When we left the house, our eyes were puffy and red from crying so much, but I still owed my daughter a trip to the boardwalk.  We put on our shades (to block out the haters) and drove to the boards. 

We ate the biggest, most delicious slices of pizza I’ve ever consumed.  Walked around for a little and bought a few small things, but it was so loud and bright and happy. 

My daughter took my hand and said, “Can we just go home, mommy?” We tried.

Once we got home, we were exhausted.  We laid in my bed together and stared at the ceiling the way I did when Betsy died.  We talked a bit and processed a lot. 

That night, somehow, I had the best sleep I’d had in months.

When I awoke the following morning, I was overcome by dread at the thought of everything I’d have to face, my brother and my breakup…but then something happened.  I heard the voice of Eckhart Tolle in my head, “Accept it as if you had chosen it yourself.” 

And just like that I did.

Miracle:  A shift in perception from false to true; an unconditional, instantaneous, and free deliverance from the imprisoning (yet illusory) problems of this world (A Course in Miracles).

It was the first time in my life that I can identify accepting acceptance.  The pain in my womb I had been carrying for weeks, left me, and peace, came.  Thank you so much.

My love told me several times that he would pray to his grandmothers to help him with our relationship.  I never met them, and I never told him this, but I would pray to them too. 

One of them had a connection to lions and reminded him of me and my connection to lions (I was born under a Leo sun). She was betrayed and left to live out the rest of her life all alone.  As was also the case with the great-grandmother. 

Maybe this is their way of helping. It would not ever be in my highest good to stay with “him,” nor would it be in his to behave in ways that harm himself and others.  Being separated from a great love is agonizing enough to drive one to change.  We can only run for so long.  For better or for worse, nobody ever gets away with anything.  Not really.

I had a dream of him early on.  It took place in the middle of the woods in a beautifully prolific setting.  Except we were standing on the rubble of a stone house that had fallen. There were two large dogs.  One of pure white.  One of pure black.  Lucidly, I recognized them as the dogs that he used to tell me about from his dreams.  He was upset and begging for a chance to talk to me.  I forget exactly what I said, but it was something like, “You really fucked up this time.  I don’t want to hear anything you have to say.  Get help.”

I heard from “him” within a few weeks post-breakup asking about picking up his things.  I gathered every last thing in my house that ever had him on it (clothes, stuffed animals, mementos, letters, even things I had kept other times we had broken up) and set them on my front porch.  Later he texted, “Thank you.”  I didn’t respond and that’s the last I’ve heard from him.

I didn’t look back for a long time.  I had bigger fish to fry.  When he would come to me in dreams, he was just there in the background.  I would be with his children, or his mother and he’d just be there.  We would never speak.  We would never interact.

(Recently I had a dream where it was just the two of us.  We didn’t talk, but we were quietly working on something together.  It was the real, real him…I could feel how much he loved me.  I woke up feeling emotional, but lighter.  Like everything that was in between us was gone again.)

Love was pulling me in a different direction, so I followed…

I soon heard from my brother and decided that so long as he was trying, I was trying.  He was devastated and profoundly shamed.  He eventually explained that him and his wife decided to call out of work for the next day, take drugs and have a ‘night of truth’ where she would tell all. 

It’s like a bad joke, “What do you get when you mix betrayal with drugs and a lifetime of unexamined darkness?”

He was so out of his mind that he didn’t know what happened.  When he woke up and found her, he assumed that he did it.  The police had their theory and it made sense, so he went with it.  It turned out, however, that what they believed happened was disproven by the autopsy report.  The case will likely go to trial and the fate of my brother’s life will be in the hands of perfect strangers…

“From a window in my cell, I can see only rooftops, but hope is found on the horizon in a cross atop a steeple…God loves to use broken people.  He does not judge as the world does.  He knows the heart.  A father to the fatherless, the only one I’ve ever known.

I guard my heart, my testimony, and my tongue, that in me others may see light in their own darkness.  I know I am where I need to be.  My spirit crushed so that I may let go of my great pride. 

The world tells me I’m unwanted, lowly, and despised.  I’m thought so dangerous that I’m kept in isolation. I control only my own perspective. 

I can’t change the past, but I can do the best I can with what I have now.  So, either free or bound, let me not lose sight of that,” (excerpt from an article written by my brother).

For the first time in his life, he has been able to finally begin talking about the nightmares he suffered growing up.  Every kind of abuse endured, inflicted by those who were ‘supposed’ to love him, nurture him, teach him.  

Much like nobody gets to the top by themselves, no one gets to the bottom that way either.

All these people hurt from one act?  No.  It was many acts leading to one moment where there was no turning back.  Many acts, many bloody hands.

Of all the sad stories I’ve heard in over 21 years of continuous sobriety, his (and hers) are the saddest.  To the dismay of some, I find my resolve to love him even stronger.  I am no less for doing so.  I cannot fathom a human being leaving this earth not ever knowing what unconditional love feels like.  I will love him even if I stand alone. 

For my part in it all, when the time comes, I will tell the exact truth according to my experience.  I will hold onto faith and continue to trust that the right thing happens.  Whatever that may be.

In contrast to My Love, I feel deeply destined and personally responsible for collapsing the cycles in my family, in humanity…these horrendous, horrifying chains. 

Finally, I understood why I had to write this.

What kind of world is this where true love dies and indifference thrives?  A very, very lost one… 

It’s up to me to not let that be my story.  I came here for a love story; I’m going to have a love story.  Maybe it won’t look the way “I” thought it would, but it will be, and it is already.

A while back, I told a friend how much I missed Betsy and how hard it is to find people like her in this world.  He said, “Maybe that means you’re supposed to be that for others.”  Ohhh…I see.

“Make me an instrument of your peace.  Where there is hatred, let me sow love.  Where there is injury, pardon.  Where there is doubt, faith.  Where there is despair, hope.  Where there is darkness, light.  And where there is sadness, joy.

Grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console.  To be understood as to understand.  To be loved as to love.  For it is in the giving that we receive.  It is in the pardoning that we are pardoned.  It is in the dying that we are born,” (Prayer of St. Francis).

The answer we’re looking for is found in the place we least want to look.  They are in Beowulf’s Grendel.  They are the dragon lurking deep in our own caves needing to be slayed.

I know it feels scary, but it’s going be ok (I promise).  More than ok.  Hold onto hope and don’t let go. No matter what happens, don’t let go. If you’re having a hard time finding it, believe in the hope that I have for you (and I truly do).  As they say, with hope you are never anyone’s prisoner.

I can slay only my own dragon, but I can walk with you. We can walk together.  I can give you the secrets that I’ve learned thus far. Hopefully others will give us theirs too (please do).

“No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others,” Alcoholics Anonymous.

There’s a better way. And like my friend, Old Man George (RIP), used to say, “As long as there’s a pulse, there’s a chance.” It’s never too late (or too early).

Come…let’s spill the real tea. Tell your friends 🙂

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