Hey guys, so yes its been awhile, over 12 months actually which seems insane to me. How could 2015 have gone by so quickly? I felt like we just blinked and it was Christmas again. Crazy times.
So 2015 was a strange year for me, I definitely had a mid life crisis at 46 and now I'm starting 2016 as a single mum after making the huge decision to separate from my husband of 14 years. Wow, I said it, I'm now a single mum with so many fears in front of me but also a lot of hope and excitement.
You see, I've not been happily married for many years now, I can't really remember the last time I was happily married and when I look at old memories that keep popping up on Facebook it gives me a shock to think about how long I was living a lie. The thing is, my life was not bad at all, in fact it was a pretty good life, my kids are healthy and happy, my husband is a lovely man, great father and all round wonderful bloke and we lived a pretty comfortable existence but in my heart I've been lacking something for many years. Lacking a connection, lacking a spark, missing the incredibly important parts of a marriage of wanting to be with my husband, wanting to spend time with him, wanting to have sex with him wanting to make a happy family life with him. All those things have been weighing heavily on my heart for many years now and it finally hit me, I'm 46, 4 years to 50, so close to not ever experiencing those things again and I knew I had to be brave and live my life for me. Time was running out.
After 5 years of trying to make it work, visiting Dr's, therapists, naturopaths, constantly whinging to my closest friends about how unhappy I was I finally told my husband I couldn't do it any more. It wasn't a surprise to him, we had discussed it numerous times before but we had always swept it under the mat, fearing the consequences and the impact it would have on our children. We both didn't want to face the fact that we were both incredibly unhappy. But how long can one be unhappy for before they lose their mind? Sure alcohol helps and the random flirtation at work is always fun but at the end of the day living life unhappy really sucks.
We decided not to tell our children until after Christmas and we officially decided to separate in September so it was a long few months of living a lie. Sleeping in the same bed, pretending everything was rosy when underneath it our hearts were breaking. We did tell close friends and we had a lot of support and advice which were all taken gratefully but the fear of telling the kids after Christmas was something we felt physically sick about. They had never seen us argue or fight, we never raised our voices to each other, we were and still are good friends so we knew it would come as a big shock to them.
How do you tell your kids you're separating without breaking their hearts? Well honestly, you can't. Unless of course you both hate each other and are constantly fighting and yelling and the kids are praying for it to end, but when you are friends it is impossible to do it without hours of tears and screaming and yelling about how could this be real? How could we do this to them? Why can't we love each other any more? The emotional nightmare still lives in my mind from that dreaded night. And then of course you have to tell them that separating means selling their beloved house, moving into separate houses, renting, living in complexes, juggling time between mum and dad, trying to work out a routine, it really is the ultimate cluster fuck. But also there is a feeling of relief, relief that we can now finally move forward, stop living a lie, get on with our own lives, maybe even meet someone we want to be with and fall in love with (although that sounds so damn strange right now).
So yes the next few months will be tough and I'm sure there will be many more tears yet to be cried from all of us but when I think about staying how things were, living in an existence where I had no spark, no connection and no fulfilment it makes me smile just a little to think about what may happen in all of our futures.
