Dating : Together, Apart.

The other side of heartache is wisdom.

December 23, 2017-

We sat at polar opposite ends of the living room, similar to the polar opposite lives we had been living under the same roof for the last year. The tree glittered in its corner, a single string of lights peeking out amidst evergreen branches to cast a soft glow into the frigid room.

I couldn’t look at you. I couldn’t breathe.

The weight of our crumbling marriage was stifling my ability to inhale. My chest felt crushed by enormous pressure, like a tidal wave crashing into me, pinning me underneath the surface.

Every muscle in your body was tense, clenched, ready for war. Ready to defend yourself, ready to say it wasn’t you that caused this rift. Your eyes burned holes into the wall before you, refusing to look at me. That’s how most of our conversations went during this time; focusing on the problem, instead of each other.

Tears overwhelmed my eyes and spilled down my cheeks. I felt a tourniquet constrict my vocal chords; I couldn’t speak to attempt salvaging the charred remains of this life we shared.

This lie of omission resting between us had been the final straw in a long year of hardship. You meant to do something life-changing for us, to start a new chapter… and instead you had left me in the dust, jumping off the edge of a canyon without me there beside you.

“So what now?” I finally asked as tears subside. You sat in silence as I forced myself to inhale, exhale. “Where do we go from here?”

“I fucked up. I FUCKED UP,” you angrily shouted to the room.

“Why are you getting angry when I’m trying to open lines of conversation? For a year I’ve held things back from you in an attempt to not rock the boat, and look where that’s gotten us; we’ve stopped talking. We’ve stalled out.” My throat constricted again, preventing me from saying anything else. Tense and terse memories of the past year flashed before my eyes, playing out like a film you can’t wait to finish. I felt like a completely different person after weathering the health, career and emotional storms of the past nine months… I was bent, broken, wounded.

It felt like you had changed, too… but not with me.

Our life together had become unhealthy. We weren’t growing together anymore. We were toxic, infected, necrotic. Instead of digging out our disease, I moved past it without resolution for fear of making you uncomfortable. I cheated us both out of a fair trial because I refused to acknowledge any crime had even been committed. I convinced myself everything was fine, that this was just the stage of life we were in, that it would be back to the old days before I knew it… but our distance continually grew until I could no longer recognize the person across the canyon from me.

“Do you even love me anymore?” you quietly murmured, posing the question nobody wants to ask in their life.

The question that sliced open my soul.

And now, here we are. Broken and faced with separation or divorce. The very place I adamantly believed we’d never be.

Inhale, exhale. “I can’t be with you and not speak truth. I can’t be with someone who doesn’t have my back, or someone who can’t my teammate. I need to know I can trust you, that you want me as much as I want you. I need you and me, I need us.” I spoke these words without the hostility felt at being an afterthought for so long. In our brokenness and disunity, I believed we could heal and be stronger through this in the after.

“…Throughout this year, I’ve found myself longing for the pain of last year, instead of this year’s. Even though I wouldn’t have wanted to lose her again, I feel like there was some measure of togetherness in the pain we both shared, as opposed to the suffering I’ve faced this year alone.” I felt the edge of the blanket wrapped around me, seeking comfort amidst the loneliness that surrounded me for the past nine months. “I just have felt really abandoned this year, and I haven’t felt like I had room to speak on it when you’ve had to basically become responsible for keeping me alive after my surgery. I have felt so ungrateful and ugly and unworthy whenever I have had these thoughts, but not talking with you about it has only seemed to separate us further.” I glanced over at you, seeing tears fill your eyes. I wipe my own away as I finish speaking my truth. “It’s never made sense, for you to love me… but somewhere along this year I just kind of figured that you didn’t anymore. I’ve been trying to be okay with that, but I just can’t be.”

You looked at me, a pained expression on your face. You stood from your seat across the room and joined me on my sofa. You took my hand and wrapped an arm around me. I noticed your warmth, felt how badly I ached to be held by you. “How could you ever think that?” You asked, incredulous amidst your own tears.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Life has just really sucked without you, without us.”

You placed an index finger under my chin and gently kissed me. You looked through tears into my eyes, and I saw your blue eyes glitter in the evening light. We continued talking for several hours after that moment, taking the time to truly listen to each other for the first time in almost a year. Restoration does not occur in a single day; we know this will take time to heal, to remedy, to refortify… but we’re up for the task.

The other side of heartbreak is wisdom. In our brokenness, we are refined and strengthened in ways we cannot even imagine, in ways that fortify us for the next challenge we will face. This will not be the last stormy sea we navigate, but it will be the last we navigate without each other.