Monday 16th January 2016
"Be not alarmed, madam, on receiving this letter... You must, therefore, pardon the freedom with which I demand
your attention; your feelings, I know, will bestow it unwillingly,
but I demand it of your justice." Jane Austen - Pride and Prejudice
As
the end of my 12 month blogging adventure draws near, I find myself looking at
how far I have come, and lately I have been thinking about how it all started. I had always said that if I was ever
cheated on, I would chop his balls off and feed them to him. Of course, I never thought I’d be in the
position where I would have to choose between taking the high road, and preparing
such a rare dining delicacy, but that’s exactly where I found myself last year. I still don’t have all the answers I want, but I’m
more accepting now of the fact that I don’t think I’ll ever get them. I have fully accepted that the vows I took
are now worthless and the marriage I gave my life and soul to has ended.
What
I realise now is that I have not said anything directly to her, the other
woman. I have alluded to a general
feeling of bitterness, after all she invited herself into a marriage that was
designed for two and thought nothing of her actions. Maybe if she knew, or had a small iota about
what I’ve been through, she might have a dawning realisation and change her
ways, but given the way she has behaved I hold no small hope for that.
Believe
me, I am fully versed in the feelings of wanting to lash out at her, but I
also know that it comes from a place of pain and deep insecurity, and I am not
that person anymore. I have discovered to my surprise, I was never that person.
I am strong and I know my worth. I know that what happened was never about me
and the qualities I lack, it was about my husband and the qualities he lacked,
and a woman who was so insecure that she went for a married man.
If I
had followed through and served up a dish of bollock a l’orange, I would be
validating every single lie that they ever told themselves about how I somehow
deserved to be a casualty of their deceit.
So
all I have left to say is what follows, an open letter to her, and whether she
reads this or not I want to say it because we often never say the things we
want to or need to say.
Xxxxx,
I
will not call you names, yet I will not wish you well.
Some
time ago you made a choice, you decided that you wanted something, and instead of
asking for it, you took it. You were
happy to be hidden and lied about, you sat silently when you could have stood
up and been counted. In the beginning I
was so angry I couldn’t even see straight, but then I tried to find a way to
understand it. Had you just fallen so
hard in love that it didn’t matter that you were in the shadows and I was in
the light? Had it gone on so long you
couldn’t see a way out? Had he lied and
told you that I was a nightmare, whilst all the time telling me he loved me to
the moon and back forever?
Whatever
it was, when it was all uncovered and he chose me, was that your comeuppance? Did you feel used, heartbroken, like you’d
lost a part of you? Then I know
something of that feeling, we have a shared pain. Had it ended there, maybe I could look at you
without contempt. But it didn’t. He came back to you behind my back, and
instead of saying, “I want to be the only one, I won’t do this again, I have
too much respect for myself”, you simply resumed your time in the shadows. You put me through it all again. You knew the pain you’d caused me once, you’d
felt your own pain, and yet you chose to try and destroy me once more.
All
the things I realise that were wrong with the relationship I was in are the
exact way in which your relationship started, lies, anger and deceit. He didn’t even tell me, I had to find out
again. He didn’t leave me, there was just
no option for us to stay together.
People
say what happened is “for the best”, but don’t kid yourself that you’ve done me
a favour. I’ve done me the favours. I chose to not let what you both did destroy
me. I chose my new path. You will always live knowing that your union
was born out of the utmost betrayal that even the legal system gives it its own
category.
What
I understand now is that real love will never ask you to hide, it will show you
off proudly from the moment you encounter it.
Real love will never make you jealous of other women in such a way that
you have to try and take what they have, and fight to protect what you believe is
yours.
One
night when you’re sitting alone with your thoughts, and he’s being distant and
moody, and he’s hiding his phone from you, and there are so many questions about his
behaviour that you cannot answer, remember that when you assumed your full time
role in his life, you created a vacancy for someone from the shadows to fill,
and like you they probably did without a thought or care for your feelings.
In
that moment, I wonder if I will come to your mind, and you will realise the
truth of Karma.
Until next time. x
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