I’ve struggled with this one. Both in committing the words to paper, and in pondering whether to even publish them at all. I only decided on the latter recently because I will this Sunday be one year past signing papers that free-fall gave me back to myself, at a very heavy cost.
This note serves both as a capstone to my final stage of grief as well as a promise to those of you going down a similar road, that it does end. And you can in fact not only survive, but grow from the experience.
As always, I hope you enjoy…
To date I’ve learned to let go of:
Your allegiance towards your tribe over me,
And my understanding of what family truly is.
Your manipulation of my life towards meeting your individual goals,
And my complicity in this to ensure your happiness.
Your disregard over my own goals while doing so,
And my disregard of same.
Your infidelity,
And my courting temptation also to fill the hole you left.
Your persistent denial of,
And my surrogate guilt over, your perfidy.
Your continued attempts manipulating me and the circumstances, well after you’d no more use for either,
And my sense of injustice over witnessing it.
Your deception in purging me from your family and our friends once you’d wrung me dry,
And my understanding of what allegiance truly is.
Your eventual success in doing just that, even with my very own children.
All in the same fashion, one at time, over the course of time. Taking your time. Much like a form of water torture wherein the victim loves the water more than oneself.
Your every effort in having me erase my own life,
And my willingness to do so.
Your total and complete denial over all of the above,
And your narcissistic lack of regard for me throughout.
You early on joked that we’d never divorce, as you would kill me first instead. I now realize just how serious your intent was on the latter part of this jest.
I didn’t die though.
I’m still here.
And since I am, the last thing I need to let go of, the very last item I will lose through this useless and hate-filled rape of my proffered love and trust, is my anger towards you.
As such, and whilst I’ll most likely need to remind myself manifold times over the next few months (years, decades, whatever), you are forgiven.
You are forgiven.
Find peace. Get well. Treat your next love like they matter. Treat your next love better.
Or don’t. Ultimately it’s your choice alone, for it is no longer any concern of mine.
I’m still here.
And here, me I’ve freed.
as long as i'm singing 