Divorce Journal Entry #4: Cease-Fire, For Now.

He said he didn't love me anymore.  He's given up on our marriage.  He has even talked about giving me the full custody of our daughter should we proceed with the divorce.  

My husband was also too chickenshit to end the marriage right away.  Yes, you read right.  The dude had the nerve to tell me he no longer loved me, but he's too scared to be the one who ended it.  I knew he wanted me to be the one who took the first steps into making that "divorce" happened, just so that he wouldn't have to feel responsible for having ended our marriage. 

And what did Sweaty do?  Well, what Sweaty DID was different than what Sweaty WANTED to do.  What Sweaty WANTED to do was:

1. Tear off Mr. LA's hair one fistful at a time until there's nothing left.  Or maybe I'd play nice and leave a few strands behind.
2. Shove Mr. LA's shiny golf sticks up his arse.  Elin (Tiger Wood's ex-wife) would be proud.
3. Scream a long string of curses on top of my lungs right in front of his face.  Possibly covering his face with my spits...  after I chewed a handful of garlic.
4. Kick Mr. LA's balls until they're black and blue.  You betcha I'd check.
5. Wrote a huge L with a permanent marker on Mr. LA's forehead while he's asleep.
6. Throw him out of the house and change the keys (ala Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive").
7. Play darts with his face (or his black and blue balls?) as the target.
8. Empty his bank account.  Ha! Who's gonna want you now, Mister?

What Sweaty DID was:

1. Took a really, really deep breath.
2. Count to 65.
3. Told him no, I did NOT want to get a divorce and that I wasn't going to give up on us that easily.    

I know that I don't say this often, nor did I ever write much about it, but I love my husband.  Despite all my rants and ramblings, my sarcasm and my jokes, I could never imagine a life without him.  When I fell in love with him for the first time, I fell in love with him for life.  Lord knows he's far from perfect, and he had done some pretty shitty things, but he's the one I want to spend the rest of my life with.  Always has been, and still is.

Here's what I didn't tell you before.  Four years ago, our marriage was forever altered by a certain life event (which, unfortunately, I cannot disclose).  Since then, I had built a wall so high to protect myself from being hurt, I was emotionally (and physically) absent from my marriage.  I was so ridden by fear, that I had trained myself not to care about my husband "too" much.  I had ceased being a wife; the only role I played in my marriage was that of a mother to our daughter.

We began to lead separate lives.  The thing that attracted us to each other at the beginning--our very different traits and personalities--became the very thing that killed us.  As an extrovert, my husband has many hobbies and interests.  He's also social and has many friends.  On the other hand, I am quite the introvert.  I prefer to stay home because being around many people exhausts me.  I have a group of close friends whom I meet with regularly, but other than that I don't socialize much.  At first, I used to accompany my husband on his many activities.  But it all changed four years ago.  

I stopped going with him, whether it was to have dinner with his friends, to visit some art galleries, or to just have a nice Sunday brunch at some new restaurant.  Always opting to stay home, I immersed myself in raising my daughter, in my books, in my own little world.  His hobbies no longer interest me, and after a while I've lost touch with what he likes and what he doesn't.  With nothing else in common other than being parents to our daughter, we found ourselves unable to connect or communicate.  We've become strangers living in the same house.

So what happens now?  

For me, it has been hell to be living in such a limbo on a daily basis.  It hurt every time I remembered what he said, about no longer loving me.  At the same time, I reminded myself that when I married him it was for better or worse, in sickness and in health, and if this was what it meant, than so be it!  Despite my bruised ego and pride, it is time for me to step up and fight for my marriage.  I owe it to myself, to my husband, to my daughter, and most importantly, to God.  It's an uphill battle that I must struggle with, not only day to day, but minute to minute of each day.  But I am a wife, one half of the marriage equation.  I have just as much power to build or to destroy my marriage as my husband, and I choose the first.

And what about my husband?  His response was a no response.  I honestly don't know what will happen in the days ahead.  

All I can say is that it's cease-fire.  For now.