Feeling Better Today

Lists please me... so here's my list for today: Things That Make Me Feel Better Today

1. Seeing pictures of all the beautiful and creative beaded projects being made by women in this year's Bead Journal Project! My creative energy is either at an all-time low, or it's being absorbed into making choices. Seeing BJP beadwork makes me feel happy and inspired... a glimmer of my muse is back!
2. Walking this morning. Very low fog this morning, the woods shrouded in mist, a soft silence all around me. Loved it.
3. Blueprint of my new home to be... Yesterday, I took a small floor plan of my new home to a copy/printer place, and had it enlarged to 17 x 22 inches. WOW! It's so fun to see it big like that. I'm going to measure furnishings and make little scale representations so I can play with the layout, especially of my studio stuff, before I get it over there.
4. Thinking about a furniture recon trip on Monday. When I moved out of my home of 24 years and into the very small (and already filled) home of my husband, I gave away or sold a lot of my furniture. For my new digs, I'll need a dining room table and chairs, a bed, a sofa, a small easy chair, a couple of floor lamps, and more over time. On Monday, I'm going off island to shop for these things... probably won't actually buy yet, but it will be fun to look and fun to anticipate having new stuff, especially since I've always furnished in used, self-finished, or make-shift pieces, fondly called eclectic.

I like this table!

Yesterday was hard, signing the divorce papers, making it "official." I went to bed feeling sorry for myself, and had weird dreams about not being able to find my friends and getting lost. But now, at 3:04 in the afternoon on Wednesday, Feb. 30, 2013, life seems pretty good.

The "D" word again

Don't read this if you don't want to know about my emotional response to filing divorce papers today. It just seems better to vent, to explore my muddled emotions, painting with words, than to eat.. which is what I want to do.

I (briefly) imagine myself in a bathtub FULL of decadent, dark chocolates, painting my toenails fire engine red and stuffing sweets in my mouth. That is not to be, for I am still abstinent on eating chocolate, and so far, thanks to OA, Words Paint, and wonderful, supportive friends, I haven't gained any weight or binged on anything.

Tonight though, I feel like I'm going to burst. My eyes burn with tears that won't flow. My stomach hurts. My jaws hurt. My brain hurts in its completely befuddled state. So many changes, happening so quickly.

I'm angry at the whole legal system and divorce protocol. Good grief, there is sooooooo much paper work, so many nearly incomprehensible forms... this stamped, this notarized, these numbers needed, blah, blah, blah. It's worse than doing our taxes. And here's the rub. We agree perfectly about how to divide our stuff. TOTAL, absolute agreement and harmony. Yet still we have to provide information down to the dime about everything we have in the whole world, whether acquired before or during marriage. And I'll have to go before a judge in 90+ days to present our decision; whereupon he or she will have a say about whether the court approves, and if not, how we need to change our mutual agreement. It stinks.

What's under my anger about the legal system?
I'm angry about the divorce
I'm angry we can't get along well enough to stay married

What's under my anger about not getting along?
I'm angry for getting married in the first place
when the signs were already there that it might not work

What's under my anger about getting married in the first place?
I'm angry at society, movies, song writers, story tellers
for making marriage seem so necessary for a woman

What's under my anger about being lead astray?
I'm angry for being so gullible and stupid
Not my husband's fault, not this anger

Let go of the anger. Let it flow away
downstream to the sea. Let springs of new beginnings
and adventure take its place

I guess the other major feeling is confusion. Numbness and memory loss are part of it too. We had a meeting with a County Clerk today, who we paid to help us with the forms. All except the basic petition have to be filled out and submitted to the district court by 80 days from now. I tried to take notes on everything the clerk said, but a lot of it seemed incomprehensible to me. She gave me a link to a website that might help. I hope it will.

Grief... that's part of it too... Or, maybe anger is part of the grief.  OK... well, that's the way it goes. Think I'll have a diet soda and an hour or so of sewing. That's always a calming. Thanks for reading along. Part of me wants to delete this post... but guess I'll let it show for now.

The "D" Word

Funny how there's ingrained shame around the "D" word. I even have trouble writing it. Divorce. There I put it in print.

you and I start down a road
the surface is a bit bumpy
but we look ahead
towards our beautiful dream

together we withstand the bumps
we try different speeds
different sides of the road
whatever it takes we say

the road seems more rutted
many deep pot holes and rocks
the dream no longer sustains us
despair grows as resolve dwindles

until finally we say
we can't go on like this
we've reached the end of this road
so we turn onto different roads

we've left the big rocks behind
traveling now on gravel
looking ahead to smooth pavement
looking back to a lost dream

Saying goodby to dreams. Our divorce should finalize around the date we met, 16 years ago. Back then, almost immediately, I fell in love and began to dream of our future together. When we married 3 years later, our dream (or at least mine) was to spend the rest of our lives together, our love, understanding, respect, and companionship growing with each year. OK.... nothing unusual about that. Everyone has a dream like that when they marry. And many see it come to an end.

