in the beginning

It is 11:47 pm on a Wednesday. I should be sleeping. Instead, bad choices are being made. Salt and vinegar chips. Vodka cranberry. True crime in the background.

It's been a week... well, a year? To say the least. But more on that later.

I am on an emotional cleanse. You know how sometimes when you get a facial or deep skin treatment, your skin will react and purge and break out and it looks and feels horrible for a few days and you're just like 'omg. wtf did i do?'. But thennnnn, skin cell renewal starts happening, you're glowing, looking refreshed, youthful, cleansed, amazing? you've basically detoxed and let out the impurities and... voila.... you're cleansed and it was all worth it?

Picture that, but with feelings. That's what I'm doing right now. Letting allllll the gross, hard, yucky stuff out on the path to renewal. Granting myself permission to sit in my feelings and experience the full depths of it all.

Release and renew.

I left my ex husband almost 2 years ago after years of deliberating. There's a whole lot of shit to unpack here, but the punchline is.... after 17 years of being in a complete and utter fog and living in a constant state of confusion and self-doubt, I am finally gaining clarity about my ex-husband.

Appears wonderfully put together.... a great catch even? Fit. A great dad. Smart. Successful. Charming. Engaged in household chores & sharing in the mental load. Six figure earner. Not a single metaphorical hair out of place. Like, is this man even real?

This pimple-picking, reality-tv watching, yoga-pant-mismatched-sock-wearing, dry-shampoo-addicted, mom-bun rocking, always-looking-for-some-shit-she-just lost momma looked a hot mess in comparison. (Don't get it twisted: I'm smart, accomplished, and pretty badass).

For the distant observer, he seemed a wonderful husband and we were a power couple. The perfect little family. (Spoiler alert: he's a real dick).

But as I reflect on a very long period of my life, I realize that, while there were moments of happiness, there was a great deal of gaslighting, stonewalling, punishment via emotional withdrawal, manipulation, passive aggressive behavior, lack of emotional accountability, loneliness, and dealing with someone who subtly and casually belittled me and dismissed my feelings and reality...... Ohhhhh he was so f'ing masterful at this... he did (does) this in a way where it seemed like he was just calmly speaking words that I.... true lunatic that he wanted me to believe i was... was just "overreacting" to. Because, you know, I was "too sensitive" and "made of glass", or as he would often later say about his nonstop demeaning digs, he "never said that."

Like I said, a lot to unpack.

Fast forward to my chip-binging-vodka-drinking-true-crime-viewing evening.

A few weeks ago, the instagram algorithm figured out that it is time for me to make sense of that long stretch of my life -- that bitch knows everything -- or at the very least, figure out how to effectively deal with this man as a coparent. And she has been feeding me tons of content about covert narcissists.

My mind is fucking blown.

Because finally it all is starting to make sense.... his behavior then, his antics now.

I'm hooked. I've been guzzling as much info as IG will give me and, when it's not enough, I've been turning to podcasts, books, websites, and anything else i can sink my teeth into that will fuel me with validation, explanations, understanding and a deeply, deeply painful clarity...

like scenes flashing at the end of a movie when the plot twist is revealed and the viewer is finally able to connect the dots and make sense of what she's been watching... or, in my case, living.

full of emotional ups and downs is an understatement. and let me tell ya, this is not my first ride on the late night chips & vodka train. (previous trips came with a side of gummy worms.)

this is a story about discovery. the sadness that comes with understanding what you just lived and left behind. the promise of new beginnings and the exhaustion of looking up at the steep mountain ahead. the reality of new challenges and never-to-be-met fantasies about what coparenting would be.

this is a story about self-love and self-forgiveness. Of acceptance and anger and healing.

Of a woman navigating the duality of being a whole person deserving of peace and happiness and a mom who loves her sweet, sweet girls in a way she is not talented enough to describe.

Of releasing the toxins. The uncomfortable, ugly phase. and the glow in motion beneath it all.