A divorce with children can take a long time. In our case, it has now been three anniversaries spent during the pendency of our divorce. Each one opened up new wounds. When I wrote about this last year, it was evidently a popular article and I don’t want to let the public down by not sharing how things are going this year.
Last year, I felt much more broken, morose, and lost through this divorce process.
I thought somehow I wouldn’t prevail. Doubt plagued me at every turn until I despaired. I compared myself to my future ex-husband’s girlfriend, even though I now recognize that he chose her specifically because she had all the qualities I don’t have; the ones he said he wanted. Another opportunity to manipulate me, tear me down. Insidiously, by making me tear myself down. I couldn’t escape my own thoughts. I had been programmed to run around the hamster wheel of negative thoughts, hearing his voice. “You are too fat, ugly, you are getting dumber each year.” If you can believe it, sadly now they are not together anymore. Boo hoo.
I rose above all the nonsense of that. Once I pulled myself out of the fog, I couldn’t believe how angry I became – angry at him, for lying, abusing, playing mind games, and pushing every button that only he knew how to push. Now he pushes but the button is broken. Nothing happens anymore and I laugh at how stupid he looks, arguing over how I forgot a sippy cup or how I lost a child’s shoe. Everything he says is insignificant and pitiable.
This year I celebrate myself and this beautiful season of falling in love with myself for the first time.
If I experienced this kind of empowerment before, I wouldn’t have been in that relationship in the first place. However, I know the New Me had to be born out of fire, singed within an inch of my life, and dragged through the dirt before I could reappear. Instead of looking to him for accolades, I look at myself. “You are a goddess, you have done everything you never thought you could do.” I see him self-destructing at every turn – hair falling out, turning gray, scraggly, fat, wrinkly, with that beautiful and expensive car he bought Chitty Chitty Bang Banging around, sounding like a fart cannon as it hobbles down the street.
I dyed my hair red. Red is the color of power. I lift weights. I want to be as strong on the outside as I feel on the inside. I’ve never exercised as hard in my life. I use the anger I feel as fuel for my transformation. I never allowed myself to be angry before, though I always felt it deep inside. Now I channel it until I am a volcano.
I stay in the moment with my kids, playing with them and not thinking about my worries. They are happy with me and I know that’s all that matters. My cause is righteous. I haven’t done anything wrong, despite how the court talks about “Plaintiff” and “Defendant,” as if I have anything to defend. How much do you have to hate someone to spend so many thousands of dollars on a trial? How much do you have to hate someone to testify against them at their trial?
I know all of this is just another mind game. “When will she give up? What will it take to get her to cave? Maybe if I say enough made-up embarrassing things about her at court, she’ll lose it.” It will take much more than you’re willing to give before I will cave. I have endurance that you have never seen in your life. I will take it all and I won’t apologize or feel sorry for how broken you become.
