Life is so fragile please for your own sake just allow yourself to fall completely into the arms of anyone who feels like love and safety to you. ~ Rhian Lockard
My Facebook is a small community of women. Seriously, I have 63 friends — all women, most of who I’ve been connected to/with for years. You see, not long ago I had a Facebook redo, consciously creating a community that feels safe and nurturing to me. It feels good over there for me these days. These women add to my life, I hope I am adding to theirs.
Recently my friend Rhian posted the above/below quote:
Life is so fragile please for your own sake just allow yourself to fall completely into the arms of anyone who feels like love and safety to you. ~ Rhian Lockard
and, well, something opened in me, for me?
I posted the following in response:
Because, well, last year right around this time, I learned things about my marriage, about my husband, that broke my heart.
These newly discovered truths shattered my already tender, fragile heart.
And for the last year I have struggled really.fucking.hard.
Struggled to stay alive when this heartbreak proved to be the proverbial straw that broke this gentle camels back.
Struggled to stay in my marriage when my woundedness wanted me to run, or to fight like an angry cat getting a cold bath.
I’ve struggled to figure so much out.
I’m still struggling.
The week my marriage imploded I drew a Daily Tending card for guidance and support. It read What do I know to be true right now?…
…wow…
What did I know right then, in those first, gut-wrenching moments of shock, betrayal, despair?
I know I love him and I know he loves me.
Well fuck, that was unexpected AND exactly what I needed to find the strength and stay here, in my marriage, with this human who is my hearts’ home, and fight (together) to save our marriage.
It has NOT been easy.
We are NOT healed.
I am NOT healed.
I still often find myself stuttering around in shock, heartbreak, and despair.
And yet I have discerned this past year that it is better to fight like hell to save our marriage, than fight like hell to get over having a homeless heart the rest of my life.
And so I stay.
And he stays.
And we both go to our therapists, mostly on our own, sometimes jointly.
And I cry and rage and shake… And he continues to do his work, to heal his shame-coated soul so that he will (hopefully) never harm me in those ways again.
And it is fucking hard, so fucking hard, to love BIG, to love BRAVELY with my WHOLE HEART and my WHOLE SOUL…
Because, really, if I can’t stay in the fray, loving and fighting for the truest thing I know… well, shit, that’s just not (yet?) an option.
I don’t know if we’ll make it together…
I hope we do.
I’d really love to spend every day of our lives loving and supporting each other…
But, one thing I will always know for sure…
That I love him, and he loves me…
As fallible and painful as that loving can be, this love is real and we are worthy of it, and worthy of healing together, instead of grieving separately.
Thank you for reading.❤
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