I’m here, writing nearly every day, for these simple reasons:
The upheaval in my life in the past year and a half is not limited to divorce, single parenting, quitting a job and starting a new one. It’s social, as well. In fact, I can hear The Jayhawks singing right now…
If you asked me today who my best friends are, I’d list the usual suspects. Most are my single girlfriends (you know who you are), and I’ve been able to reconnect with and lean on these girls much more than when I was trying to manage a family life, especially a deteriorating family life. So there has been a lot of shifting in my friendships, and not all of it as positive as I’d like.
As you might imagine, with small children, much of my family’s socialization was right here in the neighborhood, with other couples who had children of similar ages. Some, I was surprised to find, seem a bit suspicious of me following the split…as though perhaps my ex went on a bit of a public relations campaign before moving several neighborhoods away.
In fact, this PR campaign was confirmed by a local wife over a bottle of wine one night. It wasn’t as though she came out and told me he had done this; rather, she hung around until after the other women had left and literally grilled me. In the process she happened to mention that my ex had been over and told his side of the story. And I doubt he stopped there.
Most adults recognize that there are two sides to every story. I was hoping not to have to air my grievances about certain of my ex’s betrayals, simply because I preferred to take the high road. It was over; the damage was done. Dissing him was not productive. In fact, one neighborhood wife had the grace to say, “We saw in your ex the man you fell in love with.” While I knew it was a lie, I appreciated her generosity and refusal to talk bad about him.
I mentioned other broken relationships in the neighborhood — one of those to whom I was closest moved away and, after having spent several years as an at-home mother, now manages half of the parenting, a long-distance relationship and a full-time job. It’s simply become harder to stay in touch. Another close friend moved to the coast. My neighborhood is a lonelier place than it was before.
There is no question that the disruption inherent in divorce extends beyond the family circle and daily life into broader social circles, often making friends feel as though they have to choose, take sides or spare you the knowledge of the party they held last weekend to which your ex (but not you) was invited. And then there’s the couples vs. singles dynamic, where you’re no longer invited to be part of the group because you’re an odd number or a single or you just aren’t thought of by the well-meaning folks thinking of which couples to invite. Divorce forces those around us into an awkward situation.
Recently, I experienced probably the worst possible incarnation that this dynamic might take — its impact on my children.
One of my daughter’s friends invited her to a backyard bonfire and barbecue. As they sat talking about it, my daughter assumed that her brother and I would also be welcome to attend as a list of neighborhood attendees were rattled off. Whispering ensued. I could hear the girlfriend complaining that they didn’t want so many people. This friend has been known to be manipulative and generally prefers to exclude my son, if at all possible. But it seemed there was more…
Later, when we were alone, I expressed to my daughter that sometimes it was a challenge for me to know how to respond to her friend. She agreed. We talked and, as I uncovered more about this dynamic, I had an intuition and asked:
“Did you friend tell you that her parents don’t like me?”
“Yes,” she confessed.
“When?” I asked.
“Awhile ago.”
“Is that why you haven’t been making plans with her for the past several months?”
“Yes,” she answered.
“Does that make you feel uncomfortable around her parents?”
“Yes.”
My stomach dropped. I was, of course, hurt. I have been kind, generous and respectful of this couple. Certainly, we have had moments of difference as it relates to our parenting styles, but I would never exclude them or treat them differently for it. By far, though, pure rage outweighed my sadness. Regardless of what this couple thinks of me (and they’ve made plain their sympathy for my ex), one would think they’d have the discretion to limit what they might say in front of children. And, while I doubt this couple actually said the above verbatim, they need to know how grossly inappropriate and un-friend-like it was for their daughter to say something like this to mine. How dare their words be used to so callously injure my daughter’s self-esteem!
Add another difficult conversation and more social awkwardness to my to-do list…
Update: It should be noted that these friends later told me I’d done the right thing (in getting rid of my ex).
Both my home and my psyche are in fixer-upper condition.
