Month: April 2017

It’s All My Fault (and other things I tell myself)

It’s been a pretty upsetting few days as I’ve approached and reached the 12 month anniversary of my separation. As usually happens when I’m stressed, I’ve had a soundtrack of statements swirling about in my head that have made me feel worse:

You should have tried harder to make it work.

You should have left earlier instead of exposing the kids to so many years of emotional dysfunction and abuse.

You should have realised it was emotional abuse and left. You’re so pathetic.

You’ve failed your children by not caring for them properly. You didn’t leave and remove them from the situation, and you didn’t give them the attention they needed to compensate for all the things they were missing. You’re a terrible mother.

You’re over-reacting and hysterical. It wasn’t that bad. You’re being self-indulgent. No-one has a perfect marriage. You should have been happy with what you had.

You’re so selfish. You’re a terrible mother, daughter, sister and friend. All you care about is how you’re feeling when you should be prioritising other people instead.

Of course, I’m aware that some of these statements are contradictory and part of my brain doesn’t really believe any of them (although part of it believes them all). This isn’t as illogical as it sounds, because ultimately the exact wording of the statements doesn’t really matter. It’s all about the underlying message, which can be summarised into one sentence: You’re a failure, it’s all your fault, and you’re not good enough.

I feel like I failed at my marriage (if I could make it ‘work’ for 22 years, surely I should be able to make it work forever). I’ve failed to support my children as I should have (by staying in a terrible marriage, by being so caught up in trying to survive each day that I didn’t give them the attention they deserved, by making the decisions that have led to the past 12 months of horrible, confronting conversations with their father for them because he can’t get to me). I’ve failed to be a Good Christian Wife (which I feel bad about even though I can see how damaging trying to achieve that distorted ideal is) and I’ve failed to be a confident independent woman. I failed by creating the image of a functional, happy family so that others didn’t realise that I needed help and now don’t realise that my ex isn’t the victim he portrays himself as being.

Every time something is said to the kids by their father, his family, my family or ‘friends’ that upsets them, I feel like it’s my fault. I should have protected them better and created a safer place for them. I should have known this is how things would pan out when I left their father and either stayed, or prepared them better for the fallout. My decisions have created the emotionally fraught landscape they have had to navigate over the past 12 months. It’s my fault that I’m not qualified enough to get a well paying job to give us all financial security and independence from my ex.

The ‘you’re not good enough’ soundtrack is the worst. That’s the one where I run through all the things I’m not – not strong enough, not smart enough, not brave enough, not coping well enough, not organised enough, not available for the kids enough, not supporting them enough. I’m not a good enough mother, friend or partner (in my new relationship). I’m not good enough at prioritising the practicalities of our everyday life, so the house is messy, the clothes aren’t ironed, and dinner is a bit of a potluck affair that could be a home cooked meal, but could also be takeaway pizza. Or toasted sandwiches.

Of course this is balanced out by a list of all the things I am: selfish, needy, flawed, broken, damaged, stupid, naive, disorganised, unqualified. The list goes on.

I’ve always thought I had a reasonably solid understanding of my strengths and weaknesses, but in these moments (and there have been so many of them in the past 12 months), it’s like I’m viewing everything through a filter that assumes that I’m to blame for everything – every unhappiness, every disappointment, every misunderstanding. After so many years married to someone who never apologised or accepted responsibility and always assumed that I was somehow to blame if things didn’t work out, that viewpoint now seems to be my default setting. It’s like it doesn’t matter that I’ve left him, because I’m now wired to be emotionally abusive to myself.

I’m not posting this to invite a raft of positive affirmations. This isn’t a cry for help or attention. It’s an acknowledgement that stepping away from my marriage was just the first step in a very, very long process of reclaiming myself. Some days it’s easy to see the wonderful things that are happening in my life, and other days I’m just too emotionally exhausted to find the energy to silence the ‘you’re a failure/it’s your fault/you’re not good enough’ soundtrack.

I know I am loved. I know I am valued. But tonight I am sad, and that’s okay. Tomorrow is a new day.

Milestones and Mirages

Yesterday I signed the Application for Divorce paperwork.

Today the paperwork was delivered to my lawyer.

In two days it will be the anniversary of the day I officially separated from my ex-husband.

In four days the Application for Divorce will be submitted by my lawyer and the process of legally and permanently ending my marriage will begin.

I should be happy. I thought I would be. I want this divorce. I need it. My marriage was miserable and the separation has been almost unbearably awful at times. I’ve longed to reach this point, where I can feel like I am finally actually DOING something to separate myself from a man who has  inflicted significant emotional damage over way too many years. I want to be free. I want to start the next stage of my life. I should be happy. And relieved.

But…

When I signed the form, it was all I could do to not throw up. I felt physically ill. I barely held back tears and even thinking about that moment now has brought the tears back again. I’ve felt a dull ache in my chest and fluttering anxious thoughts for days as I’ve completed the paperwork.