Why then do I feel so alone in this? Why is the finality so disheartening? Why do I look at him and want nothing more than to call if all off, saying "please forgive me, it was all a mistake?"

I made an offer on a house yesterday. Will it be accepted? Will it meet the inspection? Will my financial security be lost, spent on buying a home, upkeep and the doubled costs of living alone? Will I get along OK alone? Will I have the emotional and physical stamina to do the move? Did I make an OK decision about the house? I don't know.

There isn't a dream ahead of me with this move, like the ones in the past. Or, at least, it's not clear what the new dream is. My friends might say, "the new dream is peace, contentment, balance, harmony." I must try to keep that in sight.

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PS... Update 3 PM, Jan. 25th, 2013... Just found out my offer on the house was accepted. Next is the inspection. Closing is scheduled for 2-28....  moving on.... Oh my heavens, I'm a nervous Nelly at the moment.

Confusion and Food

In my present state of confusion and uncertainty, food is ever more attractive. The kitchen calls me, loud and insistent. "Come! I will comfort you! I will fill the empty, lonely, sad place in your heart."

I make tea, thinking that will help. Normally I add a little splenda to my black tea. These days, the kitchen offers honey... ooooh, gooey, sweet... even more will be better.

I notice, reading PJ's recent post, that I'm not alone in being lured by a voice that says, "Restaurant food is better! You need pizza tonight. Pizza will help." Tonight however, my HP guided me to my own refrigerator, where I found left-over pea, bean, veggie, ham soup, which was totally delicious and much better than restaurant pizza. Thank you HP.

The group consciousness of the readers/commenters to Words Paint and writers of other related blogs helps too. I am so grateful for the comments to my previous post. There were many helpful ideas and a sense of support that has helped me immeasurably, both with taking baby steps and with the siren song of food.

In the past week, many other angels buoyed my spirits as well...

• friends who listen and share their thoughts
• my sister-in-law who suggests I go on the internet and read about the signs of verbal abuse and label myself as a victim of it
• a real estate agent, previously unknown to me, who is gentle, accepting and understanding
• my longest time friend, who listens so well
• my OA group which is a special source of wisdom and calm

I will share more of the ongoing process in a later post. But for now, I just want to voice my gratitude for readers, HP, and the angels mentioned above.

Contrary to the Previous Post...

I think I'm going to get divorced.

I feel afraid, confused, lonely, sad, excited, crazy, very lonely, critical, angry, stupid, worried, and not at all calm, centered, or peaceful.

My husband is dissatisfied with me. He doesn't like so many things about me. He doesn't like how I treat him. He says I am disrespectful and controlling of him. He says I blow smoke at him. At times he has a long litany of things I have done (or not done), said (or not said) that are wrongs I have perpetrated, seemingly maliciously, against him.

At times when he starts telling me these things, I try to defend myself verbally. That only fuels his fire and the litany gets stronger, louder, deeper. Then I get angry and mean and childish. That doesn't end the litany either. He just adds angry, mean, childish words to his litany of accusations. Then we don't talk for a while.

Finally, in the past, after thinking about it for some hours or days, I realize that I have made some mistakes. I come to a better understanding of his feelings, of how the things I did (or...etc.) might make him feel disrespected or controlled. I vow to try to be better. I try to find different ways to say the things I want to say and/or do the things I want to do, ways that incorporate respect and that are not attempts to control him.

It never works. The cycle begins again. I am not able to change myself (or him) enough to bring contentment to our relationship.

We have had 15 years together. I can not imagine 15 more years. I can not even imagine 15 more months  in our current state of discontent. I'm lucky if I have 15 more years to live (in some functioning form). Yesterday I came to the conclusion that I have to end the marriage and look for contentment from within at some safe distance away from him.

How to do it? I don't have a clue. Where to go? I don't have a clue. How to make the transition away from him as peaceful and considerate to both of us as possible? I don't have a clue. How to forgive us both for our failures. That I do have a clue about.... just do it.

I'm grateful for Words Paint... a safe place.

New Beginnings

New year - new beginnings - these words found today in other blogs resonate with me too:

peace (Loretta)

centered (PJ)

calm (Carol)

Thanks dear friends. Together we get better!