~Pushing Love Away~
I think I have yet to really open up to love. I often feel like I am putting a great big hole between myself and the man I love because I am very afraid of what giving myself totally will cost me. I have had 3 serious relationships and in the first two I was always afraid I would be left behind when things got tough. Sure enough I was. So how do I trust this 3rd and hopefully, final relationship? How do I completely give myself and my love to another man when I have lost so much already?
I don't think I even know what giving all of myself means. Maybe it means not pulling away first when we embrace. Or maybe its not being the first person to say its over when we argue. I honestly don't know how to give into the fall because I have spent most of my life trying to control the things around me. People were never something I tried to control because I knew that I couldn't love someone who would allow another to control them. What if I totally let go and I give myself to this man but he decides I am not "the one"? Its not just me who loses him. Its both of my kids too. Being married for 14 years did something to me. I remember my husband assuring me over and over through the years that he was in love with me and that nothing would change that. He would get annoyed when I'd ask him if he was happy and tell me of course he was...I recall whenever we'd argue that I would be the one to try to call it quits but he wouldn't hear of it. Yet when I was at my lowest and he and I were as broken and torn apart as we could be, he would not go to therapy, to church or even turn off the television to try to work on us. He argued that we were fine, that being parents was the reason why we were struggling and that when they got older and didn't need us so much that we would have more freedom to be happy. That reasoning made very little sense to me. If I waited until my kids were grown and moved out, what really would change? Maybe he wouldn't work so much? Maybe he wouldn't want to sit in front of the tv when he was finally home from work? Maybe he would suddenly spring forth with all the energy that he didn't have when we were young parents? I doubt it too.What a waste to wait until the kids were gone. They needed his attention,love and energy even more than I did.
So, the time came when after so many nights of crying myself to sleep and waking the following morning lonelier than ever that I decided that I deserved more. I wanted to feel like the man I was with respected me instead of often trying to prove me wrong. I wanted to sit next to the man I loved as we watched tv instead of calling across the room where he sat in his recliner. I wanted to find him, on his own, reading my blog or my poetry, or both, because he wanted to, because he wanted to know more. I wanted him to look forward to coming home to me and the kids, to doing anything and everything with us while still having his own life. I felt like I was just a detail in his world. If I felt that way then how must the kids have felt?
So, I did what I did...I met someone on line and pushed my husband out. I felt like I couldn't make him love me or even cause him to feel enough for me to give up even a few moments of his life to join our life. When I met Jesse my husband was gone so easily. He didn't fight for me. At first he said that if I gave up the computer and my relationship with Jesse that he would work harder on us but when I did he went back to his old self,watching tv and working just to work. I was so very hurt and let down that I jumped head first into my relationship with Jesse.
I did what I did and though I cannot change it and i don't want to, I do regret that I didn't take more time to get closure with my husband and to work on me. Now here I am in a relationship with Jesse, going through everyday happily but feeling regret for the hurt I caused my husband. Within days of us deciding our marriage was over he met someone new. 7 months he lived with her. For 7 months he let this woman control every detail of our life. If she wanted to handle the kids--our kids---one way there was no use arguing with my husband. He was so blinded by what he thought was love-what may have been love-that he couldn't see that he was giving up his own life and choices to her. When my son was no longer allowed to go to the home that my husband shared with her my husband was sad but allowed it to be. That was when I started blaming myself. I reasoned that if I had just waited a few more years to end my marriage, at least till both kids moved out, then I could have kept my husband from letting this kind of controlling person into my kids lives. Still, I didn't choose her. She is gone now, thank God, and things are getting back to normal. Honestly, I think my husband meeting her was a good lesson. He promises that now he is all about the kids and that he really wants to be a father first and foremost. I am happy about that because he didn't have that strong determination pre-girlfriend. I guess things do happen for a reason.
