Adjustments

I wonder how long it will take to adjust to these major changes? It's been 32+ years building these habits. God knows how long it will take to break them.

For example yesterday at lunch when I stopped by the house he was sitting at his computer. We noted a few items of business and I took my leave. It is such habit, especially when emotions are running so high, to tell him I love him on my way out the door. It's what I honestly felt, along with deep regret that there does not appear to be anything more I can say right now. But I caught myself just in time. It took all my strength just to turn and walk out the door.

Is it weird that I still feel such love for him? He's done so much right, tries so hard. It's just those trace bitter roots buried in his heart that continue to haunt me. Are those things I just have to deal with? So he's not perfect - neither am I.

I guess its all water under the bridge now. I don't think he'll ever forgive me for separating. And I really don't regret it - I just wonder sometimes how I will view these events after the dust settles. At some point I want to understand what broke and what parts I own or I'll just repeat the pattern. It's not all him nor is it all me....

I'm coming to recognize there is a difference between the grieving for what could/should have been in a healthy marriage; that hope that I've held onto for decades that someday we'd get it right, that he'd love me and I'd find a way to express my love to him in ways that he understood, that we'd finally discover the meaning of intimacy. The grief that comes from realizing we will never get there is different from the grief of walking away from the reality of what we have right now. There is sorrow in both, but it helps to recognize the difference. And I grieve for the love I have for him that I can no longer express.

Such are the adjustments of a 54 year old woman striking out on her own for the first time. I expect it is one of many to come on this grand adventure...