The readers have spoken. Everyone is agreed. I need to take a break from T. I need to forget about him. I need to realize that he and are are not meant for each other and be done with it. Maybe in a couple of years we can be friends, but right now I need to cut him out of my life so I can more easily get over him and focus on myself. Only then can I open my heart to someone else.
It is the obvious course of action. It is the easiest in terms of stress and pain. It will be the fastest route for me getting over him.
I don't care. I'm not going to do it.
Read back a couple of years of my blog and you will see something similar. My three year, slow motion divorce from K is all documented. Read the comments from back then. You will see there were a bunch of people advocating the Band-Aid approach. Rip it off quickly, endure the sharp pain and then it will be okay after that. Some wanted me to leave my house and get an apartment on my own. They said it was better or me and better for K and the kids. They said it would speed the healing process.
Take quick, decisive action. Just GO!!
I did not listen to them either. I prolonged the agony. I stuck with K a very long time. In many regards, I am still with her today. It has not always been easy. It was VERY painful a few years ago. If I would have taken their advice, I might have saved myself a lot of headache (and heartache).
But look at where I am today. As I write this I am sitting in my ex-wife's kitchen. I just had a very pleasant conversation with her new husband about the politics of the First Amendment. My daughter is playing x-box in the next room. M youngest son is loading the dishwasher. My older boys are off with friends, but I saw them as they were heading out the door. How many gay divorced men can say that? How many have the situation I have? How many have a key to their ex-wives new house, where she lives with her husband? How many gay divorced men are still best friends with their ex-wives? (To the point where I know she tells me things even her best girl friends don't know.)
I got to this point because I made the harder choice to stay, when others would have given up and split. I was more painful for me, and probably for her. (As a side note, by making it harder on me and her, it was MUCH, MUCH easier on the kids.)
I am not going to cut off T because I love him. I am always going to love him. I do not think I would like my life if he were not in it. Even if it was only or a year or two. While it is true he cannot do all the things I need from him as a partner, it does not change the love.
I would be lying if I did not admit that even today I frequently wonder if we could get back together. Maybe I could live with his situation because I love him so much. I remember what being with him is like. I remember how good it felt when he held me but I also how frustrated I felt when I had to drive home late at night, rather than staying the night laying next to him. I also know the pain of being separated from him.
Whether we ever get back together is not the point. The point is I am taking the long view with T. I am willing to prolong the pain for me (and maybe for him) so I can keep him in my life. I am not sure if I cut him out completely now, we would ever come back together a friends year later. We might. We probably would, but I don't know that.
In the meantime, I will probably write about it my struggles. I will probably complain some.
It's my blog and I'll bitch if I want to.
1 comment:
I've been thinking about your last post. I haven't read the comments there yet.
You're definitely not an asshole...
but I've been contemplating how culpable you are for your own pain.
As far as I understand it, the fundamental problem between you and T is that you'll never be able to be live-in partners, at least so long as his parents are alive. T's inability to compromise on the issue makes him look like the bad guy, but as he has said multiple times, he told you about that limitation the first time he met you - and many times afterward. Your response has been to repeatedly beat your head against his cemented will about this for years and years, yet absolutely nothing has changed. That doesn't make you an asshole...I'd say "incredibly stubborn" or "dense" would be more apropos.
That said, I wonder if the fundamental problem here isn't that you need to get over T but that you need to be 100% comfortable with yourself. That is, you need to be confident that your happiness REQUIRES living together OR you need to decide that you're willing to compromise your wants because having T as a romantic partner is ultimately more important to you. It seems to me that if you CLEARLY and UNEQUIVOCABLY could choose one option or the other, your internal struggle would be over.
Instead you've been ping-ponging back and forth, and ouch, after all this time, that's got to hurt.
Yes, I'm going to go with that.
Your hurdle isn't separating from T, it's knowing what is truly most important to you and making a choice.
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