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We went into the magistrate's office at 11 and I was driving away at 11:22. Our marriage was short and I just wanted it over. I asked for nothing. I acted with class and grace and will gladly pay for any assessed cists. I will consider it money well spent for a lesson I needed to learn. My husband made only one hurtful comment. I think I got off fairly easy.

I am glad it was over quickly, Seriously, and that you do not have to get dragged through a long-drawn out court battle.

What are your plans for you, now that this is over? Where do you think you are in your healing process?

I would say I am ping ponging between depression and acceptance. Anger will probably show up again, too, but I am pretty done with bargaining and denial. Last night I was watching a TV show and I started sobbing because I thought about how he and I had planned to do something similar to what was going on in the episode.  When the sadness comes, it is overwhelming.  I know in my head it is over. My heart is broken though. I loved him and really thought he was going to be it for me. This is by far the most devastating thing that has ever happened. It is so weird because I have been through a lot in my life. I wouldn't have thought this would break me. I am working on self-inventory and trying to find my respect for myself again. I feel like I let myself down. Even though I am learning so much, I wish I had never had to go through this. I loved him so much.

Ping-ponging is a good way to describe it.

It's strange to say this, but for me, I almost miss being able to feel the intensity. It has been over 4 years since I left, over 2 years since I felt completely detached from him. In that time I met someone else, and court terminated visitation. My ex is no longer in my life at all, nor in my son's life.

And yet that period when everything felt so intensely, it was a lot of growth. It never occurred to me at the time that a window of such intense emotion would close. Grieving the relationship caused other wounds to open us, most of all the men in my life (uBPD brother and a narcissistic father). All that grief seemed to be seated in the same place. Are you find that the grief is connected to other sources of pain?

I wonder if we able to lay these emotions to rest, if we are willing to go through the process of grieving, fully and completely.

It is devastating to go through these relationships. Mine shattered me. I think he represented the type of love I wanted to be able to give myself. That kind of love was not available in childhood, and it took a BPD marriage and divorce to learn how to give myself what I desperately wanted my ex to provide for me. If that makes sense.

Somehow we can come through these experiences.

I'm glad you're doing the self-inventory work.  It really does help.

LnL