texts went unanswered as I sat alone grasping at the teddy bear he had gotten me for my 17th birthday.

I was scared, the first time in five months I remembered what it was like to not have anything to hide myself in, no one to talk to. Suddenly, I was back in the world I lived for six years, alone.

I feel for him, I really do. He has lost more than I have. He has lost someone who took care of him, who loved him despite flaws, who tried to fix him, tried to help him. I understand what it feels like to be alone, I was there- a lot.

As the clock hit 5am I wished I could just slide my rings back on and go back to how it was, so all the hurt I was feeling would end. I can't, those rings should have never been on at all.

At 6am I wrote that post, I was hurting.

It took me a couple days of fighting to get back to where I am, it took some hard truths from my best friends and some good ol' fashioned hugs but I am back. I am back on my way to my new life. I know I will have lots of moments where I am flat on my back quietly crying during meditation-

I will be okay.

I'll Tell You About Edward

I would like to tell you about Edward. 

If you lived through the 90's you likely remember Puppy Surprise. When I was about 8 years old I received one for Christmas, She was a pink and white dog with a swollen Velcro sealed tummy, she had a litter of five. A fact that I was very proud of since the toy could also come with 3 or 4 pups. Of the five, one was named Edward.

One day our real puppy, a black lab decided that my toys resembled his and chewed Edward. His face mangled and twisted. His small rubber head opened to a smooth hollow mess.

He was broken A few times my mother suggested that we throw him out and she purchase me a new puppy (you could buy them independently  in case you needed 12 like I did.) Still every day I would play with him along side his brothers and sisters hoping eventually I would figure out a way to fix him, to make him whole. For years I held onto his mangled body, he was broken beyond repair but I held on. 

At one point I hot glued his face together, filling in the gaps with clear plastic mess that ran down his face and enhanced the franken-puppy look. 

Eventually I grew older and the Puppy Surprise made their way back into the closet with the My Little Pony and Cabbage Patch Dolls.I didn't think about them for years.

 Ironically I found Edward as I was moving out of my Condo a couple months ago. His tiny rubber face mended, as meticulously as a 12 year old with a glue gun could. His bean bag body stained, beaded fabric from 18 years of existence. 

You know what I did with Edward? I put him back in the bin with his brothers and sisters, now a reminder of who I am. You see, I did this again, 14 years after Edwards mangled face graced my toy box. I kept a relationship, a mangled, disfigured, irreparable relationship with a person I couldn't hot glue gun back together.  I hoped that one day, some how I would figure out how to fasten him back together, make him whole and not have to say goodbye.