I may have mentioned this before, but my ex was not particularly handy around the home. While he stayed home with our young children, familiarity with his surroundings seemed to engender blindness. Case in point: when the roof over his head began to leak, I had to point it out to him. And even though he knew roofers, he never managed to make the appropriate arrangements (which explains all the banging going on up there each day and the $10,000 gap in my finances).
If there was something I wanted done, no matter how simple, I started calling contractors or handymen for bids. When the tree guy came to look at the white ash, his quote was deemed “ridiculous” and my ex began trimming. So I managed to accomplish small improvements in this way. Any cost or investment, no matter how low, was “ridiculous” to my wasband, whose grasp on fiscal and other realities seemed to have eroded over his time at home.
Our kitchen remodel made it to 85% complete…and, six years later, there’s still a list of to-do’s including new back doors, trim, a back splash and a few other details. And the bathroom needs a major remodel and … well, you get the idea.
My psyche is much the same way just now: there are some areas that need anything from a little redecorating or brightening up with fresh flowers to major renovation.
Inside my house, there are improvements on my wish list that I notice every day. Yet I’m repairing the roof first. I can’t see it, except from outside. It won’t affect my daily comfort (aside from during a hard rain). Yet, it’s as my roofer said, “Above all, a good roof.” The roof is the necessary shelter, the fundamental protection that will allow me to take the next necessary steps: a new ceiling, doors and trim. Eventually a bathroom.
Addressing the internal wounds is somewhat different, but it begins the same way. The first order of business is to secure shelter, a protected space or environment in which to process the emotions. Or, as Dr. Phil has explained (on one or more of the small handful of shows I’ve seen), “a safe place to land.” Divorce (and its associated betrayals), regardless of who or how or why it’s initiated, has a way of decimating the self-esteem, self-worth, ability to trust and more. One needs time and space to restore them.
And then there are matters of forgiveness. As if forgiving the ex were not practically unthinkable in and of itself, one must move beyond this to the even more monumental effort of forgiving one’s self: for failing to make it work, for actual harm caused, for giving up to soon or for staying too long and, especially, for the poor relationship example demonstrated to the children. And so much more.
While all that work is being addressed, there are the realizations and discoveries of habits, beliefs and paradigms adopted and lived out in the course of a failing relationship that must be examined and, likely, let go for something new and more wonderful to bloom. Certain triggers cause responses that are entirely too reactionary. As an example, say the words “stay at home father” and watch as I break out in a rash… Though my ex was much better equipped to be a full-time caregiver than I was when our children were babies, the experience ultimately took a turn for the resentful. I have to take a few deep breaths and remind myself that said domestic arrangement can and does actually work for a growing number of other families.
I’d say the roof is half-way finished. It would be impossible to say where my psyche is at along the path or how far I’ve come in healing. While I’d like to think that I am facing my challenges and healing consciously, there is no real way to determine whether or when there will be an end to the work. I can’t simply look at the construction schedule (and then add another few months). The past three months of down time to mull and process has been a true gift, and I’d like to believe I’ve made significant progress in healing my heart.
Yet I have a feeling the true test will be, as it is now, the patience, love and understanding I demonstrate to my children, my presence and openness, and the woman I am in relation to others.
Today, as I dropped off my children with my ex, I pulled him aside for a brief conversation and, in those few moments, I saw in him a glimpse of the man I once so deeply loved. And I saw him for who he is.
There is no possibility for reconciliation, but it’s nice to be able to see his warmth again.
One of the lessons I’ve learned along the way is that forgiveness, like love, is expressed through action.
Witnessing acts of forgiveness is incredibly powerful and life-affirming. We know we have forgiven ourselves when we break a self-destructive habit, such as addiction, or form new, life-affirming ones. We know we’ve forgiven others when we stop doing things to make them angry.
