The Other Side

I once felt like there was no other way or possible outcome for my life. I didn’t know how to process my emotions or even the things that were happening to me. I couldn’t see the other side. Even if I knew it was there, I didn’t want it to exist. My vision for my life didn’t fit with that, and I didn’t believe I could be happy. I didn’t even want to consider that a possibility. My version included a husband and 2-3 kids, with me staying at home and raising those kids. This image makes me laugh now, but I remember the delusional, small dreams girl and I can still feel her heartache and confusion. Not understanding why God was punishing me or what I was doing wrong. What did I do to deserve this? All I wanted to be was a mom, so why was it so hard and why were other women so good at it? It seemed so easy for every other woman. And some of these women were undeserving, in my self-righteous opinion. Resentment grew, and I worked hard. I always believed that if you worked hard enough, you could do anything. I refused to stop and think about what I really wanted and whether that nuclear family I was so desperate to have should be created with the person I chose to be a husband and father. If I had really stopped to think about that, I would never have picked him. So, what felt like a punishment at the time was really a blessing in disguise. I couldn’t have envisioned the life I have now, with the children and husband that I love more than I could have imagined. Doing all of this with a partner who didn’t understand what it meant to be one was a level of difficult that is hard to describe, but I’ll do my best.

Being gaslit daily and emotionally abused by a boy who thought he was a man, and I really wanted him to be the man I needed. You can’t make someone they’re not, and he was not anything I needed or wanted. When I look back, I can still see her, in a tangible way. Like a second skin that has been shed. It’s real and so was that version of me. Sometimes I wish I could reach through time and hug her. I know she wouldn’t have listened, but she needed advice and was desperate for it. If I could somehow transfer feelings of love, understanding, and take away some of her insecurity, I would. There’s a part of my heart that still aches for her. I also ache for her future heartache…the one she doesn’t know about yet, but its closer than she thinks. Each loss, struggle, and challenge that we’re faced with or have to go through make us more resilient. What a fun reward for life’s devastating blows! Congrats; you’ve just earned a new badge in resilience. Do you feel like your soul took a punch and like you’ve lost pieces of yourself? Then you’re feeling what you’re supposed to feel. It’s that feeling that makes you feel somehow transient…like your soul is so light it might float away without you. Other times it feels too heavy, like lifting weights in molasses. These are growing pains of living in the new skin you’re in. It’s so uncomfortable to be who you’re becoming.

Looking back over the last decade and beyond, my insecurity about myself and my worth basically made me a moth to flame to the narcissistic boy man that I married. I spent years thinking I was the problem. Thinking my needs were too high maintenance or unreasonable, never stopping to consider that he was the problem. Instead I became an emotional punching bag for all of his feelings. When something like that happens, you make yourself smaller and smaller until you’re barely a reflection of who you were. Naturally, everything was my fault. I spent too much, I ate too much, I didn’t clean enough (I am very clean!). Scores were kept for everything. If something didn’t work, it was my fault. So, I couldn’t get pregnant. Initially, he thought we didn’t have a problem. I pushed to get us tested. Then, when it continued to not work (initial tests showed his sperm weren’t fantastic – unacceptable), it was my fault. Not only was it my fault, I forced him to do all of this. It’s true…I pushed hard to keep trying and to find out why we couldn’t get pregnant. Mind you, I’m the one who had to take or inject all the hormones. I’m the one who endured multiple procedures, all of which he had to approve. We didn’t do anything without his consent, even when it concerned by body. All he had to do was come in a cup a few times. But yes, I was the problem. It was also my fault for destroying our family by asking for a divorce after years of infertility, loss, and a lack of support so unimaginable it was amazing I was still standing. We finally became parents through the adoption of our son and I realized with shocking clarity that my child could not be raised thinking this was okay. The way his father treated his mother was not okay. When you love someone, you don’t talk to or treat them the way he treated me. It took years of abuse, infertility, and loss, and eventually motherhood that allowed me to see the other side and desperately want to get there.

More to come from,

The Other Side