I’ve poured out a lot of essays on the pages of Substack. Mostly, they were about happy times and treasured memories. But lately, my life has taken a bit of a turn. I’m so grateful that my children and grandchildren are fine, and that my own health is good, but over the years, things have happened that make it impossible for me to ignore that my marriage is a sham. The man I’ve been living with is not the man I married. So many lies over so many years, and I just can’t do this anymore. My trust in him has been obliterated.

So, he’s moving out, and another new chapter of my life is about to begin. I’m a strange mixture of sad and excited - looking forward to freedom and relative ease, but I can’t deny that it’s heart-wrenching to realize that something that I thought was so good was simply…not.

I’ve been writing a lot, but these new essays aren’t in the same tone as the ones in the past. In these essays, I’ve opened a vein and let all the pain and anger travel from head and heart, to pen, to paper. This is a new (and not so welcome) journey for me, but if I write it out, I can work it out. My fervent hope is that my experience can help someone else going through a tough time know that they’re not alone, that things DO get better.