the marriage

Well, here goes - my attempt to summarize the more than two decades that the two of us have been attempting to be happy together.

When we met, I was still in high school, but soon to be a dropout. I was in the midst of fullon teenage rebellion, with absolute zero self esteem. I was drinking, experimenting with drugs, sleeping around all over the place. I was just a big pile of mess at that point in my life.

In comes my knight in shining armour. He was only a couple of years older than me, in college at the time. I fell in love with him almost instantly. He saw more in me than a piece of ass. He wanted to know ME! I didn't care what anyone else thought, this was the man for me and I was head over heels.

Once we had established a relationship, he began to urge me towards making better choices. I stopped many of my unhealthy behaviors, thanks to his influence. So, that is the very positive side of our early years together.

The negative side, well, we had a lot of rocky times. We were both very young, with very little understanding of how to be in a relationship. He did things that hurt me, I did the same to him. We broke up and were drawn back together so many times. We learned from our mistakes, most of the time.

Eventually, after around 7 years and two kids, we finally were married. There was no proposal, no romance, just a decision made due to outside influences and a realization that we might as well. Certainly not the romantic dream we girls grow up hoping for, but I was happy. He was mine!

And, here we are 15 years later. There are now three teenage sons, who are amazing kids by the way. Husband and I are currently separated and realizing that we had lost the ability to communicate with each other in any meaningful way, which led to a sex life that was beyond hopeless.

We are talking now, opening up about things that we never have in the past. I am uncertain whether the marriage can be saved, or should be saved. For now, I am reading (currently "Passionate Marriage" by David Schnarch), getting to know myself better, and trying to be a more authentic version of myself. That is all I can do, I think. What he chooses to do is outside my control.