A divorced male friend recently shared this story with me: He and his ex see a child development specialist every couple of weeks to understand and try to mitigate the effects of their break-up on their five-year-old child (which I think is a very mature approach on their part). My friend’s ex had introduced her boyfriend to their daughter, a man with whom she had recently broken up. She was asking the specialist how to handle it when their daughter asked for her boyfriend by name.
My friend, meanwhile, was fuming. He sat in his chair, gripping its arms with his hands until his knuckles were white. He had been upset with her decision to introduce this man to their child, questioned her normally sound judgment and, though he desperately wanted to seethe, “I told you so!,” he held his tongue and calmly asked the child development specialist, “Is it possible that our daughter associates this man with Mommy’s happiness? and that, rather than the ex boyfriend, our daughter simply misses seeing Mommy happy?”
The child development specialist agreed that this was likely, and suggested the ex-wife ignore any of their daughter’s references to the ex boyfriend. My friend, meanwhile, was quite proud of his restraint. It even earned him a positive email from his ex-wife. But I wonder if he even recognized his action for what it was: an act of forgiveness.
I recently experienced such an incredibly generous act of forgiveness that I want to share it here. I requested a networking coffee with a man whose company for which I had done some work (more than a decade ago). This man has seen my highs and lows, including me in the midst of my most morally bereft phase (I think a lot us were there in the late 90s).
Simply meeting me was a generous gift of his time. Then he told me that he had always seen my talent, appreciated my personality and was thrilled to see the light inside me shining brightly again. I actually teared up. Even knowing the lowest points in my personal history, he sat across from me, looked into my eyes and uttered these warm and positive words. After an hour, we embraced and parted.
Every moment and every word was, to me, an act of forgiveness. And it was painfully humbling. I confess, I questioned my worthiness. How could I possibly deserve such grace? Yet every religion on Earth makes allowances that we might all be forgiven, healed and made whole.
Now if only I could learn to forgive myself and others with such grace and generosity!
I’ve probably written enough about Bob Schneider so that you know by now I think Lovely Creatures is the perfect combination of songs to nurse one’s heart through a divorce. There’s the heartbreaking Changing Your Mind, the bitter Realness of Space, the romantic and hopeful 40 Dogs, the jaunty Till Somebody Catches a Feeling and the poignant Bicycle vs. Car…and more.
But what if I had a song of my own that defined where I’m at in life? What might that be? I know what it used to be — I listened to this song over and over in my late twenties, and I’ve recently re-discovered At This Point In My Life by Tracy Chapman. In a word, it’s all about redemption.
Here are the lyrics; they might give you an idea of why this song so resonates with me:
“…At this point in my life, I’ve done so many things wrong, don’t know if I can do right
If you put your faith in me, I hope I won’t let you down
If you give me a chance I’ll try…
You see it’s been a hard road, the road I’m traveling on
And if I take your hand, I might lead you down the path to ruin
I’ve had a hard life, I’m just saying it so you’ll understand
That right now, right now, I’m doing the best I can
At this point in my life
At this point in my life, although I’ve mostly walked in the shadows,
I’m still searching for the light
Won’t you put your faith in me
We both know that’s what matters
If you give me a chance I’ll try
You see I’ve been climbing stairs, but mostly stumbling down
I’ve been reaching high, always losing ground
You see I’ve conquered hills, but I still have mountains to climb
And right now, right now I’m doing the best I can
At this point in my life
Before we take a step, before we walk down that path,
Before I make any promises, before you have regrets,
Before we talk commitment, let me tell you ’bout my past —
What I’ve seen and what I’ve done, things I’d like to forget
At this point in my life
At this point in my life, I’d like to live as if only love mattered,
As if redemption was in sight,
As if the search to live honestly is all that anyone needs,
No matter if you find it.
