"Who Was That Mask Stranger"
by Morning Star
I spent twenty-two years with a man who i thought that i knew, we shared our lives together, how could I have not known him? When my masked stranger started to become emotionally detached I had thought he's overworked tired or depressed? Something was different about this, it was difficult for me to wrap my mind around it! What is this, I thought? Why is he acting so indifferent? Little did I know what was about to become would be one of the most difficult heart wrenching journeys that my son and I would ever take together. As anyone who has ever experienced heartbreak before knows; in heartbreak, sometimes a stranger of divorce comes to visit and never leaves, the aftermath of divorce sometimes takes a very long time. Everyone I had tried to talk to about it was either uncomfortable or started to avoid me as if I had a disease. There were well meaning friends family members who would say, you're better off, be glad he's gone. Another one was "you need to forgive" or another Just get over it! Move On! Let Go? Let God! Or You're going to be stronger because of this, just watch and see! Or you should write a book! I had gone to a Grief and Lost therapist that felt that I had wanted my stranger to validate me. I stopped going to her after that because I knew she had added more guilt, shame and grief to an already full bag! My masked stranger not only lied to me and had an affair with a younger woman, i later had found out that he wasn't the person who i had thought he was at all. Who was this masked stranger? To this day, i don't know who he is, or if he ever was the man that i once fell in love with. I actually started to feel symptoms of grief before my masked stranger left my home on June 23, 2009. Little did i know that he had me served with a quickie divorce so he could go ahead and marry a much younger woman he had met on an internet dating service. I had felt something wrong in our relationship a few years before our actual divorce. We had a son together who's now 19 years old and in college. My son chose to live with me and hasn't wanted any contact with his father. We not only went through a horrible divorce we all suffered from the illusion of who was this man, and how could he up and leave like that after 22 years of marriage? He did and he could because he was running away from himself and trying to re-create himself, his life. A few months after the divorce my son and i suffered from betrayal, abandonment, lies, deception in not knowing who the masked stranger really was, who was he? To this day i wonder do you think about us? Do you realize what you've caused to our family? All the devastation? Do you remember us? Or are you so caught up in the excitement of being with your new young bride that nothing else matters to you? My masked stranger is or was, which ever comes first, a christian man. We attended church together as a family for over 14 years; same church, went out to our favorite restaurant, this was our life, this was i knew to be our life! Who could of ever prepared my son and i for something like this? My son and i were numb at first, we were blindsided, jarred as if we both had been hit by a huge Mack truck! Later i had found out that my masked stranger had been seeing this person for awhile, people had seen them both together a month after our divorce. Adultery i thought, is'nt this adultery? If you're a christian man would this not be considered adultery? My son named it and said "Dad you have always talked against this stuff!" Adultery!" All his father could say was that he had endured an unhappy marriage for years and that after praying and waiting, God had answered his prayers. Shortly after that conversation my son made the decision to detach from his father without any contact. His father would constantly call my son on his cell leaving messages saying things like, "Why are you not wanting to see me?" Four months ago the stranger who left our lives showed up at our family church of 14 years. He walked into the front door alone then he walked up to the balcony to meet this other women. My son and i faced another betrayal and violation. How could this man come into our sacred place of worship and dishonor it like this? How could he repeatedly disrespect us and hurt my son over and over again? He could and he did because he was never who he appeared to be; he was a stranger who once said that he would never leave nor forsake us! Three weeks ago our financial adviser calls me up to tell me that the stranger appeared at her office. She was in shock to say the least! She had full knowledge of his affair plus she had full knowledge that he had abandoned my son and i for another women. She told me that she was not only shocked but shocked that he had already married this person. I had thought after the shock of his leaving, the shock of his affair, now here is another mountain to climb, grief all over again. This time we have began to put closure on the tragedy! My son and i packed up everything that we could find that had any memories of what once was, and boxed them all to mail to his father. We had old pictures, pictures of his mother & father, old birthday cards that my son had once made saying what a great father he had. This i know was difficult for my son, although he appears to be handling it much easier then me. My son told me one day that he didn't know when it had started but he had started to gradually detach from his father. Another shock! I had recently found out that my stranger had been on pornography for at least four years. Somewhere that's against Christianity! He denied it and said that he had repented to God, and now he and his new bride are saving souls! My son and i have had to begin somehow to put closure on all of it. I write and my son does art work. We both have taken up an interest in oldies but goodies music and of course our christian music which is very healing for both of us!
|
|
