Years ago, when I heard the word “divorce,” I always equated it with “failure.” I grew up thinking divorce was bad, or at least something we didn’t discuss. That wasn’t because my parents did anything to make me feel or think that way; I think it was just the culture of the 1980s and 1990s.
When my parents argued (which I honestly don’t remember as being that often), my first thought was always: What if they get divorced? What will that mean for my brother, sister, and I? What will people think of us?
For as long as I can remember, this has been a recurring theme: What will people think of me and my choices?
I was forever the “good girl.” I was the one who didn’t make mistakes, got excellent grades in school, played every sport and instrument, and participated in every school activity. But now, looking back on that, I question if I was really interested in those things or if I just wanted it to seem as if I was.
I never dated when I was a teen or in my early 20s. I’m not sure why, other than I didn’t feel ready.
When I did feel ready, I was 24 years old, naïve, inexperienced, and unsure of who I was. Looking back now, I realize what a disastrous combination that was.
I married my first boyfriend, whom I met at 24 years old. I thought I knew what love was, and I thought that’s what I was feeling. However, as I began my career and became a mom, I also began to question whether what I had been feeling when I was younger was love or something else.
Now, I look at my first relationship with new eyes from this stage of my life: I’m a 42-year-old divorced mom of three, an SLP who is very comfortable in her career, and a woman who can both feel and give love to another man.
As a 24-year-old (and for the following few years), I think I was relieved to have someone pay attention to me, someone I could care for, and someone to look at as a partner.
I look back now and see a girl who was scared to be alone, who gave herself to someone who did not value her worth, who stayed with someone who underestimated her ability to be self-sufficient, who lived with someone who chipped away at her confidence and who didn’t defend her when others put her down, and who slept with someone who didn’t look at her contributions to the family as anything other than what she wasn’t able to bring in financially.
I began looking at my life and my failed marriage as something that did nothing other than beat me down and that I let create the worst version of myself. I couldn’t be the person – be the mother – I wanted to be when I felt like I had nothing left.
Divorce is not synonymous with failure. Staying in a marriage that was killing me would have been a failure.