You see when I’ve touched the sky, Earth’s gravity has pulled me down
But now I’ve reconciled that in this world
Birds and angels get the wings to fly
If you can believe in this heart of mine,
Oh, if you can give it a try,
Then I’ll reach inside and find and give you all the sweetness that I have
At this point in my life…”
Let me be clear: In the scheme of things, I truly don’t believe that I’ve had a difficult life — that’s not the part I relate to. It’s the sheer humility of acknowledging that I have a past; I have failed at relationships and I want to do better, try harder. It’s the hopefulness, the possibility — in her words, “to live as if only love mattered, as if redemption was in sight…as if the search to live honestly is all that anyone needs, no matter if you find it.”
And someday, when I meet my match, I’m going to reach inside, find and give him all the sweetness that I have!
I’ve never been a Rules girl. Perhaps this has been the source of some of my relationships problems, perhaps I need to study up. But I am learning a thing or two.
Here’s where I’m at:
As I take this pause in my life to reflect, reconsider, re-configure and re-focus, I’ve devoted a significant amount of time to thinking, creating, writing, meditating, yoga, healing, expanding — in a word, growth.
So, while I’ve had several coffees and networking meetings and informational or other interviews during which I’ve projected my energy outward and, all told, hours of meditation directing my energy inward, I’ve recently been given some feedback that’s helping me grow and change where the rubber hits the road:
Just as I finished this draft, I checked out Rob Brezny’s Free Will Astrology horoscope for Libra for the week, an excerpt of which reads:
“…Inner truths that have been hidden from you are ready to be plucked by your penetrating probes…”
So here’s to revealing — and then sharing — my inner truths!
Four – six months ago…
If you’ve followed all this bizness about Chi-guy, you already know that I had developed some feelings for him, that he was a hot mess and that, despite a mutual multi-year crush, we never got it on. And even thinking about what happened next makes me want to slap myself!
I became the über friend, the counselor and confidante. We had discovered that our situations were remarkably parallel in too many ways to ignore: he had lost his job and was the primary caregiver for his daughter while his wife was the breadwinner, just as in my household; he had been using alcohol to numb his pain, just as my ex did; even our (and by “our” I mean mine and his ex wife’s) roofs leaked following the same winter storm (despite several hundred miles between us).
“You know that’s your fault,” I teased.
“Yes, I’ve been told,” he replied.
He told me he didn’t understand why. I told him (as I’ve now written twice) that he should stop asking, because he’d never get a satisfactory answer. He asked me how her life could possibly be better now, without him there. And I told him that it’s not; it’s hard having to be the full-on single parent, especially when you’re hurting emotionally, and to take on all the other tasks that were once shared. Yet the stress is different because the emotional weight is gone. We even discussed Dr. Phil’s philosophy on what women need from men — to provide income and a soft place to land (emotional safety).
I sent him emails and texts and even small gifts. I dreamt about him — dreams that were too real and projected my fears about my own ex onto him — and then worried that those dreams might be real. I called from time to time, and I was there when he needed to talk.
I loved (and still cherish) the closeness, our conversations, his authenticity and candor, yet I hated what had become of us. I didn’t want to be his friend or his counselor; I wanted to be his woman. I wanted to feel that intensely feminine way that I’d felt when I was near him. I wanted to sit across a table from him, listening while he talked, but mostly smoldering inside as I fantasized about crawling across the table, opening him up and licking his sexy brain.
Sometimes we were flirtatious, yet emotional support or commiseration ruled our conversations. After the holidays, he updated his profile photo on Facebook. I could see immediately that he’d turned a corner. I relaxed. I let go of my need to worry about him.
When I caught myself yearning for him or, more accurately, that feeling I had when I was with him, I stopped and replaced the thought of him with “him, or someone even better for me.” I forced myself to create a list of characteristics that my ideal mate would have — even those things in direct conflict with who Chi-guy is now. And I created an online profile and opened myself to dating.
You see, it wasn’t that I thought I was in love with him. Rather, I believed (and still do) that we have a unique connection, a potential of some kind, and we were (are?) missing the opportunity to fully explore whatever it might be or wherever it might lead.
