New Choices

I don’t blame you for your anger, but did you have to be so relentlessly cruel? I’m not sure you ever truly loved me, after all. Then again, I know I deserved your wrath - deserved the hard, cold force of reality shoved down my throat. Still, it’s not like I didn’t punish myself enough, beat myself up repeatedly. I promise I was harder on me than you ever could have been.

I don’t blame you, I really don’t. I didn’t intentionally set out to hurt you. I was just so damn lonely, day after day, week after week, month after month, and then years passed, and I wondered if I’d ever feel alive again. I felt so old and withered - abandoned in the perpetual struggle of our marriage. All my efforts felt futile, disparaged, and I truly thought I might die. The need for affection became a palpable thing, growing inside me like a cancer - a volcano preparing to erupt. I never would have guessed I could succumb to such temptation, but I guess I’m more human than I thought. More than anyone thought, for that matter.

I don’t blame you – I’d be angry, too. I’m a sinner in the worst of ways. It's an irony for sure, because I’m not narcissistic – was not at all like you were in our relationship. But suddenly, my overwhelming need took precedence. All I could seem to focus on after years of being ignored was the gnawing, burning need inside me, as if I was an infant in need of sustenance and nurturing. And then one day, I was extended the slightest branch of affection, much like the apple given to Eve, and I grabbed hold of it as if my life depended on it. I’m sorry. Truly I am.

I don’t blame you. I was wrong – so very wrong, but I’ve learned to forgive myself. More importantly, I’ve learned to forgive you. I know now that we were two unfortunate, sad souls, bound in a vice of marriage that should have been forged open years sooner. Unhappy people can become desperate people, and we were both desperately seeking an escape. I forgive you. I forgive myself.

My forgiveness has lent a new born renewal to my life, releasing me from my own self-loathing as well as the loathing I once felt for you. Now, in the later years of my life, I am able to see the better moments we shared, and I am thankful in a way I never thought I would be. Life throws us curved roads when we expect straight ones, so we must adapt, must learn to navigate the courses. We could have chosen to continue to feed the hatred, but instead, we chose to free it into the universe and feel something more – something unexpectedly better: a recovered friendship and a different kind of affection.

No, I don’t blame you - not anymore. Unfortunate choices were made, but we have both learned from these mistakes. We’ve let go of the bitterness and have moved forward in lieu of regressing to a point of no return.

No, I don’t blame you. Instead, I am thankful for you and lessons learned. Most of all though, I am thankful I don’t blame you – or myself - anymore.