Friday, January 22, 2010

Holding on to precious memories

Inchmark has a great idea for a little pick me up, a little memory keeping, a little inspiration for our days. 

I take no credit for this but I am going to shameless copy this.

My cousin does this by posting her child's sunny saying on Facebook.  But this method is much more immediate.  Regardless, if it is good enough for Joan, it's good enough for me.

I hope you find some inspiration close to home.  I hope you can take a few moments out of your day to capture that ray of joy and purity.  I know there are those of you out there feeling pretty low today.  I'm thinking about you.  

Thursday, January 7, 2010

D-I-V-O-R-C-E

I was divorced this morning. 11 years, two kids and many long and lonely nights. For both of us. Any marriage hit rough patches. I’m not anti-divorce, some relationships need to end. But it is too often the selfish and stupid path to choose. Divorce, especially when there are children involved, does not “fix” or “end” your problems, they merely give force you to deal with a different set of problems.

The process of divorce was expensive and emotionally damaging both to us and to our kids. But in so many ways, even though we are no longer legally man and wife, we will be tied to each other emotionally and financially. I get 1/2 of his pension and deferred comp, regardless of remarriage (Highly UN likely) when he retires. That will be a monthly reminder in my old age of the time we were together. I guess the point I am trying to make is that I still believe, despite everything he did to me, that we COULD HAVE SURVIVED, if he would have had the courage to fight for our marriage. While I’m happy it’s over, I know that this could have ended differently. That marital and parenting counseling would have been MUCH cheaper and all of us; him, me, our kids, would be happier today. And it’s my disappointment in his lack of courage that stings the most.

So what is the moral of this sad tale? My Ex-Husband faced inhuman levels of stress, saw un-imaginable horror. We as wives and mothers also face our share of daily stress. Life can so quickly and easily put things like our relationships on the back burner. If you’re waiting for the “right” time to talk about what’s going on in your relationship, then it’s already too late. Don’t feel guilty about “burdening” him with the stress of your relationship. He’s a partner in this and needs to share in the responsibility of maintaining and improving that relationship. Just because he has this really stressful job, doesn’t mean that his emotional needs take priority over yours. Just as you need to support him, he needs to support you. Asking for the things you need is not selfish. Giving him the things he needs (time, space, an outlet) is just as important. We are not superwomen and we can’t fix everything for them.

Finally, I’ll sign off with on last piece of advice.

No one who has been married for 50 years was madly in love with each other every day for 50 years. There WILL be times when you have to be more committed to your marriage than you are to the person you married. But if you work at maintaining your relationship, building it back up when things erode, repairing it when things are broken, then you can and will survive.