Maybe this is all we get. Maybe we get to have supported one another through a transition. It’s been strangely rewarding (even if not satisfying). But sometimes I still wonder how our story is going to end…
I keep a gratitude journal, and find great value in noticing and reflecting on the blessings each of us knows in our lives. I genuinely believe that gratitude is among the most powerful emotions, and I’ve personally experienced profound changes in my life from practicing it.
I dance in my kitchen and sing along with the radio, iTunes or Pandora…despite the fact that I might as well be tone-deaf. I am a truly average singer, and I limit my karaoke episodes to bi-annual occasions and I choose either rap or The Tide is High by Blondie for the limited vocal range required.
When I’m having a really crabby day, I force myself to step out of my emotional stinginess by tipping better. It always helps to realize that there are others in society around me that contribute to my lifestyle, and I am able to be more generous and contribute to theirs. It doesn’t always make me feel better in the moment, but I like the idea of how this practice forces me to step outside of my own bad mood and give.
I like hats. All kinds of hats. But I only look good in some of them.
One of my dreams is to live in a custom-built modern home that may incorporate reclaimed shipping containers. What a cool concept! And I think modern can be incredibly warm and inviting.
I believe we create karma, and that we will attract the energy we put out into the universe.
I love reading fortunes from fortune cookies! And horoscopes. Fun! And I actually believe there can be some validity to the latter of these.
My longest committed relationship is with my hair stylist, with whom I’ve been for roughly 16.5 years.
I was a “Becky Homecky” in my youth: I learned to bake, garden, sew and craft, participated in my county’s 4-H program and even won a trip or two to the State Fair for my efforts. Still, I have many friends who can out Martha me.
I am more religious about seeing my applied kinesiologist/chiropractor once a month than I am about anything else. He does this muscle testing stuff that allows him to have a dialogue with my body’s energy. I know, it sounds crazy…I always feel as though I’m saying something like, “I was abducted by a UFO…No, really! You’ve got to believe me!” But I always walk out feeling better.
I am a Libra, a romantic, a fool for love. I crush easily and hard. I am in love with being in love. Maybe even addicted to it.
I try to eat organic and local foods, recycle, compost and otherwise minimize my impact on the environment.
I’m a late bloomer. Many of the relationship lessons I’ve learned along the way and I’m writing about now are things I feel I should have learned earlier or known intuitively.
I’m a sucker for cheesy romantic pop songs, a la “Marry Me” by Train to actually good songs like “In Your Eyes” by Peter Gabriel. (I also like good music…usually alternative…often via the public radio station here.)
I miss traveling internationally. It’s been too long, and Italy, France and Thailand are calling! I’d prefer to immerse myself into the culture and learn through connecting to the natives than by engaging in the typical tourist experiences.
I was once told by a “seer” that my spiritual symbol is a frog. I sit and I sit and I sit…and then I leap. Right now, my legs are starting to twitch. Watch how far I go!
I’m a complete blabbermouth. If you tell me something is a secret, I will take it to my grave. If you don’t tell me it’s a secret, there’s a good likelihood that absolutely everyone knows. I also have little discretion and no filter. There, I said it.
I am equally comfortable in worn jeans at a dive bar and in a cocktail dress at the opera. I relish the great diversity of experiences life has to offer!
I believe commitment has its own rewards. I believe that working on a relationship and emerging stronger and more resilient after a difficult time will pay great dividends to those who persevere.
I don’t believe in saving things for a special occasion that will never come. Every day is special. (I do, however, keep a stash of activities for children that I can pull out on a rainy day.)
My cup is always at least half full and, often, overflowing! Happiness and optimism are conscious decisions and an outlook we can choose to adopt. I also believe these qualities can be taught or nurtured in our children.
My deepest desire is to find someone to share with — a companion, mate and co-conspirator! But I have a pretty damn rockin’ life independently, as well. Oh, and write. My other deepest desire is to write…which I’m doing…now, in fact. I’m writing right now.
the life and loves of Alisa B 