Tonight we watched The Holiday and it was a great film - a great sappy love story. It left me wanting love and romance in my life again. I DO NOT want anyone else at this point, but it made me think about the things I did love and appreciate in my marriage. As I think about these things I will miss, I am sobbing in mourning for them. Is that pathetic? Is it actually part of the whole process of moving on? I don't know, but I write them down here so that I will always remember the things I loved about being married to my husband.
Some things I will miss about my marriage:
1) Being told I'm beautiful, hot or sexy...it just never gets old.
2) Family outings, even if they are just to Home Depot or the grocery story...
3) Movie nights, TV nights, Lost and 24 - they just won't be the same...
4) Sleeping with our toes touching.
5) Making plans for our house, kids, life, goals, dreams, together...
6) Having date nights.
7) Going out for coffee together.
8) Giving and receiving hugs.
9) Cooking family dinners and then sharing them.
10) Having my hair and face stroked as I lay on the couch at night watching some pointless tv show.
11) Looking into your eyes and knowing I am truly loved and feeling deep love back.
12) For awhile we haven't, but reading in bed together at night.
13) Hearing and saying "I love you" - but, I will always love you and I hope we can keep loving each other, even if our lives change.
14) Imagining what each of us will look like when we are eighty...imagining us walking hand-in-hand then as we did as newlyweds.
15) Being told it will be ok and believing it...
16) Um...do I even have to write this one down? S-E-X, especially with my husband...there really is nothing better.
Things I won't miss:
1) Arguing about who left the dishes in the sink, didn't take the trash out, made a mess and didn't clean it up...repeat...repeat...repeat...
2) The way relationships wax and wane. I was never any good at feeling secure as they waned and trusting all would wax back soon.
3) Being told to shush during every tv show, movie, or program because it was too distracting and somebody liked to watch in silence.
4) Hearing the monitor click on and knowing that a power struggle would ensue over who would go up to get the baby.
5) Worrying about the husband's drinking, feeling trapped and not letting myself go anywhere for fear that a "slip" would occur.
6) Not acting like my self because I was too concerned about what he thought.
There are plenty more, but I am feeling drained. I sobbed through typing that whole first list, but didn't seem to cry one bit typing the second list. Someday maybe I will able to read all those things I miss and know that I have found them elsewhere.
Perhaps in friendships?
Perhaps in another love relationship?
Perhaps inside of myself?
I hope the latter is true. Self-sufficiency is a skill that I seem to have stopped cultivating over the last six years. I once had a therapist who told me, when I was panicking over becoming co-dependent in my burgeoning love relationship with P, "All relationships are co-dependent. It's the nature of them. How can you be in a love relationship without relying on your partner for things and vice versa?"
Complete self-sufficiency may protect me from becoming too co-dependent, but it doesn't stop me from having needs. I pray that I will find healthy, constructive ways to meet my own needs and the needs of my children in the years to come. I am looking forward to some me time.
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1 comment:
That was a beautiful post. You may not feel as if you've been self-sufficient, but from my perspective, you've not only been self-sufficient, but also capable of helping someone else survive and cope. Definitely time to focus on yourself (and your kids of course) and get to know you a little more. You really communicated so much in this post- I think you're going to want to come back and read it in 6 months, a year, etc. Love you!
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