So this year started off pretty well as they always do.
Lots of challenges at work.
Lots of extra weight on my body.
A few more wrinkles.
A heart heavy with burden.
My husband had an affair and we were trying to put the pieces back together.
The betrayal I felt was overwhelming.
I had initially asked for a divorce, but he begged me to reconsider, and promised it would never happen again, so after a few weeks I gave in.
Never in a million years did I ever think a close friend would betray me like that.
I also hold him accountable....but the friend had crossed a line that I could never forgive.
Lets face it, most men (and yes I am generalising, not all men are cheaters), no matter how happy they are in their home, if someone is offering them something they will take it....possibly regret it later....but they will take it nonetheless.
So as the months roll on by, the body piles on a few more kilos.
I'm depressed - this I know - but I can't seem to stop myself from eating comfort food.
Already feeling alien in my own skin, I end a special friendship as I need to concentrate on my marriage. I can feel this friendship becoming a little more and I need to end it before I stumble down the same road that he did last year.
Then there is a death of a friend from highschool.
Shocking to say the least. How desperate and depressed she must have felt that she hanged herself.
This was a wake up call and I started to address my issues head on.
No more taking things for granted.
Learn to accept others as they are and learn to forgive (the hardest part of forgiveness is forgetting the hurt......this is something I am still trying to master).
A few more months roll by, a flood engulphs our lives as a friend loses her mother (in the flood).
I question the relationship I have with my own mother....which has always been strained.
The sadness I feel for my friend is overwhelming.
A few days go by and we offer our services to assist with finding her precious mother as they cannot find her body in the Umgeni river or the sea. We searched up and down the river banks and exhaust ourselves, but her mother is still not found. I am gutted for their family.
I see the pain in their eyes, and I wish I had a strong bond with my own family.
My husband goes in for surgery to his shoulder. I take a week off work to assist him.
A week later he drops a bombshell on me.
I find out I have a 29year old step daughter which was born on his 16th birthday.
I feel shocked and respond with hysterical laughter. this cannot be? Surely this cannot be?
How could this not have been mentioned to me in the 12 years that we have been together?
What other secrets are being kept from me?
A day later I am engulphed in sadness and depression (it's the shock of the news).
He doesn't see my pain.
How do I adjust to this. Our lives changed forever.
How do I cope again after almost 12 years of putting myself aside so that his son can come first. The son was almost 7 when we met and I made sure that I would never be the stereotypical step mother. I ensured that they had special time together - just the 2 of them - while I did the mundane tasks or cleaning the house and paying the bills. Life wasn't easy but I made a choice to accept my life and chose to love this child as if they were my own.
So just when you think that you can start putting yourself first, bam! another 'child' pops up who will need to build a relationship with an estranged father.
A 29yr old daughter who wants to be a part of his life.
Yet another reminder that I never conceived and produced an offspring.
How do I compete with these 2 women who bared him children?
How do I stop my insecurities from making me into a monster.
A jealous monster that want to know what is going on and who and when and where.
I can't stop myself from feeling this way, and then I get angry because of those jealous feelings, and then I am sad. It's a constant wheel of pain and suffering and I just want it to end.
How do I just let go and let live....like I did the last time around? I am not sure I am strong enough.
How will I get through this?
I can't talk to anyone about what is going on because he doesn't want anyone to know yet.
I can't talk to him about how I am feeling because then I am the jealous wife.
I have no-one.
This is killing me.
