“Tell me about your mom, I’d love to hear all about her. I will sit right here with you. I understand you are hiding behind that smile. You miss them so much. It’s hard to breathe. Your heart feels like it could actually burst at the seams.”
‘Can we talk?’ I want to give you a big hug. I’m a motherless daughter, too.’: Woman says she’s ‘here for you’ through heavy grief, ‘I will understand your silence’
‘Where do I go?’ His voice cracked. My ex-husband slept on my couch, I’d lock my bedroom door and leave.’: Mom recalls ‘awkward’ co-parenting while her ex-husband slept on her couch after marriage split
“‘I don’t want to keep doing this. I can’t.’ I was sitting on the floor of our dream home. ‘What?’ His voice cracked. I could hear the pain and disbelief. ‘Is this really happening?’ I knew in my gut I wouldn’t recover in this marriage. I needed space. I needed to find out if I could survive this hidden trauma. I’d been lying to the world, but worse, I’d been lying to myself. I hated sharing my new home.”
‘You’ve been lying to me.’ My frantic husband was pacing the room. ‘What’s really going on?’ Tell the truth.’: Wife admits her own infidelity, promises your marriage is ‘worth fighting for,’ says ‘you can gain trust again’
“My phone was in his hand. I was half asleep. He’d found a thread of messages to a friend of mine. I’d been telling her I felt like the other guy was the one for me. Not my husband. As you can imagine, he was blindsided. ‘Tell me what happened,’ he kept repeating. Tears streamed down my face. If I said it, then that made it more real.”
‘I’m done talking. I’m turning off my phone for a few days. Bye.’ Josh had broken the covenant. I would wait it out.’: Wife says she and husband are ‘closer than we’ve ever been’ after his infidelity
“My husband was supposed to be home after work and he was late. I called a few times. No answer. He finally called back and in the most emotionless voice said, ‘Ashley, we have to be done.’ ‘What?’…shocked. He said it again. I yelled, ‘What? Whyyy?!’ He was leaving to be with someone else.”
‘My wife must regret spending her life with me. If she met someone different, she’d have perfectly healthy children,’ I told myself. ‘He is one of 34 people known to have this.’ My heart sank. ‘What? In the country?’ ‘No, in the world.’
“I remember thinking, ‘Maybe we just aren’t the best of parents.’ Little did I know my wife was secretly researching and had discovered a condition. One day, she showed me a video. My heart sunk. I felt dizzy. Straight away, I knew this was what our boy had.”
‘One boy said, ‘Why is she even in here? She’s f—king crippled!’ I ignored it, but it would get worse. My mom and I got into a huge argument. She stopped, and looked at me in shock.’
“One day someone came to talk to me at lunch. I thought, ‘Finally someone wants to be my friend!’ Instead, they cut me off by saying, ‘If I was you I would kill myself because I couldn’t live like that.'”
‘He’d been having an affair. Not only that, but he ‘loved’ this other woman. My husband was my rock.’: Woman overcomes affair to have ‘miracle’ baby
“My husband had a vasectomy and we paid an absurd amount of money to get it reversed. He ‘loved’ this other woman and didn’t think he and I should stay together. We were approached about a pregnant woman looking for an adoptive family for her baby. It took several days of hard prayer, but he agreed to not see this other woman while we went through counseling.”
‘I want to be a good mom. Why won’t he let me be one?’ I sat in the chair and cried. I sought a counselor’s advice on what I was doing wrong. I was so tired of fighting.’
“I’ll say, ‘don’t do that again.’ He’ll look me square in the eyes, and do it again. And again. And again. I must be royally screwing everything up.”
‘He works midnights. I woke to him singing our baby to sleep. Ladies, there are amazing men in this world.’: After spending 12 years with man she ‘never should’ve married,’ woman finds partner who ‘respects’ her
“I spent nearly 12 years with a man I never should’ve married. He never touched me. We fought about my weight. I was immune to anything but pain. And then I met Adam. He came home at 8 a.m., kissed my pregnant belly and got our baby girl up so I could sleep a bit longer. I woke up to a homemade omelet. The greatest gift in the world is having a true partner by your side.”
‘Nobody thought I had a problem, I was just the life of the party. I was reaching out for help, but doctors didn’t believe me. I was even suicidal on my wedding day.’
“I knew something was terribly wrong. I was in law school about to collapse on the floor of my dorm room when I realized my life would never be the same again. It was like an all-night-long strobe light party in my brain.”
