Residual Divorce Rage

It’s been almost a year since I moved out. It’s hard to believe. I feel like it happened yesterday.

So much has happened since then (I’ve written about most of it if you should be so bored as to read my angst from the last 11 months) and yet, I don’t feel like I’m where I’m supposed to be. I feel like I’m behind.

But then again, I’ve always felt behind. As a kid, I felt behind because I didn’t have North American parents and everything with them was a battle. I didn’t fit in at home and I didn’t fit in the outside world. I felt like everyone else got a secret memo about life and I was missing a piece of the puzzle.

As a kid, I used to tell myself that I was running through the sand while everyone ran ahead of me. I now know that I’ve got autism from an inherited chromosome disorder (slow clap for that realization). It explains a lot.

This is a different kind of falling behind. By divorcing, I threw myself back at the starting line. There is no one to compete with when I’m the only one in the race. But I set expectations and I’m not at the level I’d hoped.

On the surface, a lot of people are blown away by my achievements. I got a detached house and remodeled it during a severe housing crisis. I’m successful at dating (“successful” meaning, I’m not for a lack of dates on a Friday night) and I lead a generally stable life.

Internally, I still feel like a hot mess. My house keeps breaking down and I’ve spent a fortune making it habitable. My kids are often miserable and my guilt suffocates me. When I don’t have them, I feel empty; it’s like a demotion from the most important job of my life.

What shocks me is how I’m still angry at my ex-husband, Joseph. I’ve ranted on Medium about my shitty marriage, the separation while living together, and the divorce. It’s over. Shouldn’t I be relieved?

Some things trigger me. I found out that a few months ago, Joseph told mutual friends how he sees some of the things he did that contributed to the marriage breakdown but that I did plenty of things too. Was I completely innocent? No. But he wasn’t the one curled up in a ball wishing for death every day. Joseph had the life he wanted. His complaint is that I didn’t stay.

I felt wrong for wanting to leave. That if I just tried harder, if I did more, if I gave him the love he needed then my marriage would be better. The failure in my marriage was that I wasn’t happy with the status quo. And when I was done, that’s when Joseph stepped it up.

By “stepped it up”, I mean, he was willing to follow a To Do list of tasks that I specifically had to write on a whiteboard for him. It upset him the whiteboard was behind the office door. It upset me that he didn’t think I’d want that hidden from guests. I didn’t advertise that I had an employee for a husband needing delegation for everyday tasks like “change toilet paper” or “replace furnace air filter”.

I keep typing further rants and then delete them. I’ve prattled on about all the ways that I felt hurt and alone. The neglect, the name-calling, the constant threats of divorce during arguments, the wall-punching in the early days of our marriage, the aggressive swearing, the dismissal of my efforts with two small children and working full time while he worked far away…it’s endless.

I felt guilty not because I wanted more. I felt guilty because I wanted anything at all.

Now that I’m not a mother/slave/secretary/doctor/maid/bill-payer/incubator/contractor/party-planner/accountant/shopper for another adult, why am I still full of anger?

I should be happy. I should be ecstatic.

But my escape came at a price, mostly my kids and my finances. I don’t feel like I’m allowed to enjoy life when I’ve ruined theirs. The adage is that “one day” they’ll understand and appreciate it. But they won’t. I’m in my forties and only now am I seeing some of the sacrifices my mother made that were tough for her predicament.

Short of telling my kids “your dad got happy endings at massage parlors,” there isn’t anything I can say that will ever make them understand why I did this to their perfect bubble of a life.

I thought that at this stage of my post-divorce life, I’d at least have everything sorted out. I didn’t think I’d still be sitting here crying (in a house full of men fixing my pipes and drywall) in anger at how my ex-husband could have prevented this.

My rage is a new kind of rage. I’m angry that I felt like I was asking for too much, thus making me unrealistic and demanding. I’m angry because I see now that I was asking for the bare minimum.

But I’m the villain in the story that is…was…my marriage.

Maybe if I’d known back then that what I asked wasn’t too much, I would have pushed for it louder and made it clear that anything less than my demands was unacceptable. The onus could have been on him to keep the marriage together instead of on me to repair the ongoing damage.

There are many ways my self-esteem has increased. Shockingly, not having someone every day making you feel emotionally dissatisfied does wonders for your emotional welfare.

I’m surprised that I’m capable of being a good partner. Joseph made me feel like I was an all-around bad person. And I believed him. Nothing I did was good enough or warranted my asking of anything. Entering new relationships taught me that when my efforts are appreciated and reciprocated, I’m a great companion.

This rage though. This rage. It’s not the kind of feeling that makes me want to throw things against the wall while screaming. It’s the kind that makes me sit still, fists clenched, tears pouring down my face, and the only movement is my chest heaving from the emotions bubbling inside.

When does this feeling subside? Is it when I’m not struggling financially (if that’s possible)? Is it when my kids stop crying over the loss of a single-family home? Is it when I’ve found a new, long-term partner? Is it when I stop feeling like a pariah outside of the Wives’ Club wearing wedding rings and bitching about full-time parenting?

I was with Joseph for twenty years, most of them full of unhappiness and indifference. Will it take that long for me to feel at peace?

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This post was previously published on MEDIUM.COM.

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