Meg Casey

Sometimes I think it is as much hard work to be divorced as it is to be married. Both require that you come in close intimate contact with your worst and your best selves.

I have my stories that I tell about why my marriage ended. They are all true. But they are not entirely complete. Until recently I found it convenient to leave out many of the bits about all I did to stress that relationship. I leave them out because its uncomfortable to admit these things. I leave them out because that means I can pretend that my divorce is something that happened to me, instead of something I actively created. Its easier and neater to be the victim, the good wife who got left. I suppose its an easier and simpler story to tell it.

Secretly though I have owned those ugly stories. I had to. I knew my divorce would be a whole heap of pain for nothing if I didn’t at least explore them, didn’t at least explore all the ways we got to this place and ask myself, what I could possibly learn.

For years at night I would wake up unable to sleep, the litany of all the things I had done to destroy what I loved so dearly running through my mind. There were nights I blamed myself. I fixated on my temper, my impatience, my resentment. There were other nights I railed against the injustice. Sure I was difficult, but it was no reason to leave me. Sure I could be a pain in the ass, but lets talk about what he did to provoke it! Some nights I wallowed in how wrong I was, others in how right I was.

And then one day I gave up with all this need to be right (and wrong). I simply was. It dawned on me that there is no right or wrong in something as complicated as marriage. There are just two wounded people, doing the very best they can. We bump up against each others sharp bits. We cause pain. We hurt. We soothe each other, delight each other, bore each other, infuriate each other. We push buttons–either by accident or on purpose. Sometimes we come through it. Sometimes we simply cannot stay. At very best we can hope to learn something from each other from all these interactions. We can gain some wisdom about ourselves. We might chose to stay the same,or chose to grow and change. There is no right or wrong, no fault or blame to be doled out. It just is. And in that recognition is a world of freedom and forgiveness.

The minute I stopped with the blame, I began to forgive–not just Juan, but myself for all that had transpired. Knowing that we were two people just trying to do our best, failing miserably every day, getting up and trying again, suddenly made it all redeemable.