Thoughts about my Divorce

Divorce is sad and frustrating conclusion to a relationship. I am tossing all the reasons for doing it aside for the moment and for my own good I am laying it all down in retrospect. To simplify it, it’s like having a broken-down car you are taking to the junk yard. You don’t want the car anymore and it’s more trouble than it’s worth. But as you step away for one last time, you look at the driver’s seat and think of where it had gotten you. The car seat impressions from the back seat that spoke to the existence of two children who came along for the ride. The trips to day care and later, school. The solitary drives to work. The hours you have spent sobbing uncontrollably behind the wheel, knowing that life was going to make a drastic change.

And lucky me, the field service trips as a pioneer.

A marriage has similar baggage, and if it were a challenging one as mine was, a lot of regret. You look back at a junk car you are giving up for nothing and can remember a smiling face driving it off the lot. I smiled a lot in the first months, maybe even years of my marriage. It got me away from a bad family situation which now as I look back; it was a primary reason why I got married in the first place. My marriage is like a car that ran great at first and I was proud to be driving around, but later as it gathered rust, dents and even the bumper coming off, it was a stark embarrassment to be in.

It still hurts to look back though and think of what it once was.  A lie?  Sure, but …  But what?

I regret getting married, and especially to the man I did. It was doomed to failure, and I should have disconnected from the religion of my parents and entered college as soon as high school was up. I’d rather have college debt and perhaps two university degrees rather than just debt and a life in semi-poverty that I live in now. What could have been, what should have been? It hurts to be even writing this as I know the answer is squarely in front of me. But the past beckons and I keep thinking back to how if something was done or said differently, I could have made it out in a better situation.

My mother was often in depression and my father was abusive, so at around the age of 13 I started becoming the family cook out of necessity. Canned food dinners and Mac and Cheese were not meals that made a family want to eat. I first started making spaghetti.  Even the jars of sauce combined with onions and garlic were a huge improvement. I improved my technique by watching YouTube channels and my spaghetti is famous around my social circle. I also started making all kinds of foods from around the world, and even can make great Indian food! I make my own naan bread and in the fridge sit a few mounds of dough. I am teaching my eldest how to roll it out and put it on a hot plate.

Seeing this talent in me, my father-in-law at the time who liked to fancy himself a businessman had an idea for me (and him) to make money. A catering business was up for sale, and he offered to purchase it for me if I were to run it. He was to pull a percentage but after a certain amount of years, it would be mine. This business had a name, and it is still in business today. I often check out the Facebook page and see how successful they became. I’m envious.

Why did I not jump at that? Well, two things. I was pioneering at the time and knew of the bad reputation it would give me had I dropped that and went to work. People knew I was taken care of, and that would have been materialistic. As for my father-in-law, he was always more of a businessman than a JW even though he had a rep for being the opposite. It was his way of getting paid for doing nothing. But I didn’t tell him no right away. I took it to my husband who had already knew about it and he was mostly against it but since it was his father’s idea, it was clear it wouldn’t have been a deal-breaker.

Why didn’t I just take it!  I would have been financially independent by this time and close to paying him off and owning the business outright!

A little over a month after getting the offer I got pregnant. So that was the end of that! I was still in my teens, and no one taught me about birth control. Certainly not my parents. In fact, I can’t say at the time I was fully educated on the how, rather to my embarrassment. I was too young to be having children though. Children having children and all that. But that became my reality and I adapted. The same way this has become my reality, and I am continually adapting.

I absolutely despise this divorce process and wish it were a lot easier. I’m not even sure I ever want to marry again when this is through. My life is in a state of constant flux, and I am finding it hard to stabilize. Before you pity me, understand that where I am at now has its roots in decisions I made. I could have and should have stopped pioneering. I could have educated myself on family planning. This upbringing and my family situation has left in me this bad habit of not planning things through and thinking too far ahead of time. I find myself still stuck in a world where the end is coming only a few years away. Who cares about a catering business, right? It’ll be gone soon anyway.

I read somewhere that life is a series of lessons, and what you learn from each step will build towards your future. Time is on my side. I am relatively young and can/will move on to something better than I am in right now. I feel badly for those who did not figure this out until it was too late.

It’ll work itself out. Even though I have been split from my husband for almost a year now, there still needs to come a final realization that it is over. I am surprised why I didn’t come to this a lot sooner. Perhaps because of the trauma and my ability to push things aside and ignore it. Now I just need to say the words out loud without losing my shit (good luck!).

It’s over.

Madison