For the past year or so I’ve had writer’s guilt because I’m not writing as much as I’d like to. It’s been that constant nagging voice in my head that kept talking to me. Why aren’t you writing anything?, Do you have nothing of any importance to share? Etc., Recently I just decided to stop beating myself up about it. I have talked to my other writer friends, and they shared that they too go through this and for certain writers it could last for years. So here I am writing something! When I started my blog back in early 2010, I wrote about my sober life and dealing with my family of origin and living in a non-sober world and it was exciting and I relished each blog post I did. Five years later in 2015, I self-published my Memoir, “Last Call, A Memoir” and to support that effort I was blogging almost weekly for the next few years. Well, that was over six years ago and here I am barely able to blog every few weeks. I’ve had writer’s block off and on, and some of that I think is due to my busy lifestyle and career, but also, I just don’t feel like doing it. Am I lazy? Or do I just not feel like expressing my words and thoughts anymore? I don’t really know and honestly, does it matter? No. After being in a marriage for over eight years and then going through a painful divorce, a good amount of my time was spent trying to navigate my loss and grief and living solo, and some days just being able to get out of bed was a success.
I woke up at 4.30 am the other morning and writing for my blog was on my brain as a blog post from last September popped up on my Facebook feed. Ironic it was “Falling in Love during Covid,” as I’m now dating that same person again! Almost a year to the date that we broke up, we got back together. Having a year to reflect on that relationship and “what happened” I realized how much I genuinely still cared about this person. In my blog post, the summarized version is I broke up with him after six months because I wasn’t feeling it anymore. That turned out to be not entirely true. At the time, I was confused about my feelings as I was still grieving the loss of my husband and our marriage – which I didn’t realize until a few weeks after we broke up. I then went through the next year of healing and pushing through those uncomfortable and painful feelings of loss and sadness. I don’t regret jumping into that relationship a few months after Liam left, but it wasn’t fair to him or myself. I’m a stubborn alcoholic so when someone says, “He’s your rebound guy” or “He’s just Mr. Right Now,” or “You should wait a while before you date again” BAH! That’s what I said – because as much as I thought they were right, I didn’t care. I needed that person to get me out of my hole of utter grief and despair and to make me feel whole again and he did that. He did that so well that I started getting antsy and wondered why I kept crying at night to go to sleep, and why I couldn’t stop wondering what my ex was doing (not that I really needed to know), but he was on my brain. I felt like I wasn’t being genuine and real to myself about managing my grief process of divorce, so I had to walk away from that relationship so I could save myself from my own selfishness.
Over the next year, I grieved – yet again – but more thoroughly, and I shared about it, and I sat with it, and I did the work. I completed a seven-week Grief Recovery program (which I highly suggest to anyone going through a divorce or death). Eventually, I started forgiving him and myself and becoming ok with who I was, and the decisions I had to make to leave our marriage. I had this cloak of guilt and remorse that I couldn’t make my marriage work, and I couldn’t shake it. I felt like I made a mistake. I missed my spouse and our life together and the adventures that we had. I had, what my Al Anon sponsor called it, euphoric recall of all the amazing times we had. And as much as we did have those amazing times, (because we really did). We also had see-saw years of toxic, unhealthy, and abusive behaviors happening. With each of us. Not just one of us. I had a part, but I also had to know when I had to let go and move on. I was able to forgive myself and my ex, and that was so important for me to be able to walk through that pain and to get to the other side. Today, my ex and I are friends, and I want him to have the best life he can possibly have. We occasionally spend time with our dog and talk about our lives, and we respect each other. We are both in new relationships and honor those. He was my best friend for an exceptionally long time, and I’ll always love him, but we just brought out the worst in each other – not a healthy recipe for any long-term relationship. God keeps showing up for me and usually I don’t see it until months later. For anyone that is going through a rough break up or divorce, or any life changing situation, just know this. Things will get better – it may take a while, but they will. I thought I’d never be in a happy, content and comfortable place again, but deep in my psyche I knew I would be. The universe has a way of showing us what we need to see – when we need to see it.