After the Storm

Posted on | August 13, 2012 | 11 Comments

It’s been a whole year.

Can you believe that? Can you even fathom that it’s been a full year since I sat in the half-empty Chatham County courtroom and sobbed out “yes” when my attorney asked me if my marriage was irretrievably broken?

Because honestly, I can barely believe it myself.

I go back and read the words I typed here, the emotions that poured out of me through the cracks and holes in my heart, and I wonder how so much changed in such a short time.  I wonder how it’s possible to heal so quickly, to mend and stitch and paste together the pieces I thought were gone, the segments of my heart and of myself that I believed were permanently lost.  I look at my life now and I think only “yes” where I used to think “no”‘, I see splashes of sky where I used to see only storm clouds, colors where there used to be merely black and white.

I am a whole, vibrant, and thriving woman.

I am a happy, satisfied, embraced by the world and most importantly myself, divorcee and single mom.

And when I look at where I was just 365 days ago, I can finally believe that anything and everything is possible.

So to any of you, to all of you, who are lost in the world of wondering, adrift in the sea of newly separated or soon-to-be divorced, please know this…

There is life after divorce.

There is love after heartbreak.

There is light at the end of the darkness.

People told me this was true some 365 days ago.  People whispered “you’ll survive” and “you’ll get through this” into my disbelieving ears.  But it all seemed too big, the hurt too real.  It felt as though I would never be able to look in the mirror and see anything other than a broken woman, half-gone.  Divorce feels somehow worse than dying when it first begins.  It feels like losing everything and yet still waking up every morning as though it never happened to the rest of the world.  It feels like a slap in the face, again and again, until you lose every part of yourself in the overwhelming ache of it all.

It feels like being rejected every time you check “Single” on a physician form, every time you say “no” when asked if you’re married, every time you catch yourself referring to your “husband” or your “in-laws.”

Divorce feels like melting.  Like every day there is less of you; less to love, less to embrace, less to know, less to just be.

But oh my God, is the rebirth worth it all… please trust me on that.  Because divorce is not the rejection of you.  Divorce is not the stripping away, the baring of all your fears and shortcomings for the world to see.

It only feels that way.

The truth is this:  Divorce is nothing more nor less than the reconstruction of your soul, the rebuilding of your heart, the re-strengthening of your resolve that you are worthy of being loved the way you need to be loved.  It is nothing more nor less than just exactly what you need in the form and format you least desired.

Divorce is your freedom to be you, after years of being not loved enough, not appreciated enough, not respected enough.

Because no matter the grounds for YOUR divorce, if it comes to divorce then neither of you were who or where you needed to be.

So seek shelter the best you can.  Hunker down and let the tears come as fast and as often as they need to.  Kick, scream, write, draw…  get out the hurt the best you can.  Because at the end of the year, those tears you shed now will bring the peace you deserve.

You will get through this.

You will be stronger.

You will be happier.

You will, you are, you have always been completely worthy of being loved.

Trust me on that.  I’ve been where you are.

And I lived to sit where I am now and tell you all about it.

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