When it comes to matters of marital struggles, I’ve never held with the belief that marriage issues should remain 100% private (obviously). As someone who aspires to someday know how to be happily in a long-term relationship, I learn a great deal more from people who share their real struggles and solutions than by cruising the self-help aisle, or listening to the notable silence whenever questions of monogamy or commitment arise. Understandably, many people are hesitant to explain to us lost souls how this sort of thing is supposed to work, believing rightly that there isn’t some magic key or formula or practice that makes it fall into place.
But the question remains…How is it that so many find happiness or joy or at least some measure of serenity and peace within committed relationships, and I seem to flounder again and again?
I said to my mother the other day,that I don’t really mind if I ultimately fail at relationships /marriage/whatever as long as my girls can be happy and secure and experience a loving family group of one sort or another.
Or maybe the truth is more like this: I’m on a path of some kind, which involves AA meetings, learning new habits of thought and living, prayer, and caring for my daughters. Whatever or whoever else fits into that amalgamation with love and understanding and gentleness… well time will tell.
Day #48
I watch nervously from the sidelines cheering you on the whole time.
As a divorced mom I’ve had to make many choices about what I tell whom. It might seem easier to tell everyone everything to garner a wealth of knowledge and opinions, but sometimes the best decisions are made right in our own heads, all on our own.
I don’t keep secrets, but I do have a respect for privacy - and think there is a difference.
Your path is unknown, but you are on the right track to determine it.
I came close to losing my marriage once because between my illness and what I thought I wanted, I pushed him away, and confused interdependance for dependance.
I’m able to see it clearly now, and know that leaning on him doesn’t mean I absolutely need him. We’re partners in this life.
However, he’s my first and best love, found while floudering as a teenager. I accept him as he is, and always have. I’ve always figured that some people just aren’t able to do that as easily, are pickier for themselves, more demanding. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
And maybe-maybe you’re waiting for your “one”, the one who you can lean on and not worry for, the one who fits into your life. I believe in many ways I’m lucky to have found that early.
I hope you find it too. Everyone deserves the other half of themselves.
Interestingly, my mother and I were just talking about this over Thanksgiving. Even more interestingly, two bloggers just wrote about love and marriage and had intriguing points. The first one said she and her husband went to marriage counseling before getting married, where they learned not how to avoid argument, but how to argue constructively. The second found insight in classic literature where she decided love depends on how the other person makes us feel about ourselves.
I’m not sure I know anything, but I have 14 years of marriage under my belt so maybe I know something. I’m not sure what though.
A different blogger once asked why people can’t be as open about marriage on blogs as parenting. I think it’s because one is a common story and the other is completely unique, in a way.
I agree with Thordora too.
Julie
Using My Words
Being a person who found my two instead of my one I think the basics are the same regardless of the paradigm. Honesty and integrity with yourself so you can interact that way with another. It seems from what little I glean here that you are on that path, presently, and feel you may not have been here before. Just no telling what you’ll discover, discard, incorporate as you go forward.
Your path is a difficult one… and I feel for you, your family, and your girls.
Your thoughts have been here for all to read for quite some time, and yet I sense there is something missing. You’re holding back…..
One thing I’ve learned in life is that no one around you will ever be happy if you are not happy.
Your girls will never be happy if you aren’t- and their lives will never be happy when you fail at relationships- especially when you let them see you flounder. Children learn from experience, and perhaps it’s time to ask yourself: is this the chance to right the past and truly understand the power within myself or do I choose to let the circle of destruction repeat itself time and time again?
Blindly throwing yourself into the storm that is the world around us while caring only for the lives of your daughters will get you absolutely nowhere. It’s like the little message on the airplane safety guide… you know… the one with the oxygen masks. You have to take care of -yourself- before you can begin take care of your children.
What I have to say is this:
Instead of focusing on escape, guarding, hiding, and suspicion- perhaps you should do exactly the opposite. Give opportunity, trust, compassion, and dialogue the chance to mend the problems of the past and the present. Only when the walls in your own mind have come down, will you begin to see the light of day.
Best of luck to you and yours…
… the season of light is upon us ..
FWIW, I struggle. Privately, for the most part, because I do not know how to write about my isolation, frustration, etc. without ripping the relationship apart, and I don’t want to go there.
I applaud your courage in writing honestly about this time in your life.
I’m finding, after several consecutive failures, that maybe the key is in the relationship I have with myself: if that’s good, the rest will follow.
I’ll update yu on this in a few years.
Yes, it’s all about time and patience. You will know when and if it is right.