Right where I am:three months in

I'm writing from my hotel bed, Oliver is finally asleep in the bed next to me.  I am so tired that I really should be sleeping myself but naturally I am wide awake, my usual go to options of listening to a devotional or a guided relaxation being impossible due to my forgetting to pack headphones.

We are on our first break away as a team of 2. Well, when I say team, what I mean is an exhausted big person and a small person with relentless needs and demands.  We are in Windsor, with two nights in the hotel and two days at Legoland.  We did the first day today.  It went pretty well, we had a lot of fun and I can appreciate that the relentless needs and demands are a lot less relentless and needy than they were two years ago.......it just doesn't feel like it when you're the only one dealing with them. I cursed him (Mark) more than once today, starting this morning when we arrived at the car laden with coats and bags to realise I'd left the car key in the hotel room.  He would never have done that. I felt irrationally abandoned. Well, perhaps not so irrationally. 

My counsellor encourages me to recognise irrational thoughts for what they are, to avoid catastrophising and entering a negative spiral. I can do that for the most part. Eg thoughts of self blame, how could I not have known? Was I a terrible wife? I know those are irrational and I am quick to dismiss them.

But I can't shake the feeling of being abandoned. I'm really struggling to forgive him for landing me with this life.   Today, aside from the car key fiasco it hit me when Oliver wanted to have a go on a play park.  As I stood watching him, alone, I couldn't hold back the tears.  I really missed having my husband there for a hug, a chat, a shared sense of wonder at the little human we created. And if I'm honest, to send off to buy us both a cup of tea! How could he leave us? How could he throw it all away? 

Christmas passed by relatively peacefully. It was very lovely in a lot of ways.  I did things and saw people I wouldn't have done if he were with me, and enjoyed them all.  I wasn't distraught, I wasn't a mess. I felt largely numb.  When I went to place a Christmas wreath on his grave I told him off, again, for leaving me.   I thought we would grow old together. I'm really still trying to process that he is gone. 

At Christmas dinner, I managed to quell the impending panic attack.  There is progress in that. What was an almost daily occurrence for the past couple of weeks is now less frequent, and I am better able to control attacks before they take hold. I recognise what a huge deal even being here for these couple of days is, considering just six weeks ago I couldn't manage a supermarket shop.   But, after yet another battle over screen time with Oliver this evening, bringing out the worst shouty parent in me and culminating in me hearing my first "I hate you" from my son, I am feeling yes, abandoned. 















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