Even though I realized in my heart our marriage was over, I never said a word about it.  Recognizing the truth did something inside of me.  I became more sullen in my nature for a while but was content to let things be as they were.  I did my best to hold out, but something in me knew I was on the road to divorce.  I always vowed I would never get divorced and hurt my children but I just knew this train was bound for inevitable destruction.  

 I was watching Moonlighting one evening when things finally came to a head.  I called my husband to find out when he would be home.  We ended the conversation in a very nasty way.  About forty minutes later, he came home, headed for the bedroom, and proceeded to pack his bags.  I didn’t budge from the couch.  He came downstairs into the rec room and stood at the back door and said, “Is there anything you want to say to me before I walk out that door (as he pointed to our back door), because when I leave, I am not coming back?”  I stared at the TV set, not moving and said, “No.”  I knew he would be back.  I would lose weight and he would come back.  It was a pattern we had lived for so long, why would it be any different now.  He slammed the back door and left.  I continued to sit there and think it was just a matter of time.  Maybe in a week or two he would be back, we would pretend to be love and everything would be okay. 

  Day after day went by and he didn’t call or come home.  I would wake up in the mornings with the familiar ache I had grown up with as a child.  I wondered what in the world was wrong with me that I would cause something like this to ruin my life.  I was barely able to get to work.  I would go to work, pick up Dara, come home, hunch down in the corner of my room and wail out to God, “Why did you let this happen to me?  Where are you?  What am I going to do now?  I hate you for allowing this to happen to me! Help me! Where are you?”  I would rage on and on.  I would cry and cry until I thought my stomach was going to turn inside out.  I was just able to maintain enough composure for my daughter’s sake.  Dara started to sleep with me at night and I lied to her telling her that Daddy was away on a business trip but would be coming home soon.

  Well, she and I were asleep in bed one night and my husband showed up.  She was thrilled to see him. But, he only stayed long enough to get some of his things and out the door he went.  He was oblivious to her needs.  She cried after him.  She cried and cried that night as she fell off to sleep.  He left us both there crying that night as he walked out the door.  I tried to soothe her the best way I knew.  Emotionally, I was still a child myself, but I was going to have to be strong now for the child I had brought into this world.    

 I had to explain to her about her daddy and me and it cut me to my very soul.  What had I done to her?  What had I done to him?   

 Christmas came several months later.  Time and circumstances had emotionally worn out both my husband and me.  Our daughter needed us both so he had begun spending time with her again.  The spirit of Christmas was upon us and we both pretended for the sake of our daughter.  He almost came home that Christmas.  However, something I could not see was keeping him from returning home.

  The unusual thing was we both turned to the only Pastor we knew.  I had been praying to the only God I knew and I guess he had too.  Early in our marriage, we attended church but only on special occasions.  Regardless, we both felt he was the only one who could help us right now.  We made separate appointments with him and met for counseling sessions over lunch.  My lunch meeting ended up with me blaming my husband and his long work hours for our failed marriage.  As I got up to leave, I did so carrying with me the belief that he would help us; I just didn’t know how.  I put all my trust in this one Pastor to “put us back together again.”  

  I had to stop therapy because I didn’t have anyone to watch my daughter.  I thought blurting out my loveless marriage was the answer I needed in order to come to terms with my life, but I found this was not the answer and I was still a mess.  I knew I had to buck up and do something but I was in such turmoil.  I felt as though I was treading on thin ice everywhere I turned.  Now, I was faced with having to turn my focus on my separation from my husband and attend to my daughter, who was not doing well due to the upheaval in our home life.

 My husband called stating he wanted to come over and talk to me.  He walked in and the feelings between us were icy.  He had a seat and said he had come up with a list of ten things he wanted me to change about myself and if I would, he would come back home.  The first thing he wanted me to do was lose weight.  I recalled the Burger Chef incident but tried to remain calm knowing I had to hold my tongue if I wanted him to come back home.  I agreed to this stipulation.  He continued with the next item and then the next.  The list he held in his hands brought back to my memory “the list” my dad kept of all the money his children had borrowed.  What was it about lists?  Heat started to rise within me like a volcano and I knew I was going to erupt.  It was about after the fifth thing that I said, “Forget it!  What about the things you need to work on?”  I was furious.  I was hurt that he was so cruel to me in his comments about my weight, stopping counseling, and getting myself “fixed.”  It was downhill after that.  I took off the engagement ring (his mother’s) and threw it at him as I stood there spouting off at the mouth.  Then, I said, “And why don’t you just put the house on the market and sell that too?!”  We had only lived there for about a year and a half.  He stormed out the door and that was that.  I somehow felt that it still wasn’t over.

  My husband jumped at the chance to put our house on the market and I had signed the papers in agreement since I was the one who had opened my big mouth about it.  I didn’t think anyone would really buy our house and if it did sell, I thought it would take a while.

  My daughter and I had gone to the movies one Sunday afternoon, I walked back into the house and the phone was ringing.  It was my mother-in-law.  She told me that there had been an all cash offer on our home and I had thirty days in which to move.  The house had only been on the market for three days!  I sobbed and sobbed and she asked me why I was crying.  I said, “I didn’t really want to sell my home, I didn’t want to move, and I didn’t want to get divorced.”  She said, “Well, it’s too late now.”

  I hung up the phone, sat down at the kitchen table and cried.  I didn’t think I was going to be able to stop. Yes, my daughter caught the brunt of my emotions.  She started crying too.  Dear God, what was I going to do now?  I didn’t want to leave my home, my beautiful home.  Where would I go?  Who was going to help me? 

