Until I started seeing a therapist, I had kind of seen my life as somewhat charmed. My parents had met as teens...they started dating when my mom was 15 and they got married when she was 19 and a sophomore in college. Both were from poor families. My father had the extra stigma of being the child of a divorced family. His father was an abusive alcoholic. He and my uncle beat the shit out of my grandfather and threw him out. My grandfather was the kind of man that raped my grandmother in front of my uncle and father. He was a gem.
My paternal grandmother was a nervous sort. She could never handle getting a driver's license. However, she fought hard to make sure that her boys were always taken care of, including wearing clean clothes, making education a priority, having backyard ponies, and being their boy scout leader. The other boys in the troop would try to scare her with snakes, bugs, frogs and such. She would laugh and say that she loved "critters." So, she could handle things that crawled around in the dirt, but she was afraid of piloting a car.
Grandma was staunchly pro-civil rights. In the 1950's and 1960's, she would march with the protesters. At some point, she was moved to a house within walking distance to her job at a library, but she would also ride the bus all over town. As with all of her grandkids, I learned to love animals along her side but also, that litterers were on par with some of the most terrible criminals. At her funeral, my cousins and I joked about "litter bugs." To this day, I pick up other people's trash and I have passed that on to my daughter. When we go to the playground, she picks up food bags, cans, etc. At the farm, she joyously digs up any glass or rock buried in the pasture.
My mom's family were also poor, but my maternal grandparents stayed together until my grandfather died at an old age. I was lucky because both families pushed education. My mom was smart enough to get a scholarship and my dad's mother ensured college funds via a personal gift via a local wealthy family. It was expected that my sister and I would go to college. My dad never saw me graduate from college as he died suddenly when I was 16. By that time, we had gone from food stamps to a 5 bedroom house. And I felt that I was expected to take my "seed money," get my education, and exceed my parents' wealth.
Despite graduating with an advanced degree (both my sister and I have doctorate degrees) we are unlikely to surpass my parents' seed money. My mom remarried, but retains some of her own property along with shared property. I am learning the ropes of dealing with my folks' property management. Yes, I am cleaning toilets and picking gardens to earn my way.
My husband is an amazing man. He was diagnosed with ADD, but I think that there was likely some anxiety there. He was the oops son of a military chaplain, being dragged all over the world. Not really the perfect thing for a dude with anxiety. I met him when his dad retired and they moved to our city and the dad became one of our ministers. So, our parents were in Sunday school together, our dads played golf together, and my dad provided the lumber and design help for his skate board half pipe.
We had friends in common, had looked a little too closely at each other, and we were both looking to break out of the "normal."
My husband left high school after 10th grade and got his GED. He did go to college, but did not feel like finishing with a degree in lit would help him. He is well spoken, a musical genius, and physically fit. When we re-met, it was right after I had moved back home. We knew so many of the same people. We listened to so much of the same music. We liked the same art, film, books, etc. And I could use the word "fantastical" and he would understand. He had worked at a vet clinic for 4 years, the same one I worked as a tech, and he understood what I did at work. And after a class in medical terminology, he speaks my language.
I thought that he was perfect for me. Our families knew and liked each other. We had the same friends. It was like an arranged marriage. If our families could have put us together, they would have. So now I feel like a fool. I am left sitting in the center of this storm....and I can almost see my life being whisked away by a tornado. I feel like a fool for believing someone that can so easily put me aside. And today was the first time I left my daughter with my husband after moving out. I dropped her off before an appointment. Then I went back to get a mattress cover. My daughter begged me not to leave her. She did not want to stay with him or to go on vacation with my in-laws. It might be petty, but I was happy for my husband to see that his actions affect not only me, but also his daughter. It might be petty, but I hope he hurts.
Saturday, June 9, 2012
Monday, June 4, 2012
First Post
Therapy? Blogging or a diary? Which is better? At least with a blog, I can include movies and links and such. I am a 36 female that has been married for 7 years. Last week, my husband told me that he wanted a divorce. This was a surprise. Let me set it all up for you.
I met him over 20 years ago at our church. His father was the minister and he was one of the cool kids that smoked behind the church and never actually went. I had the hots for him from day one. I think he might have noticed me, but our folks were friends and I think that the thought of our fathers killing him make him back off a bit.
Fast forward through high school, college, grad school, a terrible first job, and a useless fiance, and I had moved back to town. I happened to do a relief date where we had both worked as veterinary technicians. He was dropping off his dog as I was walking into work. It was magic from there.
