I have to give just the biggest THANK YOU to those who sent kind emails, tweets, Facebook hugs, and blog comments on the post about my unexpected divorce. The kindness of relative strangers never ceases to amaze me, and with this particular situation (one of the hardest in my life, tied with my mom dying), I needed all the kindness I could get. I certainly wasn't giving it to myself.
<Sidenote> I wasn't going to address these things, but they're questions I seem to be getting over and over, so I'll just put them to rest. There is no saving the marriage. The day I posted about it was the day that it was finalized. It was a swift 7 weeks from finding out about the situation and having him admit he didn't want to work on it that it was processed and over. You can't fix something that's broken if one of the pieces is missing. He was gone. <End Sidenote>
As much as I hate to admit it, I spent a lot of time the past couple of months crying on the bathroom floor. Or my office floor. Or my living room floor. Or my bedroom floor. Any floor, really. I don't know what it is about getting on the floor, but everything just pours out when you're down there. These waves of huge emotion would hit me – at first multiple times per day, then daily, then a down to a couple times a week – where it felt like I couldn't breathe, I was sobbing hysterically, and my insides felt like they were dying. Maybe going to the ground was for stability: if you're already on the floor, you can't fall any further? Who knows. All I know is that I've spent a lot of time on the floor lately.
My reaction any time I have feelings is something like this:
Push it down. Push it down. Push it down.
But I've been working hard to tell myself:
Release. It's okay. It's essential. Let go. It's not weakness. Release.
For whatever reason, hitting the floor made it impossible to push anything down. Go figure.
This is my first holiday in 12 years without my ex's (it stings every time I say it) family. When I first started having Thanksgiving's with them, I just remember feeling so grateful as I didn't have other family to spend it with. I also remember being annoyed because it wasn't like childhood Thanksgivings: I didn't like the boxed stuffing made with “I Can't Believe It's Not Butter” and not having baked macaroni and cheese. I remember thinking it was too loud because there were so many people at the table. I thought their jokes at the table were crude (albeit funny). Over the years I grew to love most of those things, and today I am missing them hard. I miss the political rants and the fart jokes and the fight between the brothers over who would get the last spoonful of mashed potatoes. I miss hearing the same stories over and over. Every year I wanted to host Thanksgiving for them like my mom used to make, but for whatever reason it never happened. I regret that.
This is a day for gratitude, and I'm trying to focus on that. I stared out onto the water today while drinking a pretty fantastic cup of coffee. I saw dolphins out swimming. I ate a delicious meal with wonderful people. I sang along to “Frozen.”
But perhaps the thing I'm most thankful for today? I didn't have to pick myself up off the bathroom floor.
Happy Thanksgiving to you all.