There's something that flashes through my mind on occasion and when it does it always flashes through my mind at the same time and in the same place -- just as I'm laying my head down on my pillow to go to sleep. It's a simple enough statement: "What the hell are you doing here?" This is usually immediately followed by some variation of "you should be with your family."
It hurts for long minutes, maybe more. I wallow in the guilt of abandonment, feeling like a horrible mother, a horrible wife, a horrible woman. Sacrificing the relationship with my exh was one thing, but sacrificing my relationship with my daughter? I can feel the loss so sharply, like a neverending hollow pointed pain in my gut. I begin to accuse myself and point out that I have become peripheral to my daughter's life, of my own choosing. How could I voluntarily give away those seconds and minutes and days and weeks and months of her life that I should share with her before she grows up and I won't have that opportunity any longer? Why could I not have waited?
I feel the tears well up; sometimes they fall and sometimes I swallow them back down. I let myself feel it for a moment and then, purposely, I start my internal dialogue. I remind myself to stop creating worst case scenarios. I tell myself that my daughter is still available to me, she won't forget about me, I am still her mother. I tell myself that things are not as bad as I imagine and that I have much to pride myself on. And in that manner I talk myself back down and away from that mental precipice. Then, some time later, I fall asleep.
When I wake up the next morning I listen again. I have another voice then, my morning voice, one that is free of all the day's parading thoughts. I've learned over the years that it is this simple unadorned voice that is most tapped into the deepest parts of my soul. The what I want and what I need parts, the what is best and what is true and right parts. So I listen to it and it is mostly silent and quiet and clear. Inevitably I feel better.
This process is exhausting. I hope the two voices can find some sort of synchronization soon. I'll be relieved when they do.
I experienced this last night except that following the internal struggle of guilt and the talking myself back, I did not immediately fall asleep. I lay there thinking about a situation that had presented itself over the weekend concerning my roommate.
For the first time in my life, I am enjoying being by myself. It feels like a gift that has been given to me at just the right time....but it's not, it's a reward. I've earned the ability to feel this way. It is so liberating.
I look around me and everyone is wanting to be with someone or already is. I don't. I have noticed how people -- women, especially -- seem to need another man in place before they're willing to make the leap out of a relationship. I've never been able to condemn this because I have been one of those women my entire life. Until now. This time I didn't leave for someone else, I didn't need that crutch to support me on my way out the door. No, I left for ME.
I'm proud of that because it is so very unlike me. I'm proud of the strength of purpose I found somewhere when I needed it most. I'm proud even through the tears I have to suffer through when I think about my daughter. Sometimes I think about going back, as I've said, but one of the things that always comes up in that internal dialogue -- and inspires me to soldier on regardless of the guilt -- is the fact that I left because the alternative was waiting until I found someone else and walking out the door with that kind of crutch propped up under my arm.
I didn't want to be that woman any longer.
((Song: "Coin Operated Boy" by the Dresden Dolls. Lyrics here:
http://www.dresdendolls.com/downloads_n_lyrics/lyrics/coinoperatedboy.htm ))
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