02 May 2011

Last Supper

As Carol is packing up her stuff, it came to me that it is not how good and bad, or how right and wrong are so far apart but how mangled together they are. Yes there was the affair that happened two years ago which I thought I had forgiven but I now realise that unforgiveness is like building your own prison. Slowly at first and before you realise it, there is strong thick wall around you. For my own protection I cried out but I found God on the outside and I in.

After doing an Alpha marriage course last year, I came to realise that I didn't feel like I supposed to have felt. From a lack of feelings I said that I didn't love Carol anymore but I still wanted the family together as a whole. Not to be broken as I feared for my son's future. Maybe I was naive. Maybe I just wanted the security. No, there was no-one else in my life as some have asked. I just didn't feel like a married person is supposed to feel. I felt so alone.

I could not give a time limit on my feelings as Carol demanded. It was not something that I could simply read in a book. One counselor said that love was just a feeling, that it comes and goes. I answered that I don't feel love at all but I liked Carol as a person and still wanted to be married. Sadly that was not good enough for them. They wanted all or nothing. Come to think about it, I suppose it wasn't fair expecting Carol to accept it. So I was pushed out to the cottage on our property.

Living in the cottage still didn't change me 180 degrees as I felt everyone was praying for. The problem was still there. I still didn't love my wife as a husband supposed to. I started getting very depressed. Blaming myself. To help me cope and survive, I started surrounding myself with many friends who kept me busy. This of course widened the gap between the main house and cottage. Interesting thought crossed my mind was that when we moved here, the cottage wasn't a big draw card for us but now that I am living in it, I am starting to realise that maybe God is in control after all.

I am still a child of God but I still feel so lost in this mess that I have created because I didn't feel the love for my wife. I keep saying to myself that I could have pretended that everything was still alright and maybe, just maybe because love is a feeling, I could have felt it again. After a number of skirmishes across the ever widening gap, Carol has unilaterally moved my son to another school on the other side of the city and taken up a lease. She is now packing. I had no say in any of her decisions. Maybe the gap has become a big a gulf. If it has come to this I wanted to part as friends and have my son every second week. But this too is becoming bleaker.

Tonight we are going to a mutual friend for a dinner party. This may be our last supper together.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

Jerome,
My heart breaks for you my friend. Firstly to lose a marriage is difficult, but to have your son moving away as well is soul destroying.

Have you considered divorce and joint custody?
Are you getting any legal advice and are you seeing a counsellor at the moment?

You can't do this alone, it will eat you up.

Praying for you my friend

Anonymous said...

need to check

fm.in rural.ZA/RSA said...

Whoa, Jerome, your writing is so authentic and resonates with many, I suspect.

My own has been a journey of some remote similarity, however I keep thinking that thankfully there were no shared children - human or fur - and we had actually not really lived together! I was here in ZA post our Civil Union and he was in the UK. He wanted to move on, while I was attempting to secure my visa to the UK. The single most interesting thing was I was not ever told that I was missed! One would think that would have been an indicator! I can now smile about it. I hope you can about what you went through too. Hindsight is 20/20 vision, and educating too!

Aluta continua!