So what now? How do I get closure with my husband so that I can move on successfully and happily with Jesse? Often I think that he and I are doomed because of the fact that he misses his family and California. If I go there then I miss my home and family and I would have to either leave my kids behind or take them from their father. Its not easy. I think that is why I push him away.Somewhere deep inside I know he is hurting. Maybe the best thing I can do for him is to push him away? Push him all the way back home....
I don't think I even know what giving all of myself means. Maybe it means not pulling away first when we embrace. Or maybe its not being the first person to say its over when we argue. I honestly don't know how to give into the fall because I have spent most of my life trying to control the things around me. People were never something I tried to control because I knew that I couldn't love someone who would allow another to control them. What if I totally let go and I give myself to this man but he decides I am not "the one"? Its not just me who loses him. Its both of my kids too. Being married for 14 years did something to me. I remember my husband assuring me over and over through the years that he was in love with me and that nothing would change that. He would get annoyed when I'd ask him if he was happy and tell me of course he was...I recall whenever we'd argue that I would be the one to try to call it quits but he wouldn't hear of it. Yet when I was at my lowest and he and I were as broken and torn apart as we could be, he would not go to therapy, to church or even turn off the television to try to work on us. He argued that we were fine, that being parents was the reason why we were struggling and that when they got older and didn't need us so much that we would have more freedom to be happy. That reasoning made very little sense to me. If I waited until my kids were grown and moved out, what really would change? Maybe he wouldn't work so much? Maybe he wouldn't want to sit in front of the tv when he was finally home from work? Maybe he would suddenly spring forth with all the energy that he didn't have when we were young parents? I doubt it too.What a waste to wait until the kids were gone. They needed his attention,love and energy even more than I did.
So, the time came when after so many nights of crying myself to sleep and waking the following morning lonelier than ever that I decided that I deserved more. I wanted to feel like the man I was with respected me instead of often trying to prove me wrong. I wanted to sit next to the man I loved as we watched tv instead of calling across the room where he sat in his recliner. I wanted to find him, on his own, reading my blog or my poetry, or both, because he wanted to, because he wanted to know more. I wanted him to look forward to coming home to me and the kids, to doing anything and everything with us while still having his own life. I felt like I was just a detail in his world. If I felt that way then how must the kids have felt?
So, I did what I did...I met someone on line and pushed my husband out. I felt like I couldn't make him love me or even cause him to feel enough for me to give up even a few moments of his life to join our life. When I met Jesse my husband was gone so easily. He didn't fight for me. At first he said that if I gave up the computer and my relationship with Jesse that he would work harder on us but when I did he went back to his old self,watching tv and working just to work. I was so very hurt and let down that I jumped head first into my relationship with Jesse.
I did what I did and though I cannot change it and i don't want to, I do regret that I didn't take more time to get closure with my husband and to work on me. Now here I am in a relationship with Jesse, going through everyday happily but feeling regret for the hurt I caused my husband. Within days of us deciding our marriage was over he met someone new. 7 months he lived with her. For 7 months he let this woman control every detail of our life. If she wanted to handle the kids--our kids---one way there was no use arguing with my husband. He was so blinded by what he thought was love-what may have been love-that he couldn't see that he was giving up his own life and choices to her. When my son was no longer allowed to go to the home that my husband shared with her my husband was sad but allowed it to be. That was when I started blaming myself. I reasoned that if I had just waited a few more years to end my marriage, at least till both kids moved out, then I could have kept my husband from letting this kind of controlling person into my kids lives. Still, I didn't choose her. She is gone now, thank God, and things are getting back to normal. Honestly, I think my husband meeting her was a good lesson. He promises that now he is all about the kids and that he really wants to be a father first and foremost. I am happy about that because he didn't have that strong determination pre-girlfriend. I guess things do happen for a reason.
So what now? How do I get closure with my husband so that I can move on successfully and happily with Jesse? Often I think that he and I are doomed because of the fact that he misses his family and California. If I go there then I miss my home and family and I would have to either leave my kids behind or take them from their father. Its not easy. I think that is why I push him away.Somewhere deep inside I know he is hurting. Maybe the best thing I can do for him is to push him away? Push him all the way back home....
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