When Parents Separate: My Story
My marriage, as most marriages do, was launched with hopes of creating a happy home. We were both so excited to have found one another. Together we dreamed and schemed the hugest of plans. Together we would make them all come true. It was delicious.
Two years later I began daydreaming of separate households like Frida and Diego had. Ava was 18 months (yes, shotgun wedding) and I was beyond exhausted. I was running a small baby clothing business and trying my best to be a decent mother and wife, doing none of it with any competency. Depleted; fury and resentment became mainstays in my life. I did not know how to ask for help and my husband did not know how to offer any.Five years later we begat (I have always wanted to use that word) our son, Atticus. An acquaintance commented to another friend of mine (and yes you gossipers, it got back to me) that she was surprised we had another child together as she thought we were well on our way to divorce.
I did not think of divorce. This was my family and I was in it for the long haul. But, the daydreams of Frida and Diego mutated into daydreams of my husband not returning from his writing retreats. Not that he would die. Just that he would never return. And, I suppose, I finally recognized that it was an unhealthy relationship when an acquaintance lost her husband in a snowstorm and instead of feeling horror and grief for a widow and her two daughters I imagined myself in her place and the relief I would feel had I been her. Pretty sick, eh?
Seven years later my beautiful children sit before me and I must pinch myself that they are indeed real. They are everything to me. I would do anything for them. But, I also love myself. And, after agonizing for years I realized that the right thing for me to do was to request a separation from my husband. This is absolutely the most difficult thing I have ever had to do and I gave birth naturally. And, let me say to you that my husband is a gentle person and a sweet man. That the blame for the toxicity in our relationship sits squarely on both of our shoulders. Our fights increased in frequency and were ones neither of us recovered from completely. They occurred in public. Things were said and written that could never be fully retracted. My daughter showed problems in school. She demonstrated aggressive bullying behavior and fought with her friends. It shattered my heart to know her behavior to be imitative of her home life.
Two months ago I found a fully furnished cottage built from reclaimed building materials, as so many things in Portland are these days. I am listening to the rain fall upon its roof made from the lids of tin cans. My husband and I switch off between this cottage and our home. Our children stay in their home. They sleep tucked into their beds in their room with their toys and clothes and books. They keep the same schedule and maintain the same habits. The difference is they only have one of us at a time. But, is this a bad thing when having the two of us together meant the possibility of watching a fight or spending time in the company of ghosts?
My husband and I are making every effort to work though our anger and resentments and are currently in counseling. Next month my husband will move into his own apartment. He will see the children alternating mornings, every day after school and some evenings for dinner. Should I want to spend the night away from home he will come and stay with the children. We plan to switch off every weekend. Perhaps I will go to the beach while my husband stays in our house or my children may choose to camp out in their father’s new abode. If, during the week our children miss one parent, they can go visit or return to their home. Our focus is no longer upon negotiating who gets time away from the children but who gets time with them.
And, this is not to deny that the transition is incredibly difficult for everyone involved. It is hard. But, this movement is fluid and with this change there also comes the hope for something better for all of us. We are separating for now but a year from now, after having let our marriage breathe, we may come back together as a nuclear family or perhaps we may sit down at the same table with our children and our new respective partners and their children and delight in this new form of family.
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