During the most difficult times…
in my marriage I realized that I had kept the man whom I hated and the man whom I loved in two separate rooms in my head. When I was with the one, I hated, I learned to shut down and ignore what was right in front of me to keep the peace. When I was with the one, I loved, I loved him as much as I was able to without breaking. And because I was very guarded, I didn’t love him with my whole heart.
Neither one of us knew how to communicate our dissatisfaction. So, my unhappiness fed his discontent and his confusion about what I was unhappy about fed my anger.
We had a very rocky relationship in the beginning. We broke up and got back together numerous times. After each time, somehow, we opened up to the other in the smallest measurement and in our own ways and slowly but surely, we learned how to love one another.
In retrospect I had also put the “other me” in another room as well. The me that wanted to fight my way out. A person The me that was learning how to love herself. The me that had to face that I knew that staying with him was my choice. I wasn’t being forced to love him.
Talk About Denial
So, on we went, hand in hand, until eventually this boy became a man who was learning that I mattered too. Accountability followed. And this girl became a fighter, my own advocate, and then a person who recognized that you must see and love yourself first before you can truly see and love anyone else.
People always show you who they are, if only you’ll pay attention, right? But we tend to apply that proverb to others. My actions, inaction, judgments, self-righteousness, showed people that I didn’t know who I was. I avoided those that could see right through my words. The like-minded people I attracted allowed me to focus on others’ behaviors. Talk about denial.
I secretly judged friends, acquaintances, family members who stayed, went back with, or excused bad behavior. It sounded so easy: leave.
And because I stayed, I judged myself the most harshly. I knew like no one else why I should leave. It made it so much easier to ignore his other self so that I could justify staying with him. I denied my other self so that I could feel as if I didn’t have a choice. I was not taking responsibility for my decisions.
Survival or Denial?
I felt incomplete with him, but it was my other half that I had stashed away, that made it so. I split myself right down the middle. A strong independent woman within the world and a weak needy one behind closed doors.
So, the initial question was survival or denial? Well, both. I needed to be in denial to give myself the time I needed to become strong enough to know that I could survive. That I would survive without him. To learn that wanting someone was healthier than needing them.
The only way out of my unhappy existence was to let our other selves out of captivity. Once we could face ourselves, face each other, maybe there was a chance for us.
And even though I separated what he said from who he was, I am now very aware of his intentions, motivations, and his struggles. And I have shared mine. We are both human, whole, and enough.
Let It Go
We have seen the worst in each other and there is still love there. Why not try to see the best in each other as well? Someone, witnessing me having a moment of frustration with my husband, once told me to forget everything that came before and love him as if there was only now. She wasn’t saying give him a pass. She was saying that if I forgave him and still loved him, let it go. At least for this one moment.
That person was half my age, an old soul, and her words changed my marriage forever.
We are all led by our pasts. It’s unavoidable. The question is will you stew in it? Hold it in a death grip? Or step out of it and let it sit quietly beside you?
The past has no place in the present. Its time has come and gone. Its only purpose now is to remind you who you were, who you have become, and who you want to be.
“Man is not what he thinks he is, he is what he hides.”
Andre’ Malraux
Leave a Reply