Ending a marriage is a serious thing. I was married for more than two decades – it’s a long time to have your life connected to someone else. I have three children. So many memories of my children, my family and my friends are connected with my marriage. Ending the marriage means disconnecting from parts of myself in some ways. There is loss and grief and regret. Signing the paperwork didn’t feel like a release. It felt like an acknowledgement that I’d failed in so many ways; a reminder that my bad decisions had significant consequences for myself and my children.

And it didn’t feel like the milestone I thought it would. I didn’t feel like I was transitioning from the ‘past’ to the ‘future’. Instead, it made me realise that this is just a piece of paper. That the legal process can proceed, but I’ll still have to worry about how his words and behaviour will affect the kids. I’ll still know that no matter what happens, he’ll see himself as the victim. He’s always created his own version of the truth and refused to acknowledge anything that isn’t consistent with that ‘truth’ and that won’t change.

And even though what he thinks, feels and believes is no longer something I need to feel responsible for, our children will always connect us and the way he treats them and speaks to them has an impact on me, especially while I am still responsible for their everyday wellbeing. The divorce application can be submitted, I can wait three months for my hearing, and then one month for the divorce to be finalised. I can redefine my goals, prioritise myself and get on with building the amazing life I deserve, BUT there will always be a part of my life that is connected with the man who made me so unhappy for so long.

I know that time will make a difference. The children will get older and become adults and they will be able to manage their relationship with their father themselves. I’ll only need to have contact with him on very rare occasions. My memories will fade and become more soft focus. My sense of self and wellbeing will be restored. I’ll feel stronger, happier, and less broken. I’ll move away from the lingering shadows of my old life and my new life will dominate my thoughts.

But for now, I’m simply myself, where I am, wishing that signing a piece of paper could really work miracles and close the door on the parts of my old life that leave me feeling so broken and confused and aching. I wish it could absolve me of the guilt I feel for allowing myself to be treated so badly for so long. I wish it could serve as an official statement of truth about who I am and what I’ve experienced. Instead, it’s just a piece of paper that acknowledges a series of dates and logistical details about my marriage and parental responsibilities. It’s a form that will be looked at with disinterest by the various people who process such documents. It is nothing significant.

And the milestone I’ve been counting down to reveals itself to be a mirage.

An Invisible Woman

When I came up with the concept for this blog, the title Notes from an Invisible Woman felt right because for most of my marriage, my ex-husband made me feel invisible. I felt like who I was as a person, the things that made me uniquely me – my thoughts, opinions, feelings – had no value, because they were overlooked, denied or (most often) simply ignored unless they were consistent with who he wanted me to be. If I did or said anything that fell outside his definition of a Good Christian Wife and Mother, then it was as if those things had never happened.

It wasn’t just my ex-husband. The same attitude was evident in many of my friends. I seemed to surround myself with people who confirmed that I was loved and valued most when I stayed within the boundaries of their expectations. Who I was as an individual never mattered. My connection with these people was a form of unconscious self-sabotage. When I approached these friends for support, their response was always that I should find contentment in my situation, reflect on how much I had to be grateful for, and/or try harder to focus on supporting and encouraging others in order to be less self-focused and selfish (because apparently being unbearably sad and ‘allowing’ yourself to feel disconnected and unloved is self-indulgent).

My husband, and many of my closest friends, made me feel invisible.

By now, almost twelve months after the separation, I expected to feel less invisible. I thought leaving my ex-husband would release me to be myself again. That I would no longer have to filter every word, thought and action to make sure they were appropriate. In some ways this is true. It’s been a struggle, but I’ve stepped away from most of the toxic relationships in my life (both friends and family). I’m gradually realising that I’m allowed to be happy; that it’s okay to prioritise my feelings. I’m very, very slowly learning to not feel guilty every time I feel sad or prioritise my own wellbeing instead of satisfying the expectations of others.

But I still feel invisible. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say I feel insubstantial.

I’ve spent so long suppressing myself and trying to comply with the expectations of others that I feel like I don’t even know who I am anymore. I’ve spent so long watching life from the sidelines, I’m not sure if I even know how to participate and engage with life outside my everyday routine.

I feel like I never have the time or energy to engage in serious conversations, even though I’m desperate to be part of discussions and debate about a wide variety of topics. I feel like I’ve spent so long focused on simply surviving, that I’ve lost track of what is happening in the world. I feel like I simply don’t have the background knowledge to make a meaningful contribution when serious discussions start, so I once again take a step back and watch others exchange ideas while I feel silly and ignorant and useless on the sidelines.

I know there is an element of self-pity in what I’m feeling, but sometimes it really does simply feel too hard. Meeting new people, staying up-to-date with news, current affairs and pop culture, and finding time to read articles about social issues – finding time to read ANYTHING meaningful – seems like far more than I’m capable of achieving.

