Don't let the hard days win (and an update from me!)

I am so sorry, this got realllly long. I haven’t updated in a while, so I thought I would share a bit of what has been going on in my world.


Thursday morning, an ad for an engraved bracelet appeared on my Facebook feed that said, “Don’t let the hard days win.” It really spoke to me because I have been in one of those down-in-the-dump places I sometimes have a hard time finding my way out of, and I bought a similar one I found on Etsy that I liked better.


That phrase stuck with me all day.


The past few weeks, it’s been impossibly challenging for me to keep the positive, hope-filled attitude I try to have. I know it’s okay to have bad days, but if I give in to them too often, it tends to lead me to a downward spiral I have a hard time coming back from.


Sometimes when this happens, I don’t have a real reason for it. But this time, I did. It started a couple of weeks ago when I had a conversation with someone I was once close to who told me that “people shouldn’t have to focus on your divorce.” I was devastated and felt as if I had been punched in the gut and kicked in the shins at the same time. What made it even worse is that the person who said it to me is someone I haven’t talked about my divorce with in well over a year. So often over the past three years, I have worried that I and my divorce will eventually be too much for people. Because of this, I have tried to NOT make anyone focus on my divorce too much, not even my closest friends. The person who said this to me literally never asks me how I am doing or how the divorce is going, even when I see her in person. In fact, she mostly ignores me.


Around the same time as I was told people shouldn’t have to focus on my divorce, I found out STBX was in Tokyo running the Tokyo marathon. I found myself feeling so down and angry and frustrated. A few days later while using the printer in his home office, I accidentally discovered a shirt on his desk that said Antarctica Marathon on it. After some googling, I found that it is a super expensive, 2 week experience, with participants taking a cruise ship from Chile to Antarctica. The packages start at $8,300 and go up to $15,900 per person, depending on the suite you choose for the ship. In addition to that, there is a 4-day optional trip to Buenos Aires before the trip to Antarctica. That part of the trip is $500 a person plus an additional $149 a day, plus airfare, food, and excursions. At first, I thought maybe he just registered for the marathon to get the shirt because he has done that in the past, but at the same time I found the shirt, I found a letter welcoming him to something called the 7 Continent Club. Also, I’m sure it’s not a coincidence that he left on the 14th, telling me he was going to another state for work when the Buenos Aires part of the trip began on the 15th. He left saying he would be gone for 2 weeks. Surprise surprise, the whole Antarctica trip, including the part to Buenos Aires, is 14 days.


When I filed for divorce, my attorney told me that neither party can have any big expenditures once it’s filed; I’m starting to feel like the judge doesn’t really give a shit about the money he is spending while I worry every single day about money. I always tell my attorney when I discover these big trips (she told me to), and I know that more than once, she has shared them with the judge because I have seen it mentioned in some of her motions. Meanwhile, he is court ordered to deposit temporary alimony to me on the first of each month, enough to cover some of my expenses as well as our mortgage, which is automatically withdrawn on the 8th. He hasn’t once put it in on the first. Usually, it’s the 7th. Last month, he did it on the 5th, sitting in the courtroom while our attorneys met with the judge! This month it was on the 8th.

UGH. I am feeling very defeated, and I don’t understand WHY he keeps getting away with this shit, and I have been so, so SOOOOO down in the dumps. The past two weeks have been some of the worst I have had yet. Just in the past year, in addition to all the “little” runs he does around the country every weekend, he has done marathons in Hawaii, Alaska, New Zealand, Australia, London, Berlin, Philippines, Tokyo, and now Antarctica. Even one of those trips for most people is a once-in-a-lifetime trip, and he has done all of them in YEAR.


So back to Thursday and the bracelet I bought. LOL This long, pitiful story will get better. LOL 

That thought about not letting the hard days win stayed with me because in many ways, I HAVE been letting the bad days win. Most days, I feel hopeful that this is alllll going to end up biting him in the a$$ in the end, but other times, like the past few weeks, I struggle to believe that and am sure I am going to get royally screwed out of anything.

On Thursday, we had a crazy morning of storms and an even wilder afternoon and evening of bad storms and more than once that day, I headed to the basement because the tornado sirens went off. When all was finally clear, I spent the evening making myself a chicken mushroom pot pie and listening to a new music group I recently discovered that is calming and soothing and just lovely. (Paper Kites) In the midst of that, I happened to look out my front window and saw the most spectacular sunset. The rain had stopped, and even the wet street was glowing. I grabbed my phone, a glass of wine and sat on the wet porch step just staring at it for the longest time. Of course, I had to take some pics! LOL



I made this pic the background on my phone because it makes me think of an awful day during an awful time when I decided to not let the hard day win. A day when I made myself a delicious dinner (I rarely even cook anymore and often eat a bowl of popcorn for dinner), when I enjoyed a good glass of wine, when I listened to lovely music and sat on my wet porch staring at the sunset after a stormy day. A day when doing all of that soothed my soul in every way it needed to be soothed. That sunset will remind me that even the stormiest times do end and what comes after can be beautiful and healing.


Now, who wants to tell me what they do on hard days to not let the hard days win?


Oh, and here is a photo of that amazing stormy sunset.