Dear diary

My mind has been unsettled a lot lately. I’ve been trying to sort through my thoughts like organizing piles of loose paper scattered on the floor. Which pages went together? What order should they be in? And what cabinet do I file it under? I’ve found that writing has helped me identify some of these feelings and put a label on them. I don’t know what it’s ultimately doing for me but in the short term, it helps me get it out when I have no one else to talk to.

So here I am, blank notes app page, writing to you as if you can reply back and give me any direction, feedback, perspective, or comfort.

It feels weird being in this in between place. Emotional and mental limbo of who I was and who I am and who I will be. I think it’s called “healing”? I don’t know. I never thought I’d have to heal from the man I loved and the life we built over the last decade. I am still in shock. I am still heartbroken. I’m still confused. I’m still numb. I feel like I’m doing okay considering everything. I’m still alive, that’s a positive. I’m trying to better my environment. I’m trying to be present for my kids. I’m working on trying and doing new things and reconnecting with old ones. I’m still making future plans, just alone now. I’m trying to get to know myself again. It’s hard. It does still hurt.

It’s hard to try and identify yourself again when you are also questioning yourself. I poured my life into loving another person and now I’m left wondering what is wrong with me. I know the typical response is “nothing. It’s a reflection of them, not you” but honestly, that feels like a soft way to pat someone on the shoulder and feel like you said something helpful. Reality is, after over a decade together and then suddenly being discarded, it’s impossible not to feel like it’s personal. It makes you feel worthless like you just simply have no value. You feel useless like you failed at a fundamental human level. You feel ugly and undesirable like having their children ruined your body and mind in ways they couldn’t accept. You feel stupid like you should have seen the signs sooner. You lose all sense of reality.

It makes you question every conversation. Every shared moment. Every kiss. Every hug. Every laugh. Every memory. Was any of it real? Was it all for show? Was it just because I was a warm body that made him feel comfortable? Was I just stupid and naive this entire time?

I’ve looked back at the whole relationship like I’m looking for any kind of clue or sign or answer. I’ve been looking for anything to try and understand what happened. I’ve scrolled through old photos and read texts. Found letters shared between us. Old notes in drawers. I’ve sifted through everything just to try and see the relationship for what it really was this time and not what I thought at the time. Looking for proof that it wasn’t all fake.

It wasn’t perfect, it never was, but man.. I was so happy. I was so in love. I see the way I smiled in pictures together. The way I looked at him. I’ve read the texts so full of love and life. I can still feel the excitement in some of the messages. There was such an energy of connection and genuine desire to just exist with him. I don’t know that he ever felt that too. I don’t know that the messages he sent had the same foundation. I don’t know if the smile in his picture was real or his texts honest. I want to believe they were but I just don’t know.

Now all I have is the message I have and the photos I took. He’s gotten rid of every moment he captured of me or us. A whole decade plus of my life has been erased. Pictures I will never get back. Memories lost forever. Even photos and moments with my kids that are just gone. Pieces of me that now only live behind the delete button. Moments my kids will never get to see. And that’s why it’s hard not to feel worthless. How was I so easy to discard like that so quickly? A whole life shared together just gone. My whole life just gone. It’s so hard not to attach a meaninglessness to yourself when the person you loved with your whole heart didn’t even hesitate to get rid of the shots of you growing into an adult and pictures of you pregnant with their child or you with your newborns or playing with your kids or candids of you just living life. Years upon years of moments I couldn’t capture myself so callously trashed without even considering if I’d want them. My entirely life, deleted.

When he left, he took all of it with him. I’m grieving more than just my marriage. He is only a piece of it. I’m grieving my life. My past. My identity. My memories. My family. My entire adulthood and motherhood. My future. The little pieces of myself. Everything has been stripped away. Another “helpful” statement… “but he gave you those kids.” Yes, he did, and he took them for half their lives too.

I can rebuild myself. It’s going to hurt for awhile but I can do it. I can create a new life for me and my kids. I can be happy again. But I can’t get back those moments again. The pictures of the good days when I was naive to the truth. The feeling of being recklessly in love before my heart was jaded by reality. The naivety of a girl whose heart skipped when she was with a boy. That smile I gave him, that look in my eyes, they only live in the past now. All of those moments we shared as a young family just figuring out life. I wasn’t perfect. I would never claim to have been. I have an entire document of all the ways I can identity that I fucked up. But I loved.

I’ve given up all hope of us reuniting one day. It’s a bittersweet thought. I really truly believed he was it for me but I also see that the him I thought I knew wasn’t real. I was in love with a the man I wanted him to be, the man I thought he was, not the man he actually was. I can’t help but still feel and have memories where I believe maybe he did love me in the moment. I have seen photos of him smiling at me where maybe he was happy to be with me. It’s hard for me to accept it knowing what I know now but I would like to believe that our children were created and born out of love. Maybe that’s wishful thinking but I want that for them. I won’t delete the pictures or memories I still have because they deserve to see that too one day.

I know I’m going to be okay. I do. I know I will eventually be able to look back at my early adulthood and the beginning of my motherhood with fondness again and not betrayal. I will keep the memories in my heart even if the pictures are long gone. I will be a new version of myself. Maybe I will even love again. I miss the life I had but all I can do now is build a new one with my boys full of love, compassion, and laughter. The three of us deserve that.

Now… do I file this under G for Grief or H for Healing…?