The first date was wonderful....oddly, I went with him to a market and met up with his parents (whom I knew better than I knew him). He saw a weird painting that he liked. We had a very good time. The next day I went back and bought the painting. I took it to him sheepishly at work, kind in that toe kicking sort of way. He got really excited and took me to his car, where he had a necklace that he had bought me. It was a hand made necklace from one of our favorite gift stores. I became a thing with us. His gifts and cards were almost always from this store.
We would sit for hours listening to music at his house. He had no cable, but we would listen to the evening college station DJ. The year that preceded me moving back to town, I could get his station, and I used to listen to it on farm calIs. The DJ was amazing and I learned more about current music and picked up more new indie rock loves in that first year just from the DJ. It turned out, he was fairly well known in our town just because his show was so broad based.
It took a week at least before we even crossed the barrier of opposite ends of the couch. It involved me scratching his head. I loved the bristled feeling of his hair. He asked me if I would still scratch his head in 20 years when we were married. We both laughed it off.
But this were serious quickly, as happens when you approach 30. He asked when I wanted to get married and I laughed. Our parents asked us when we were going to get married. We had so much in common: same friends, same music, same sense of humor. And everywhere we went, we had fun. We fell in love quickly and completely.
Maybe that is enough for tonight. I am already crying. His client is no longer in the basement and recording. My husband is avoiding me, doesn't even want to watch TV with me. He would rather drink beer and smoke pot and surf the internet. And dump me from face book because he thinks that if see anything happy, I will get upset. I am waiting to have him dump my company email. I just have to figure out how to move all of the mails over to my new email address. I hope people are not planning on contacting me in order to set up recording. They will be waiting a long time for a response. That reminds me. I have to set up personal back accounts tomorrow and change me etsy account to use a paypal to go to that account. Then talk to the lawyer on Thursday.
Here is to the recycled women out there. Not looking forward to being a 36 year old single mother.
I feel used.
I met him over 20 years ago at our church. His father was the minister and he was one of the cool kids that smoked behind the church and never actually went. I had the hots for him from day one. I think he might have noticed me, but our folks were friends and I think that the thought of our fathers killing him make him back off a bit.
Fast forward through high school, college, grad school, a terrible first job, and a useless fiance, and I had moved back to town. I happened to do a relief date where we had both worked as veterinary technicians. He was dropping off his dog as I was walking into work. It was magic from there.
The first date was wonderful....oddly, I went with him to a market and met up with his parents (whom I knew better than I knew him). He saw a weird painting that he liked. We had a very good time. The next day I went back and bought the painting. I took it to him sheepishly at work, kind in that toe kicking sort of way. He got really excited and took me to his car, where he had a necklace that he had bought me. It was a hand made necklace from one of our favorite gift stores. I became a thing with us. His gifts and cards were almost always from this store.
We would sit for hours listening to music at his house. He had no cable, but we would listen to the evening college station DJ. The year that preceded me moving back to town, I could get his station, and I used to listen to it on farm calIs. The DJ was amazing and I learned more about current music and picked up more new indie rock loves in that first year just from the DJ. It turned out, he was fairly well known in our town just because his show was so broad based.
It took a week at least before we even crossed the barrier of opposite ends of the couch. It involved me scratching his head. I loved the bristled feeling of his hair. He asked me if I would still scratch his head in 20 years when we were married. We both laughed it off.
But this were serious quickly, as happens when you approach 30. He asked when I wanted to get married and I laughed. Our parents asked us when we were going to get married. We had so much in common: same friends, same music, same sense of humor. And everywhere we went, we had fun. We fell in love quickly and completely.
Maybe that is enough for tonight. I am already crying. His client is no longer in the basement and recording. My husband is avoiding me, doesn't even want to watch TV with me. He would rather drink beer and smoke pot and surf the internet. And dump me from face book because he thinks that if see anything happy, I will get upset. I am waiting to have him dump my company email. I just have to figure out how to move all of the mails over to my new email address. I hope people are not planning on contacting me in order to set up recording. They will be waiting a long time for a response. That reminds me. I have to set up personal back accounts tomorrow and change me etsy account to use a paypal to go to that account. Then talk to the lawyer on Thursday.
Here is to the recycled women out there. Not looking forward to being a 36 year old single mother.
I feel used.
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