” We forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget. We forget the loves and the betrayals alike, forget what we whispered and what we screamed, forgot who we were.” – Joan Didion
I thought I’d be planning a wedding right now. I imagined myself, pen in hand, jotting down which songs we’d dance to. The color of the flowers and how they would match your bright eyes and the bright blue stone I saved for us. For this exact moment in time. Our handwritten vows.
All the while thanking God for finally bringing you back to me.
I imaged the small group of family and friends who would be present to watch us commit our lives and love forever. They would whisper to each other as they watched us, tears rolling down their cheeks, ” This is a fairy tale. Can you believe it? After all this time?” Our mothers would dab away their waterproof mascara while grinning from ear to ear. There would be no more, “Why can’t he just find a nice girl?”.
” She’s been through so much, this love is a gift from God.”
” He always said he loved her.”
” This is a love story that will be spoken of at every family meal, every holiday, every birthday and all the days in between.”
” Look at them, they are perfect for each other. Decades apart and still made for one another.”
This was my fairytale, carefully crafted with what I thought was love. I watched it come to life after decades of wondering where he was or who he was with. He was finally mine. He waited for me, just like I waited for him. It was true love and to me, he felt like home. We were meant to be. He said we were so connected that he could hear my thoughts without me speaking them. Just like a dream come true. I felt him in my bones, he felt me in every breath.
It still confuses me how quickly I fell into the fog. I couldn’t see reality anymore. I couldn’t see my family on the other side. I felt my children slipping through the density and reaching for me, but they were out of my view. The fog made me believe in things that weren’t true. The fog lied, and I let it.
Being a mother of three little girls has been the greatest gift of my life. It’s also been the hardest. I love being their mom. It’s unconditional. Unbreakable. I didn’t understand that until they placed my babies in my arms after nine months safe inside me, protected from the world we were bringing them into.
A world in which women are less.
Less of a leader. Less of an income. Less of a right. Less of equality. Less intelligent.
Less worthy.
We are in a constant state of receiving messages that women can only have success as long as they have a husband. A partner. They say women aren’t built to live an independent life, they need help. They need a husband. They need a wife. They need a good job, but they also need to be home for bus pick up, homework, home cooked meals and snuggles before bed.
I kept my silence as I ran the hamster wheel over and over. Occasionally I jumped off if I could. I jumped off and grabbed onto sobriety like my life depended on it. It did. Still does. I jumped off to breathe. I jumped off to let my King go to his new castle. I jumped off for moments of accountability. I jumped off for moments when I felt myself choking on my own air.
I never jumped off completely. I still had the idea that I needed someone. I thought if I stayed on long enough, it would make sense. I could believe all of the lies and all of the love, but only if I kept moving in a never ending cycle of denial and self-pity. I let him watch me suffer through the steps. My body started to give up, it was tired. I was tired. But- if I stopped what would happen? Would he swoop in a save me like he said he did? Would he tell me he felt me, even when I was gone?
He came to me one day and looked down at my bloody feet, restless for years, and offered me a hand. The wheel slowed down and he put a bandaid on each of my wounds. It made him feel big. He told me he knew about the wheel, but that I shouldn’t worry. I wouldn’t be needing that or anything else ever again. He would be my everything, I did’t have to run anymore. His eyes would stare at me as he said this. I couldn’t tell if he thought I was beautiful or if he was wondering how long it would take to break me.
I believed I was a damsel in distress. The scenes played out in my mind, on paper, and right in front of me like a play. The first act was full of hope.
He can save me.
The second act was empty. The lines we had rehearsed suddenly disappeared. I couldn’t find the script I thought we had written together. All I could hear was his voice. His words. Cowered in a corner of my kitchen floor, his baritone voice booming over me as I begged him to stop.
This isn’t a unique story.
A woman feeling less than.
A woman manipulated by his master plan.
A woman in love with the wrong person.
A woman loosing herself in him.
A woman who thought the fairytale was sustainable.
A woman who didn’t see the nightmare until it went black in the blink of an eye.
A woman who thought she deserved it.
A woman who forgot her strength.
A woman on the edge.
A woman easily broken.
I never tried to stop the fire, but I wasn’t the gasslighter.
Burnt to a crisp, and unable to face myself in the mirror. I didn’t have matches. I had something more lethal. The art of annihilation through words. Page after page, insult after insult, lie after lie. Right back on that hamster wheel. It felt easier to run than to ever allow someone to take me like that again. The wheel was predictable, lonely, but consistent. I learned to sprint faster than ever.
I wanted to win the race. I wanted it all. I wanted to recover my broken heart while crushing theirs. I wanted to wither away to nothing as I put one foot in front of the other, never daring to look down. If I saw where my feet were, I would have to come to terms with this loss. It was easy to come to terms with divorce, addiction, and even death. But this was different. The fear of seeing where my feet were actually planted, prevented me from taking a risk on myself. Living and loving myself.
For myself.
How could this be? Hasn’t history told all of us that we must change everything about us, just like Cinderella? She had to become a nameless princess with poor taste in footwear in order to follow the master plan of meeting Prince Charming at the ball. That’s how I thought it should go. It never occurred to me that I could wear my own shoes, the yellow ones, and walk a path of my own. It never occurred to me that I could fix broken things, including my own injuries from love gone wrong.
I thought I found my voice during all the road trips and car sing alongs we shared. Every playlist I put together suddenly had new meaning. The songs were about us. He tried to harmonize with me, but his voice was louder than mine. I couldn’t hear myself anymore. I thought that his voice in my head was my own.
You’re a bad mom.
I can’t wait to watch you suffer through life without me.
I understand why he left you.
I can buy your love.
You bring joy to your kids lives.
Your daughters will grow up to be just as messed up as you are.
Your family breeds incompetent women.
I promise I won’t say that again.
You are broken beyond repair.
Your sobriety is an act.
I’ve loved you since we were kids.
You’re a liar.
You’re nothing.
You need me.
Recently, I was sitting out on a stone porch looking over the ocean and cliffs that encompass the coasts of Block Island. I closed my eyes and I saw my grandmother. Her heart intertwined with mine, breathing in the same salt water air. I saw my mother, collecting freckles from the sun while holding my hand, and never letting go. I let the wind push me around a bit, and as I finally felt steady, I looked down.
I saw my feet.
They were right there whole time. I saw them walk, not run, onto a path all my own. The plot twist wasn’t a broken heart, it was the courage to walk away.
The courage to walk along side my daughters and someday watch them walk on their own.
The Queen Mother 