Layers

I was not prepared to learn that my grief has layers.

It is complicated.

It is painful.

It is exhausting.

Just as I thought I was making tremendous progress in a forward direction, in terms of grieving the premature death of my son, I found myself sitting in the depths of despair again.

Oh, the heartache!

This time around, I was feeling the overwhelming sadness of the death of my marriage.

Oh yeah, I guess I didn't ever take the time to really deal with that.  From the time that my husband announced he wanted to quit, I have been in survival mode, or comforting myself with the anticipation of the new baby.  I did not take the time to accept or feel the deep emotions that come from such betrayal and rejection.

Rejection hurts.

Being betrayed by the person you loved, married, and chose to share your life with, is intensely painful.  

My trials are so complicated these days, that it appears I have to grieve each loss, a layer at a time.  Ugh.  This is no fun.  

I say the death of a child is the worst pain that can be experienced.

I am fairly certain that the betrayal of a spouse is the closest 2nd place pain possible.

At least with the death of a child, I have the comfort of knowing my children are in a better place and I will see them again in heaven.  God is in control.  That comfort helps ease the pain.

With the death of my marriage, at the hands of my husband, there is no comfort.  I don't get a say.  I don't get a choice.  I don't get a vote.  I am expected to accept it and deal with it, regardless of my personal thoughts and feelings about it.  

It takes 2 to Tango....But, apparently, it only takes 1 person to quit and leave the dance floor.  

When we were told that our daughter, Mackenzie, had died in the womb just 3 days before her due date, I was shocked to learn that such a thing could even happen.  I was completely naive about such tragedy.  I was not prepared for such bad news.  It haunted me for years that I never even realized such a thing could happen to me....until after it happened.

That is exactly where I am, right now, with the end of my marriage.  Even though I am aware that divorce is common, I dismissed it as a possibility.  I was completely naive that such a tragedy could happen to me.  I don't even get a choice in the matter.  I value marriage.  It is not a legal contract to be changed over time.  It is a covenant that lasts a lifetime.  I did not realize that my husband was capable of breaking his promises, and quitting on our life together.  I trusted him explicitly.  It never crossed my mind that he would ever betray me.

I have been in a complete tailspin lately.  I keep asking "how is this possible?"

It does not help matters that I do not have a clear understanding as to why my husband is rejecting me like this.  His comments are not consistent.  Some times he tells me it is him, he needs to be alone, and that I don't deserve this at all.  Other times, he tells me that he needed to get away from me specifically, he was never happy in our marriage, and I was just ruining his life.  

My self esteem is under assault.  

What is so horrible about me?  Am I that bad of a person??

I try to logically remind myself of the truth about our life together.  He did love me once.  There was a time when I was very important to him.  There was a time when he said I was the best thing that happened to him.  Life has been tough for us, for sure.  But, the challenges were not in my control.  I can't cause job losses, bully coworkers, and health problems.  I just don't see how it can be my fault, the way that he seems to see it.  Even to this day, it is obvious he still cares about me.  He continues to show acts of kindness towards me.  He also takes the time to remind me regularly that he does not want to be with me, as a couple, anymore.

Rejection is very painful.

Rejection from the person who knows you best, with whom you are most vulnerable, is gut-wrenching.

Grieving the death of my marriage is torment.

The hopes and dreams and plans are gone.  There is no hope for the future.  There is no time to look forward to, in the way we look forward to seeing our children again in heaven.  The death of the marriage is a death in hell, completely separated from anything good. 

The way that I have had to manage these layers of grief is to rely solely on God.  No other human can really tell me that I am valuable as a wife.  How would they know?  When this level of despair has me questioning my own self worth, I have to remind myself to look at myself the way that God sees me.

God loves me, even if my husband does not.

The cold, hard reality of my situation is that the marriage is dead.  There is no going back to it now.  There is no way to fix it.  The damage is done.  Any level of relationship with my husband would have to be a new relationship.  We just can't resume where we left off after all that has transpired.

Thankfully, there is opportunity to maintain a friendship for the sake of our children.  We both share the common goal of wanting what is best for our children.

So, I am giving myself permission to grieve the death of my marriage.  I seek comfort from God to enable me to carry the pain of this rejection and loss.  

I can feel hurt.  I can feel angry.  But, I cannot take revenge.  I must leave the consequences to God.

I must focus on raising our children.

The misconception about a broken marriage, when you have kids together, is that there really is no clean break.  For the rest of our lives, we are going to be the parents of our kids.  They will go through milestones in life....graduations, weddings, career achievements, and children of their own.....where they will want both of their parents to join them in celebration.  We will continue to be the parents, and eventually the grandparents, of the family we formed.  

All because two people fell in love....

We are stuck together as the center of our family.  Until death do we part.

Ironically, *our song* is "Happy To Be Stuck With You" by Huey Lewis and the News.

It is Ok to laugh.

Clearly, God has a sense of humor.