The land of What Ifs

by susansommers

The painful and beautiful part of life right now is that there are a lot of unknowns. Will he change his mind, will I be divorced, will I always live with my parents, will I lose hope in our great love and move on, and if he comes back, will it be too late?

Yesterday I went to work without my ring on and I felt exposed and scared. Once I started working though my body kind of went into shock. I felt no happiness and yet no pain. I worked all day and acted like nothing was going on. And maybe that was a good thing (partially because it will help me keep my job), because it was my brain showing me that life will be fine without him. I read this article about toxic relationships and the need to make movement forward. If you read it, I answered all her questions with a “yes”. It made me mourn a bit, that my relationship with my husband has become a toxic one. I didn’t ask for it to come to that. I don’t want to not be married to him, nor do I want to live away from him. Every moment of every day feels like a large piece of me is gone. But it’s been gone awhile. When I met with my therapist Monday we talked about how he hasn’t been present for awhile. Like, in the last 4 months.

And I couldn’t stop it. I tried to make him love me. I tried to get him to see how good our life is and could be. I became a sexy car salesman. And yet his love is just…. Gone.

What do I do? What is going to happen? I’m writing this as a sort of prayer to God, because I know He has the answers. There are a million scenarios and I can’t even fathom how much harder this is going to get. I have been thinking about it the last few days, and for me to move back into the home will be a feat in itself. I’m not moving back in if things are still “working out”. To move back in would mean that he is 100% and our relationship is solid. I feel selfish saying that he has to prove it, feels cocky. I guess reality is that the relationship feels kind of over already, and so moving in would be a total rebirth.

Living in my land of What Ifs, I also encounter the “what if I just put the relationship aside and just be happy”. Feels scary. I know it is what I should do, and I know I need to give to God, but relinquishing that control kind of feels like giving up. I don’t want my husband to ever feel like I gave up on him.

I will say that moving out has caused him to actually take care of himself. I think I had been kind of taking care of things around the house, grocery shopping and listening to him cry, etc. Now that I’m gone he’s actually just feeling everything. And he’s going on antidepressants. Unfortunately for me I think the best thing I could do for him was force him to pick himself up now. (Side note I went to the house to get more stuff and the fridge looks exactly the same which means he’s done no shopping and possibly no eating.)

I feel like I’m in a part of the journey where I’m looking down many roads and down each are many possibilities. I think I’ll end up dabbling in each road, and maybe a bit frantically. I guess I just have to believe that the What Ifs will be explained to me eventually, when I least expect it.