             I had worked for the past five and a half years at the same bank working my way up to assistant manager.  An announcement was made that our president had sold the bank to a larger one in town.  He made a deal for each of us so that we could keep our job but an equal position wasn’t guaranteed.  I was transferred to another office with a new boss and new co-workers as an assistant manager. 

 I got along well with the co-workers but from the get-go, the manager did not care for me.  I hadn’t worked there long when I had become separated.  I would go to work, start crying, go into the break room and not be able to pull myself together.  I couldn’t bear the thought of having to pretend to be helpful when my life was going down the toilet but, I tried, only to fall apart. 

  It was time for my annual review and I walked into the conference room where my manager and a co-worker were sitting.  She had given me a warning previously that my work performance was not up to par, so for the past 90 days, I made more of a concentrated effort to do better.  They sat there staring at me and stated I was not going to receive a raise because I just wasn’t performing up to expected standards.  Here I was thinking that my work ethic had improved considerably, but clearly, they thought differently.  My complete work history was spread out before them.  I had always had good job performance ratings, excluding my attendance, and now I sat face-to-face with someone who was going to “allow me” to keep my job but not give me a raise.  I had counted on that raise.

  Most all of my life people liked me, but there were those few and far between who really just couldn’t stand the sight of me and I could feel it.  I would always recall the statement my mother had made to me when I would encounter people like this, - “If you be nice, they will be nice.”  The harder I would try with these few people to be nice, the more they didn’t like me and it only made them dislike me more. 

 So here I sat.  The thoughts that went through my mind that day were wide-ranging.  How dare she be so heartless.  I was the girl who had worked her way up to being a branch manager of a large financial institution in my early twenties.  I had won an area-wide speech contest, having the accolades of man.  I had left my management position due to stress and then started all over again as a teller.  I worked my way up back up to the position of assistant manager at this new bank and was in the depths of a serious personal crisis.  I had heeded the warning and done better but that didn’t matter. 

  Everything I was putting my hand to was falling apart little by little, and piece by piece.  The last 90 days had meant nothing to them.  I tried not to cry but one tear blopped on my cheek and then they all started coming.  Before I could stop the words, I blurted out, “I have had enough.  I continued, ”I need to stay home with my daughter anyway; she needs me.”  They didn’t care.  They were just as glad to get rid of me as I was glad to get rid of them.  I was shaking all over as I cleaned out my desk to leave.  I was so furious but I didn’t say one word.  It was over and there was no use trying to say anything else about it.  I didn’t even know what was going to happen to me as I walked out the door but one thing was certain in my heart, I could spend some time with my daughter and help her heal.  She needed me.

             My daughter was still upset over her daddy leaving.  Saying good-bye to her daddy, as he left the house one day, involved her running down the driveway yelling and crying for him and she was only two and a half at the time!  I ended up doing the only thing I knew to do.  I took her to the Psychologist I had recently stopped seeing.  I wanted an opinion on her mental state from not only a professional standpoint, but I wanted to hear from someone who was not involved in our lives on a day-to-day basis.  He saw her alone and then he talked to us together.  He recounted his time with her to me, saying that he told her a story about a family of birds who lived in a tree. The story went like this:  There were three birds.  The daddy bird flew away leaving the mommy bird and the baby bird.  He said, “What happened then? Can you finish the story?”  She replied, ”The daddy bird flies back home with the mommy bird and the baby bird.” 

  Hearing her answer cut me like a knife.  WAKE UP CALL! IS ANYONE THERE?  What had I done to her, for God’s sake?  Did I actually do this to my one and only living child?  What kind of a monster was I? 

  Those days shook me up enough to get me going on the right track again.  All I knew was that for right now, I didn’t have to work.  I could stay home with my daughter.  I moved us into an apartment.  I was trying to find and make some kind of a life for us but I knew I was winging it.  I felt like I was at a loss.  I just got up and carried on from day to day but it seemed like it was all a blur.  I tried to stay happy in hopes that my husband would see the change in me and come home.  I also tried to stay on good terms with his family who wanted to be around their granddaughter.  I put on my happy mask and kept doing what I knew how to do.

  I had received half of the settlement from the sale of our house, but not without a fight on my husband’s part.  My ex-husband had argued that his money bought the original townhouse we lived in, and therefore, I was not entitled to get anything.  I had to go see an attorney because this obviously was not going to be settled between us in a civilized manner.  I hated confrontation but I knew for my daughter’s sake, I needed to stand up for us.  We were awarded half the proceeds from the sale of the house. 

  I then had to take my husband to court for child support.  He was not amicably going to hand over anything.  We had argued endlessly over an amount for monthly child support.  He called the night before we were to appear in court and offered me $225.00 a month for her support if we would settle out of court.  I said, “If you will give me $250.00, I will do it.”  The judge hit his gavel the next day and said, “$450.00 a month support plus all medical and dental for the welfare of your daughter.  In addition, you will pay all expenses of your wife’s attorney.” 

 My ex-husband flew out of that courtroom enraged.  It was always about the money with him.  It was like dejavu all over again.  I had had to argue with my dad about it years earlier, telling him if he ever left us (Mom, my sister and me), I would take him for everything he had.  He ended up paying us a huge amount of alimony.  Why did it always boil down to putting a price tag on love, feelings and hurt children?

 Of course, no one in his family or his friends could understand how this had happened to “poor him.”  The so-called friends I thought were mine, turned out not to be.  They all sided with him.  I was becoming increasingly aware of the fact that I had literally bitched him out of the house, yet I also knew it took two to tango.  There was “his” side and there was “my” side and the truth was somewhere in the middle.