SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

So today would have been mine and xWS' 9 year anniversary.

I wasn't sure how I was going to feel today but to be honest it's just another day! It's not even six months since DDay and I think the complete lack of remorse from him has woken me up to how broken he really is and I know i my heart that the relationship had to end.

It was unhealthy and I deserve so much more from a partner.

Though it makes me sad when my 3 year old DS gets depressed but all I can do is be a brilliant mother to my two children and help them heal from the pain xWS has caused them.

I've been using a lots of positive visualisation lately and I can see myself in the future with someone who is going to love me for being me, warts and all.

I'm looking forward to meeting that guy one day! :)

Today would have been the 9th wedding anniversary over here too.

I have been free exactly one year, 19 hours and about 15 mins right at this moment.

This antiversary hasn't sucked - I didn't think about it until quite late in the day.

The date I met him sucked for sure. I hope it doesn't suck as bad this year.

The marriage was in palliative care well before DD. I see that now. I told myself it wasn't really as bad as it felt but it was, it really was. Time and distance has shown me that. I'm not sad for what I've lost, a little for what I never had but mostly for all the years I wasted.

I am happy that I won't waste one more day like that ever again.

((dindy))

I think that too StrongButBroken.

I also wonder looking back on the relationship if I ever would have come to the decision to get out and find more. To be taken out for dinner just once in that time would have been nice, or thanked for bringing our two beautiful children in to the world, and in such a traumatic way too.

But, I guess there is someone out there who is going to recognise me for the amazing woman that I am and how amazing my children are.

For now, I am happy focusing on myself and learning to put me first again.

Onwards and upwards to us! :)

But, I guess there is someone out there who is going to recognise me for the amazing woman that I am and how amazing my children are.

There are already a few of those someone out there hun. You, your kids, me - lots of us here.

There is a single photo taken of the 4 of us - it was when my youngest was a day or two old and I had to beg him to sit for it. She was 18m old on DD.

We simply didn't have fun together - family time was a laundry list of "THINGS WE MUST DO OR ELSE!!". A trip out became a huge bag of stress because he wanted to stick to 'the plan'. I used to jokingly call him Drill Sergeant D[his surname]. Everything had to be a military operation and it was exhausting, upsetting and as frustrating as hell.

I'm not built for that life - my babies and toddlers weren't built for that life. He sucked the joy out of every single moment. I'm sad that I let it go on for so long.

There's a great joke I saw on FB once. "Before you wonder if you have depression, have a look around to see if you are in fact just surrounded by arseholes".

I was surrounded by arsehole. Consumed by him. Neck deep in arsehole quicksand.

I thought it was me. I thought my expectations were too high. How could I expect him to revel in this family he so desperately wanted to have when he was so gosh darn stressed/busy at work?

2011/2012 NYE we were at my mums holiday house and I remember chinking champagne glasses at midnight and thinking:

THIS is the year I WILL have the courage to fix this or end it. It cannot go on. I cannot go on. I've tried and tried - yelling, begging, crying, screaming... all the way to silent surrender. I've tried it all and he is dead inside, this M is dead - both are dead inside of me.

The man I loved is dead and gone. I must save myself before I am dead and gone too.

And I did save myself - I didn't realise at the time that I was saving my girls too.

They sadly had an empty mother for their first years. I relished in them but I was so desperately lonely and alone. Even with him laying next to me.

Now they have a full mum. So full she is bursting at the seams sometimes.

She is still grieving and hurting but she is healing a little more each day.

They don't complete me or my life - that is a lifelong journey I'm undertaking myself.

I simply enjoy them for the fabulous, amazing, sweet, brilliant, complex and HILARIOUS little imps that they are. I pity their father that he does not.

About him I want to slap myself. About them I just want to pinch myself.

I'm excited about the future again - that feeling had all but disappeared in those last years of that M. It is now back with a vengeance.

Wishing you all of the love and laughter you can stand honey.