I considered (and am, I suppose) writing to the X today, the day before our tenth anniversary/his 35th birthday, because tomorrow is going to be busy and hard and possibly frantic. We haven’t spoken in person since May 20th, and it seems as if he’s making a lot of life changes, so I don’t really know who I’d be speaking to anymore. We’re still technically married, so this is still TECHNICALLY an anniversary. But honestly who cares what a random person you used to know hears in passing on the internet. Even if the person talking is their wife. Even if the writer knows this person well enough to know they’re suffering, not undeservedly, because of bad decisions.

Full disclosure, I blocked him online, and on my phone. My email is still accessible, and if he wanted to talk he would find a way. That’s another life choice that hurts me, but is ultimately not my business. I should stop asking about his welfare, he’s not my partner anymore and his life, however it spins down the drain, is not my concern. Yet I linger in maybes and assumptions. This person I used to know intimately is not a part of my life anymore, and cannot be (healthily) part of who I consider myself to be.

I feel I’ve salted the earth with tears overmuch, and I will cry more, but I’m a big believer in knowing when to stop wishing and start doing. My good choices may not always result in good actions of others, but at least they negate the possibility of knowing I could have done better to honor myself and my kin. I’ve been an utter shitshow for the last week, health wise, and I need to stop pretending that what I put into the universe is a wash. I am in control of what I choose to do and who I chose to be. I’m still furious, and grieving, and I need to stop taking those emotions out on myself. It’s only going to hurt more to look back in another ten years and recall being an idiot because I was in pain. So self-care is a priority.

Part of my self care is forcing myself to acknowledge that the last ten years were not a waste and love was not always a lie. And knowing that this belief only sinks in when I accept the facts that I did love someone AND I can’t bear to interact with them now. DBT would suggest that these two ideas are incongruent and yet both true. The suffering of the psyche exists due to not allowing one or the other to exist in the brain and heart. Struggling to make only one side true, that is where my training and therapy have been underutilized and ignored.

So I will not be salty and mean, to someone who will probably never even read this. It’s never good to curse someone. Comes back to haunt you. I’m plenty haunted already.

I spent a good time yesterday sitting listening to the rain with my dog in my apartment. It was deeply peaceful to have that connection and to feel as if the world was ok.

The traditional ten year anniversary gift is tin or aluminum. So for your birthday, husband, I wish you a rainy day under a tin roof, with time and silence and sobriety enough to truly consider what you’ve done in the last year to promote a happy, healthy life. I wish you the sound of a thunderstorm to drown out your demons. I wish you healing, because you have wounded many, yourself included and not the least.

For the two of us, I wish for peace and growth. In the next ten years, and forward.