I want to reconnect with the world. I want to feel like I have something significant to contribute. I want to learn new things, meet new people, debate, discuss and have my perspective challenged. I want to be drawn into conversations where the mess of my personal life doesn’t matter. I want to contribute without feeling like I need to brace myself for the reminder that my opinions are unwanted and unnecessary.

Very early in my separation, when my ex-husband was trying to convince me that we should stay together, I mentioned that I didn’t understand his enthusiasm for our relationship given he’d never really liked who I was. He didn’t like that I was opinionated or outspoken. He didn’t agree with my politics or my need to discuss social issues. He didn’t like the kinds of people I felt most drawn to – people who challenged ideas and didn’t fit inside the square. I spent so many years trying to be less than what I was so he wouldn’t feel uncomfortable, but it was never enough. When I said ‘You never really liked me and who I was’ he replied with ‘You’re right. I didn’t. But I’m okay with it now’ and I felt the invisibility descend on me again.

Twelve months on, I’m still fighting to not feel invisible. I have some wonderful people in my life who love me and accept me as I am, but my instinctive response is always to assume that I don’t have anything meaningful to contribute. I always assume that I’m to blame. That I’m talking too much, too loudly, too confidently. That my opinions are unwanted and uninteresting. That I should be content with having a seat on the sidelines.

It probably doesn’t seem like much – an anonymous blog with (too long) posts about the jumble of thoughts and ideas in my head. It isn’t much, I guess. A very, very tiny corner of the internet that won’t be noticed by many. But after so many years of feeling invisible, posting here feels like stepping into the daylight and letting myself be seen. It’s liberating and terrifying at the same time.

But it’s time to stop being invisible.

The Hardest Part

When I left my marriage, I expected the decision to leave would be the hardest part emotionally. That deciding to end a 22 year marriage would be harrowing, but after that, no matter how tough the decisions were, I would still have the relief of being free after feeling trapped for so long to carry me through.

What I’ve discovered is that pivotal decision was the first of what has become countless moments that have been so emotionally overwhelming that I’ve been convinced, often, that I simply don’t have the emotional reserves to deal with anything else. And then the next challenge comes along and I drag myself up, push through, and then retreat into myself to gather my defences before the next onslaught.

There are the obvious challenges of course. All the external issues like supporting my children, dealing with family and friends, finding work, the legal and financial aspects of separation and divorce, and dealing with my ex as we redefine our relationship. I’ve cried more times than I care to remember about all of these things and I’ve found the issues I’ve dealt with heartbreaking on many occasions, but they are all predictable consequences of my original decision to leave.

What has caught me by surprise are the internal issues I’ve had to deal with. Coming to terms with how emotionally broken and damaged I am. Feeling emotionally fractured and unbearably lonely and isolated. Feeling incapable of connecting with others because the emotions I’m dealing with are so intense and overwhelming that my head often doesn’t have room for anything else. Feeling like a failure as a friend. Feeling undeserving of the new relationship I have. Feeling selfish and cruel because I couldn’t put my own emotions aside to reassure my parents and respond to this situation in a way they could accept. Feeling weak and needy and broken beyond the ability to be repaired. I feel worthless.

I doubt myself at every turn. I’ve spent the past two decades constantly suppressing myself and trying to make decisions based on what would keep my husband’s world functioning. I’ve spent so much time filtering my thoughts and feelings that I feel like I don’t even know who I am and what I want anymore. Of course I expected there would be some need to redefine myself after leaving the marriage, but I didn’t expect to find that I would have to rethink every single aspect of myself. My thoughts. My opinions. How I see the world. Every emotion I feel now goes through an exhausting process before I can work out whether it is genuine – am I over-reacting to a trigger (there are so damn many of them), am I overthinking, am I slipping back into old habits of repressing myself in order to appease someone else, and I simply wrong and misjudging the situation. Happiness, frustration, confusion, pride, love, affection, gratitude – I second guess them all. I am always ready to assume that I’m at fault.

I don’t think there is a single thing that I used to believe about who I was that still holds true. I feel like I’ve lost myself in this, or more accurately that I’ve realised that I lost myself long ago and didn’t even notice. I wonder constantly what I have to offer anyone now – why anyone would be willing to care for me when I am so incapable of caring for myself.

I am grateful beyond words for my children who have given me a point of reference through all of this. Their love and belief in me hasn’t wavered and in my most fragile moments, that belief helps me to believe that I’ll get through this somehow. They remind me constantly of one of my favourite lines of poetry, from Valediction: Forbidding Mourning by John Donne “Thy firmness makes my circle just, and makes me end where I begun.” They help me to believe that I’ll find my way back to myself, even if takes a long time.

On days like today, I hold on to that belief. Because today is a hard day.