Divorce parties are a relatively new way to say goodbye to an old dead marriage. People are starting to realize that bad marriages don’t get better by staying in them. Torturing yourself with a life sentence of guilt and bondage to a man who is not good to you, or for you, is not the way to make everything that went wrong, right again.
Even in the middle of a bad relationship, leaving is not easy, but once you finally do it, you wonder what took you so long.
Once you can see the bad relationship you left behind far enough back in your rear view mirror that you to feel comfortable again, you could be faced with some doubts that you never expected. The doubts are brought on by the news that your ex is in a new relationship. Your first instinct will be to ignore it and get on with your life, because even though the news rocked you off your guard, the fact is, you really are completely over it.
Still, as over it as you are, for the next few weeks you experience what feels like regret. And as many times as you gather your facts together on the why and how of your love’s demise, you still find yourself going over your decision to leave again and again, like playing the repeat feature on a song you used to love. After a while it becomes like a broken record, skipping in every place that you recognize as how badly things were going, and would have turned out had you stayed.
The places that your relationship were broken are places that you are happy to be free from. You know this with all of your heart. If you are satisfied with your decision to leave and know it was for the best, your lingering doubts will subside and eventually go away to leave you to enjoy the rest of your life.
But what may not leave you as quickly is how you feel about the new woman in his life, and knowing that she is putting everything she has into what she thinks she has to look forward to. With all the hopes and dreams of what could be; forging ahead with the absolute belief that she has found her mister right. And feeling like the luckiest girl in the world to have found such a catch. You even imagine that she tells him that she can’t believe you were stupid enough to let him go, but she is glad you were. All the same things you once said to him. Thinking about this may even make you feel a little guilty because you know that in all the time you have known him, he has remained the same. Unyielding in his opinion of himself and his behavior, she is headed down the same road that you have traveled. And you can’t help but feel bad for her.
You feel bad for her until she lets him turn her against you like an unknown enemy; just to make himself look good. He makes her believe that everything that went wrong was your fault, and she clings to it like catnip. All of a sudden you are free again from that life, and you can’t wait for her to get exactly what she wants; all of him all to herself.